YMMV / Rainbow Six 3

• Complete Monster (PC version):
  • Nikola Gospić, born Dejan Blazevic, is the leader of the People's Social Nationalist Party (PSNP) who seeks to plunge the world into fascism. Previously a high-ranking member of the Nazi-sponsored Ustaše Regime in Croatia during World War II, Blazevic was tasked to liquidate assets from countless Holocaust victims. Escaping to South America after the war, Blazevic changed his name and started a new life as a successful businessman and philanthropist. Seeking to turn the world into a fascist regime after discovering he has liver cancer, Gospić plans to create an economic downturn that will tarnish South America's oil industry and allow him to swoop in with his own oil company and rise to power. Sending out his terrorists to kill anybody who knows of his identity, while also working with politician Alvaro Gutierrez for political protection, Gospić plans to use his meatpacking plants to send out a deadly nerve agent, preparing to kill millions of people to create terror, even attempting to deploy a nerve agent bomb in Rio de Janeiro with the goal of killing thousands.
  • Alvaro Gutierrez, also in Athena Sword, is a far-right politician who works with Gospić to secure funding for his presidential campaign. An accomplice in Gospić's plans to kill millions of people to create a fascist empire, Gutierrez provides Gospić with the VX nerve agent for his plan, and even launches several terrorist attacks to cover his tracks. Despite being arrested by Rainbow Six, Gutierrez still tries to complete the late Gospić's operation. Gutierrez commands his soldiers from within his prison cell to launch terrorist attacks in Italy and infect Athens with a deadly nerve agent to make up for Rio de Janeiro, fully anticipating the deaths of thousands.
• Difficulty Spike:
  • The missions that require you to rescue hostages or disarm bombs increase the difficulty due to the twitchy AI that will kill the hostages/detonate the bombs if they hear an unsilenced gunshot or detect you, which can lead to a lot of mission failure screens.
  • Compared to previous Rainbow six games, an incapacitated Operative is now no different than a dead operative which means you won't luck out and have a shot down operative return in a few missions because he wasn't actually killed. Also, the backup generics are only available after a party member is lost, and therefore cannot be used to avoid early deaths of team members.
• Sacred Cow: Raven Shield is considered the last pure tactical shooter of the franchise and thus most old school fans will headshot you if you dare to say negative things about the game.
• Surprisingly Improved Sequel: While the first two Rainbow Six games were well-received, they were highly critized for their janky squad commands, outdated graphics and slow gameplay. Raven Shield on the other hand was praised for being both an improvement and refinement of the formula while maintaining the deep gameplay and tactical possibilities, and its considered the best game in the franchise by many.
• Vindicated by History: Sort of happened with the PC version of Rainbow Six 3. While the game was very well received upon release, the Xbox version (released about seven months later) was much more popular and influential, with its online play being especially praised. However, thanks to the PC game's modding community and the shutdown of the original Xbox Live servers (meaning online play is now impossible with the Xbox version), many people retrospectively agree the PC version of RS 3 is the better game - as well as possibly the best tactical shooter ever made (give or take some Fandom Rivalry with 'Ghost Recon'').

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