New year, new content. Rainbow Six Siege fans have a lot to look forward to this year in terms of in-game enhancements. Some purely cosmetic, others include new maps, at least 8 new operators, new weapons, and more. The next wave of content expected to hit the game will include a team of Spanish operators that, until now, were still a complete mystery.

Ubisoft released their newest teaser and it shines a spotlight on one new operator, Ryad Ramirez Al-Hassar – codename: Jackal. In the teaser below, you’ll see Jackal in the Attack role with the C7E and PDW9 as his primaries, and ITA 12S and USP 40 as his secondary weapons. The teaser surrounds Operation Velvet Shell – check it out below:

The teaser is just that – a teaser, so there are definitely a lot of questions left unanswered. We do get to see Jackal in action, at least a little bit, as the character advances utilizing a special visual headset to track footprints. A powerful attack for the Attackers, definitely gives an offensive advantage over the enemy team.

Jackal’s unique ability won’t be revealed until the Six Invitational, but we do have at least a little background to the character thanks to the official website. Rainbow Six Scriptwriter Farah Brixi talks a little bit about what they drew inspiration from when developing Jackal. According to Brixi, they wanted to properly portray Spain’s Spec Ops and how they operate in dolling out roles and tactical choices:

We created Jackal with that in mind, so that he would fully embody a specific play-style. When you pick up Jackal, you are sending a clear message to the opposing team: now they’ve got a target on their back.”

The good defense is a good offense, they say:

You can expect Jackal to embody their resourcefulness in difficult terrains as his specialty lies in counter drug smuggling operations. He underwent extensive survival courses, tactical desert navigation programs, and specialized combat diving courses to gain this edge.”

You can read all about Jackal’s backstory on the website here, but a brief cliff notes version is that we know that Ryad was 9 years old during Spain’s political transition but that he was too young to really understand the implications of said changes. He was in and out of different “dysfunctional families” throughout his youth as a foster care child. Faisal, his older brother, promptly took him out of that system when he became old enough to be Ryad’s legal guardian.

October 8th, 1985 brought tragedy to the Ramirez brothers when Ryand was found next to his older brother’s corpse. They were found in an abandoned house in El Principe Alfonso. Ryad, “Jackal”, was 17 years old at the time and was in a state of a medical emergency. He was not charged with his brother’s death because there was no weapon found, no motive, and no witnesses – instead it was passed off as just another street death.

The quest to understand what happened to his older brother led him to enter the Cuerpo Nacional de Policia, where he honed his skills to an elite level. Eventually, Ryad became the Jackal when he became a member of the G.E.O.

Ubisoft will be holding an event on their Twitch channel on February 3rd to celebrate the Year 2 Roadmap and Operation Velvet Shell. The Six Invitational will be held in Montreal, and you can find all of the details for their live panels here.

What are your thoughts, agents? Are you looking forward to seeing all of the new content 2017 will bring for this title? What’s your favourite thing about R6 so far? Sound off with your thoughts in the comment section below and don’t forget to stay tuned in with DFTG for all of your gaming news!