Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six

Rainbow Six  

Book cover
Author(s) Tom Clancy
Country United States
Language English
Series Jack Ryan universe
Genre(s) Novel, thriller
Publisher Putnam
Publication date 1998 (1st edition)
Media type Print
ISBN 0-3991-4390-4
OCLC Number 39069409
Dewey Decimal 813/.54 21
LC Classification PS3553.L245 R35 1998
Preceded by Executive Orders
Followed by The Bear and the Dragon

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six is a media franchise created by American author Tom Clancy about a fictional international counter-terrorist unit called "Rainbow." The franchise began with Clancy's novel Rainbow Six, which was adapted into a successful series of tactical first-person shooter video games.

Contents

Team Rainbow

The novel Rainbow Six describes Rainbow as an international counter-terrorism operation hosted by NATO and funded by money funneled through the U.S. Department of the Interior.

The base of operations for Rainbow is located in Hereford, England (at the time, home to the SAS), due to the United Kingdom being one of the most accessible countries in the world, having the world's foremost Special Forces unit, and also due to the press constraints that would not be possible to impose in the United States. Most of the characters in Rainbow are American or British, however, the NATO countries of France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Canada plus Israel have at least one representative each.

Clancy describes the structure of Rainbow as having one Director, who oversees the entire operation, and one Deputy Director, who is second in command. Rainbow is portrayed as the "blackest of black" operations, and it works off of its very own intelligence service which has intelligence contacts all over the world. In the book, when Rainbow is called upon for help from another country's government to deal with a terrorist situation, usually only one of the two teams will be sent, but in some situations both will be sent. Both teams have an officer (O-4 or equivalent) as team leader and a senior NCO (E-9 or equivalent) as second in command. Not including the team leader, each team is made up of eleven men. Rainbow also has a standard-issue weapons kit. In Rainbow Six it consists of a Beretta 8045 Cougar semi-automatic pistol (referred to as a "Beretta .45 automatic") and a suppressed Heckler & Koch MP5/10 submachine gun (mislabeled as MP-10) for each soldier, with an M60 general purpose machine gun for each team's support gunner. Each team also has two snipers, each with a custom rifle of their own choosing. In Dead or Alive, Rainbow uses the more conventional Heckler & Koch MP5SD3 submachine gun and Heckler & Koch MK23 semi-automatic pistol, with the Knight's Armanent Company M110 Semi-Automatic Sniper System having replaced Remington M24 Sniper Weapon System. When not using the local police's camouflage they utilize a light blue and/or black pattern, leading to their nickname "Men of Black".

In the video games, Rainbow is portrayed differently. John Clark is still the leader for most of the series, but he is supported by a set of other key staff and advisers who vary from game to game. As of Rogue Spear, there are around 30 Rainbow operatives. This includes members from NATO countries and from non-NATO countries, along with six female operatives. For each mission, a maximum eight operatives can be deployed and can be split into a maximum of four teams. Weapons, uniforms and equipment are less standardized, and are instead chosen to suit the operative and the mission, so it is more common to see assault rifles and large-caliber handguns.

Members

The following is a list of all the members of Rainbow:

Director
Deputy Director
Executive Secretaries
Team One
Team Two
Team Two Secretary
Intelligence
Communications
Technical Staff
MH-60K Night Hawk Aircrew
Weapons Trainer

In The Bear and the Dragon, Rainbow makes a return. While their part in the novel at first seems small, they become more involved as the novel progresses.

It is noted that since the events of Rainbow Six, the public has become more aware of the existence of Rainbow, and are often referred to as the "Men of Black", in regards to their uniforms.

It is also said that the teams' roster is constantly changing. Many of the original members of Rainbow have left the team, some later returned, and then a few left again, with new members always being added. Ettore Falcone from the Italian Carabinieri was added to Team One (still under Covington's command) just before the events of The Bear and the Dragon. Lieutenant Colonel Malloy has been promoted to full Colonel and appointed to command Marine One, piloting the President of the United States.

