Rainbow Six: Siege’s editions are getting updated for Year 3

Ubisoft is making some big changes to the way fans buy Rainbow Six: Siege, and what it means for their in-game unlocks.

Right now, Siege has five different versions that players can buy that all offer slightly different amounts of content unlocked from the start. The rest of the game’s content is available to all players via Siege’s in-game currency, called Renown, which can be earned by playing matches.

Starting on March 6, the first day of Siege’s Year Three content, players who buy, or already own, one of four editions — Standard, Advanced, Gold or Complete — will have the Renown cost of the game’s original 20 operators removed completely, making them free for players to use as soon as they start the game. The game’s DLC characters from the Year One and Year Two content will still cost Renown.

Along the same lines, all weapon attachments for every operator in the game will now be free and unlocked for all players.

While all this free content may sound like a good deal, it has a few players understandably upset about the time they’ve already put into the game. According to Ubisoft’s announcement, “Unfortunately, due to a technical limitation, we will not be able to issue refunds for players that have already acquired these Operators, or attachments.” Many players are left feeling frustrated by the hundreds of hours worth of invested Renown that now feels meaningless and won’t be refunded.

For players who own the game’s other edition, called the Starter Edition, things don’t look much better. Players who purchase the Starter Edition after March 6, will be given six operators at random — from a list of 12 — that will be unlocked as soon as they launch the game. Purchasing these characters with Renown would take at least 50 hours of play. Unfortunately, it would appear that these unlocks don’t extend to the players that have already purchased the Starter Edition.

Even more frustrating for Starter Edition players, there’s no way to upgrade their game to another edition, an issue that Ubisoft has not addressed despite frequent player complaints.

All of these changes to Rainbow Six: Siege’s different editions will go live with the start of the game’s Year Three content, which begins with Operation Chimera, on March 6.