Rainbow Six Siege closed alpha begins today, here’s what’s included

As you may be aware, closed alpha for Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege begins today, giving not only those who have been accepted a chance to preview the game, but also provide value feedback to the dev team.

“The overall player experience is a big focus for the dev team,” said Gameplay Designer Andrew Witts. “Level design, player navigation, readability and input are our primary focus. The game really shines when a player gets his hands on the controller and goes into a match.”

As part of a post to clarify what Rainbow Six Siege's closed alpha will offer players, Ubisoft explained that some things in the environment may seem unfinished. "That’s because the team at Ubisoft Montreal is working hard to put the siege gameplay and innovative destruction technology first for players to get a good sense of how the game will feel and play," the developer said.

“With the game being all about indoor close quarter combat, we are making sure that 60 FPS and low latency are mandatory so that player’s input is fast and responsive,” assured Witts.

As for what's included in the closed alpha, players will get to play on the House map that first premiered at E3 2014, as well as a brand new Plane map — "a huge three-level monstrosity laden with trap doors and lethal choke points."

“We were inspired by previous Rainbow games in terms of settings for some of the maps,” explained Witts. “The plane was one of them, and it was a test. We really just wanted to try it. When we were developing it, it was kind of what we call an “edge case,” which is meant to stress our systems and gameplay in terms of size and in terms of choke points and things like that.”

“Our level design team is no joke. They made an awesome prototype and it was very fun. We thought it was just too awesome to not show and let people play, especially since we ourselves considered it to almost be the map that shouldn’t work. This is a map that, on paper, should not work, but it does and it’s incredibly fun.”

Of course, all 10 of the recently revealed Operators will also be playable.

The closed alpha for Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege has already begun and is scheduled to run through April 13, 10:00am ET. If you weren't accepted into the closed alpha, you can still head over to the main website and sign up to be placed on the waiting list for the console and PC beta coming later this year. Of course, if you already know you want the game you can just pre-order it for automatic entry into the upcoming beta.