'Tis the season to be spooky, and Rainbow Six Siege is getting into the spirit of things tomorrow, 12th October, with the return of its Doktor's Curse limited-time Halloween event.

Doktor's Curse first emerged as a seasonal treat for Rainbow Six Siege players back in Year 4, but its 5v5 hide-and-seek-style Monster Hunt mode - set across a suitably sinister Frankenstein-themed version of the Theme Park map - has, according to Ubisoft, seen a few tweaks for 2021.

As before, one team takes on the role of the attacking Exterminators while the other plays the defending Monsters. The Exterminators' goal is to eliminate all Monsters in order to win the game, while the weaker Monster players must either defeat Exterminators or simply stay alive.

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Jesse Lingard, as in, England and Manchester United footballer Jesse Lingard, now has an esports team.

Previously known as Audacity Esports, and briefly playing under the temporary name Team JLE, Lingard's team is now officially titled JLINGZ esports, taking on the moniker of his personal brand. The side will compete next year in the Rainbow Six Siege UKIN Second Division, with the ambition to "create a legacy within Rainbow Six Siege as well as qualify for the 2022 European Challenger League".

Ahead of the official unveiling we talked to Lingard about his decision to buy the team. "Well I've always been a big gamer," he said. "You know, I think esports is only going to grow bigger than what it is now. I've had various conversations with Ubisoft - they've been brilliant with me - and I just thought it was the right time to get into esports and own my own team. And I think taking another jump into something different is going to be good - I always like trying new things."

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Ubisoft has warned Rainbow Six Siege AFK abuse "will be sanctioned".

The developer said it had noticed the "rising issue" of players abusing AFK methods in recent weeks, which it said had disrupted play in the competitive online shooter.

Last night, Ubisoft issued a wave of manual sanctions as it confirmed it was "evaluating design changes" to address the problem. Meanwhile, it's adding new automatic AFK detections.

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The definition of gameplay is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That's largely the case for me, at least. I play a lot of online competitive multiplayer (mainly Call of Duty and Rainbow Six Siege), and this year, I've even been jumping back into the Destiny grind now and again. The point is, I'm constantly running through the same environments, chasing the same objectives, using the same fairly small pool of weapons. Why am I not getting bored? Why am I actively enjoying it?

In an effort to understand this, I manage to encourage neuroscientist and author Dr Dean Burnett to chat with me about it. Despite a packed schedule - he's recently been promoting his latest book Psycho-Logical and he's helping to decide the future of European science communication policy - he fits me in one evening. He is incredibly friendly and cheerful, and very happy to share his insight.

"What seems like a sweet spot for how the brain responds is a nice mix of both something familiar, and also the element of novelty," he tells me. "With a game, there is always an element of novelty [...] you still have control over what happens so you can go this way, use this weapon. 'This time I'll try it this way around.' So there's an element of novelty, there's an element of direct influence in the situation so you've got that control, that sense of [...] I have control of the environment."

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A writer on Rainbow Six Siege has expressed their pride at the game's first transgender operator, who arrives with the Crystal Guard season update.

Narrative writer, Simon Ducharme, said they are "incredibly proud" of developing the character and had "tears of joy" knowing they were "encouraged and supported" to write queer characters.

Speaking to Gamespot, Ducharme added: "The decision to create a transgender character was made early on, as part of our initiative to have an inclusive roster of Operators. The consultants, all of whom are trans people, wanted to make sure that Osa was presented as authentically and organically as possible. She was written by a queer person and she is voiced by a trans woman - and while her identity is certainly influenced by her gender, who she is in the Siege universe is centered on her talents, her influence on Nighthaven, and her close friendship to Kali."

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PlayStation 4 Rainbow Six Siege players in Japan have said the game is being ruined by what have been dubbed AFK "bouncers".

Players of Ubisoft's competitive multiplayer shooter have complained they are constantly joining matches where other players are exploiting the way the game works in Japan to farm for in-game currency.

This in-game currency, known as Renown, is earned primarily by completing matches. You can also earn some extra Renown from daily challenges and from Ubisoft Connect, which is Ubisoft's cross-platform social and loyalty hub. Players use Renown to unlock operators, weapon attachments and customisation items.

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Hello! Welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we've found ourselves playing over the last few days. This time: rats, sieges and samurai.

If you fancy catching up on some of the older editions of What we've been playing, here's our archive.

Online multiplayer games have never been my thing. I've heard too many stories about toxic players and the abuse directed towards women, POC, and queer players, let alone the anger thrown your way if you're - god forbid - learning how to play the game and don't have the reflexes of a teen who just downed three espressos.

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The ever-popular Rainbow Six Siege will get crossplay support, Ubisoft has announced, though PlayStation and Xbox platforms will have to wait some time.

Crossplay and cross-progression between PC, Stadia and Luna will arrive on 30th June, Ubisoft said tonight during its E3 Ubisoft Forward presentation.

PlayStation and Xbox crossplay will arrive later, in "early 2022". At that point, cross-progression between all platforms will then be possible.

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Following a fragmented and often confusing to follow show last year, E3 2021 is mostly business as usual when it comes to its run of conferences.

Though there is no physical show, with organiser Entertainment Software Association (the ESA) opting for a free online-only event due to the ongoing pandemic, there is a return to a more familiar structure - a three day event, running June 12th to June 15th, with most major publishers taking part in a series of livestreams in the days up to the show.

This means, instead of multiple standalone announcements throughout the summer, we can expect the usual week-long rush of announcements. That said, some publishers (such as EA) are opting to host their own events later in the year, while others (such as Sony) are seemingly not doing much at all.

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The hostage hoax that saw armed police rush to the offices of Ubisoft Montreal while dozens of employees barricaded themselves on the rooftop for safety was the work of a notorious Rainbow Six cheater, says a new report by Canadian newspaper La Presse.

According to court documents obtained by La Presse, the catalyst for last year's police response was a hoax call from an individual claiming that five men had taken 40 employees hostage at Ubisoft - and that they would "blow up everything" if demands for a $2m ransom weren't met. Employees were later safely escorted off the premises as police continued to investigate the scene, but La Presse reports the incident didn't mark the end of the caller's malicious campaign.

In December, for instance, an individual allegedly claimed to have placed a bomb near the daycare facility within Ubisoft Montreal's offices, while another call in January claimed a senior Ubisoft employee had been shot in the head following another hostage incident. In both cases, the police are said to have made more "discreet" checks instead of immediately launching a major operation such as the one seen in November.

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