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Ubisoft confirmed that Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege will be coming to the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X as soon as launch, and will include cross-generation play (via Engadget).
In an interview with Windows Central, director Leroy Athanassof broke the news. Hundreds of developers comprise its Rainbow Six Siege team, and they are focused on optimising the game for the next generation of gaming. As a result, the game will be available when the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X debut in the latter half of this year, though Ubisoft is unable to say when that would be. “Why I can’t give you a date is because those dates are, in the end, on the people doing the next-gen consoles,” explained Athanassof. “What I can tell you is that we are going to be on [the consoles] from launch. When they will release the consoles; but it’s up to them to agree that. For Siege, our target is to be available right at launch.”
Moreover, the game will feature cross-generation play between the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 and between the Xbox One and the Xbox Series X. “We don't want to break our community. So, we want people who buy the new system right away to play it with their friends,” stated Athanassof, but clarified that cross-platform play is a work in progress. “This is more a discussion between Microsoft and Sony. We would love to be fully cross-play—have Xbox players matchmaking against the PlayStation players. We are ready to support that. And hopefully, this will happen because as I said, it’s a general move in the industry, and there is nothing that can prevent that. It’s just a matter of time before it happens.”
PC players aren’t counted in this, though. “I don’t think there will ever be console cross-play with PC,” said Athanassof. The move to make Rainbow Six Siege available on the next generation of hardware may tide players over til they get their mitts on Rainbow Six Quarantine. That game was meant for a Q1 2020 launch, but slid to the winter of 2020, due to the poor performance of The Division 2. Ubisoft is reportedly reconsidering its plan of action for developing new games, and might have binned an entire game because it didn’t deliver on its new objectives.