Members within the Video and Computer Game Universe

The following is a list of characters that make up Team Rainbow's roster within the universe of the video and computer games, as of 2010.

Director
Deputy Director
Intelligence
MH-60K Night Hawk Aircrew
Alpha Team
Bravo Team
Other members

Novel

The novel, Rainbow Six, was written by Tom Clancy and published in 1998. The novel focuses on John Clark, Ding Chavez, and a fictional multinational counter-terrorist organization named Rainbow.

Computer and video games

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six/Tom Clancy's Rainbow 6
Genres Tactical shooter
Developers Ubisoft Montreal
Ubisoft Red Storm
Publishers Ubisoft
First release Rainbow Six
May 15, 1998
Latest release Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas 2
March 18, 2008
Official website Official Website

The first game was developed by Red Storm Entertainment, while the novel was being written. The game later spawned a number of sequels and expansion packs. Red Storm was later acquired by Ubisoft, who currently develops and publishes the games. Mobile phone versions of the game are developed and published by Gameloft.

Rainbow Six and its sequels defined the tactical shooter genre, forcing players to focus more time and effort on stealth, teamwork, and tactics rather than on sheer firepower. With some of the more recent releases; however, the game has taken on more of a "mainstream" first-person shooter approach in an attempt to appeal to a wider audience by moving away from the tactical planning aspect that made the game popular in the first place. This is due to several factors, the most prominent being the buy out of Clancy-owned Red Storm Entertainment by Ubisoft Entertainment.

The latest game has changed the series title to Rainbow 6.

PC & Console games

Overview of released games
TITLE Windows release Console versions Mobile versions Comments
Rainbow Six 1998 N64, PSX, 1999; DC, 2000 GBC, 2000
Rainbow Six: Eagle Watch 1999 expansion pack
Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear 1999 DC, 2000; PSX, 2001 GBA, 2002
Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear: Urban Operations 2000 expansion pack
Rainbow Six: Covert Operations Essentials 2000 expansion pack (stand-alone)
Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear: Black Thorn 2001 expansion pack (stand-alone)
Rainbow Six: Lone Wolf PSX, 2002
Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield 2003 Xbox, 2003; PS2, NGC, 2004 Mobile game
Rainbow Six 3: Athena Sword 2004 expansion pack
Rainbow Six 3: Black Arrow Xbox, 2004
Rainbow Six 3: Iron Wrath 2005 expansion pack (downloadable)
Rainbow Six: Lockdown 2005 PS2, Xbox, NGC; 2005
Rainbow Six: Critical Hour Xbox, 2006
Rainbow Six: Vegas 2006 360, 2006; PS3, 2007 PSP, 2007, Mobile game
Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 2008 PS3, 360; 2008
Rainbow Six: Shadow Vanguard iOS, Android; 2011
Rainbow 6: Patriots[1][2] 2013 PS3, 360; 2013

A Korean-only PC game called Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Take-Down – Missions in Korea was created for the South Korean market by KAMA Digital Entertainment. The game boasted South Korean Rainbow operatives and weapons with a different story and interface. As of July 2009, it is not available for purchase outside South Korea.

Film

The current status of the film adaptation of Rainbow Six is still up in the air. Although the novel "Rainbow Six" wasn't written until 1998, two characters from the Rainbow Six franchise did appear in the 1994 movie adaptation of Clear and Present Danger. Willem Dafoe played John Clark and Raymond Cruz portrayed Domingo "Ding" Chavez. Additionally, Liev Schreiber portrayed John Clark in the 2002 movie The Sum of All Fears. In the 1996 novel Executive Orders, the character John Clark sarcastically suggests to a journalist "Get Val Kilmer to play me in the movies" to which the journalist replies "Too pretty, Nick Cage has a better stare."

Connections to other games

The Rainbow Six novels and games take place in the same universe as all the rest of the Tom Clancy games. In addition to Ghost Recon and Third Echelon, former members of Rainbow made an appearance in Tom Clancy's EndWar, comprising some of the European Federation's and Russian Spetznaz troops and commanders.[3]

References

External links