In case you haven't noticed, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege is still going strong on PC. When we say 'strong', mind, we mean strong. The game peaks at over 100,000 concurrent players on Steam alone - daily. That's an incredibly large player base for a game that's now just under five years old. Coincidentally, it's also well in-line with our predictions about the game's future. In fact, Ubisoft has successfully grown the game since. If that's not impressive, we don't know what is!

This article is going to present you with a short overview of what's happened over the course of 2019 in Rainbow Six Siege. We'll also concern ourselves with content that might be coming our way in 2020, which is particularly exciting.

As you may or may not know, Siege's current season of content is called 'Year 4', and it's been ticking along since March 2019. Since then, we got four substantial content packs with a variety of smaller patches and hotfixes being released according to necessities. Operators, weapons, maps - all sorts of goodies. In effect, we've got about one more month of Year 4 to go through before Rainbow Six Siege Year 5 kicks off. And yes, word on the street is that it is coming. Anyhow, that about does it for background info.

Let's get on with it!

How did 2019 treat Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege PC?

According to everything we've seen so far, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege has got an incredible amount of staying power. On average, 2019 player numbers were higher than they had been in 2018, and the concurrent player stats were healthier by a substantial amount, too. Average player count losses came and went, but with almost 100,000 players playing the game at any given moment, there's always a match to join. For a multiplayer game that's a fair few years old, this is an incredible feat. It is, of course, owed to Ubisoft's long-term content strategy. We do reckon a few other things come into play too, but we'll get to that a bit later on.

In more practical terms, Year 4 added a wealth of content. The player count rose and fell in accordance with this! We received eight new Operators, which are the most obvious addition. There were, however, new maps, features, and cosmetics to pick from, too. Here's the hard data!

Operation Burnt Horizon - March 2019

• Gridlock Attacker
• Mozzie Defender
• Outback Map
• Freshman Playlist for new players

Operation Phantom Sight - June 2019

• Nøkk Attacker
• Warden Defender
• Kafe Dostoyevsky Rework
• Reverse Friendly Fire

Operation Ember Rise - September 2019

• Amaru Attacker
• Goyo Defender
• Kanal Rework
• Battle Pass introduction
• Unranked Playlist

Operation Shifting Tides - December 2019

• Kali Attacker
• Wamai Defender
• Theme Park Rework
• Limb Penetration feature

Since each new Operator adds an entirely new layer of strategy to the game, this means Siege has become increasingly complex over the years. That's a given, of course, but it does give us a few ideas on what the future of the game might be like. After all, there are only so many gadgets you can add to a game...

What Rainbow Six Siege Operators might we get in 2020?

The first thing we need to mention is that there's been little official word on this matter as of yet. Ubisoft will slowly begin to unveil Rainbow Six Siege Year 5 over the next month or so, but we believe there may be some changes to the core content release structure coming our way. Namely, we're talking about new Operators. At the time of writing this article (Year 4, Season 4 - Shifting Tides) there are an astonishing 52 Operators available in Siege. Ubisoft sure hasn't been twiddling their thumbs, you see.

What little information we do have on Year 5 says that there will be fewer Operators coming our way. Six of them, more specifically. We believe this is a sign that Ubisoft might be slowing down with Operator releases over the next few years. The more Operators there are, the more layered and complex balancing the game gets, and it can get really messy really fast if the devs aren't on top of things.

To that end, it is our expectation that Ubisoft will, over the course of the next few seasons, at least temporarily conclude the Operator release schedule. It would be far easier to balance new weapons and gadgets, should they opt for something like this, and focusing on all-new maps and levels could go a long way in lengthening the game's shelf life. We've no idea if this is what will happen, mind, but it does like a sensible development in the long run.

According to Ubi themselves, "The Year 5 Pass reflects this direction focused on features that benefit all players, not just those playing the newest Operators. It will lead to additional content for all players, such as free events, extensive reworks, and other core gameplay features." This could easily be an attempt at easing the player base into a different kind of release schedule.

How come Rainbow Six Siege Stats have kept growing?

It is curious, isn't it? Usually, games don't really garner all that much attention following their initial release hype. With Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege PC, the opposite is the case. This is, as we've previously established, the natural and expected effect of quality long-term support. Not only does Ubisoft constantly and consistently push out all-new content, but they also occasionally polish and rework previous stuff. That way, everything is healthy and up-to-par, and the game organically attracts new folks to give it a shot. It's a wonderful system, and if there's ever been a game-as-a-service that definitely works, it's Siege.

Since the game is consistently a high-quality experience that offers an incredible competitive scene, people flock to it. Can't blame 'em! There is something else, though. Something that, perhaps, plays an even more vital role than quality does.

Quite simply, Rainbow Six Siege PC remains an entirely unique experience. We said it about a year back, and we say it again - the game straight-up has no real competition on PC. Some will point to Call of Duty and Counter-Strike in this context, but the games are quite different. Siege is far more granular and technical, especially with its terrain destruction features. Bet Ubisoft is glad they went with this instead of Patriots, huh?

We'll keep up with the news on Siege as it is released, but in the meantime, we'll see you on-site, gun-in-hand. Good luck!