Like all mobile game releases, a trickle of information to keep eager players hyped is the typical strategy for publishers, and so it comes as no surprise to see Ubisoft plugging a fresh dev diary video that covers the details for the upcoming closed alpha for Rainbow Six Mobile. Earlier this month, Ubisoft officially announced that this bite-sized mobile version of Siege would be landing this year, and today we learn that the first closed alpha will kick off at the beginning of May.

The above three-and-a-half-minute video is presented by the creative director, Justin Swan, and the video covers the territories the closed alpha will launch in, all while detailing when this alpha will kick off. Starting next week, on May 3rd, the first live test for Rainbow Six Mobile will be available to a select amount of Android gamers across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. If you'd like to toss your hat in the ring to participate, you can still sign up on the official website. Should you get in, you'll receive an email that contains the details necessary to install the game.

Ideally, this upcoming alpha will be used to test for bugs, which means bugs are expected. Beyond that, the creative director has also detailed that some online alpha matches may contain bots. After all, this is an early alpha test, so expect a lack of polish. There is no progression system yet since this is a technical test for the core gameplay. Co-op will be available, and there are currently 16 playable characters to choose from, with two maps to play on, Border and Bank. As for game modes, there will be two, Bomb and Secure Area.

While it's surprising to see Ubisoft opening initial testing in North America, seeing that it's such a large region, more tests are planned for more regions in the future, so don't worry if you currently feel left out. Of course, everyone can expect more news in the coming months as Rainbow Six Mobile enters into more testing phases as development progresses.

UPDATE: 2022/05/03 12:40 EST BY MATTHEW SHOLTZ

Rainbow Six Mobile enters its first closed alpha

Ubisoft first revealed that it was working on Rainbow Six Mobile last month, recently detailing (in the above coverage) that the game would enter into its first closed beta in the United States, Canada, and Mexico on May 3rd. That's today, and so the game is indeed rolling out to the first wave of fans that registered to take part in the alpha.

So far, Ubisoft only plans to test on a handful of supported devices across a range of Asus, Google, Samsung, OnePlus, Huawei, LG, Motorola, Oppo, and Xiaomi devices. Of course, this is only the first alpha, so it's more than likely that more tests will be coming, hopefully with even more device support across more regions.

So make sure to stay tuned, as this is assuredly just the start of the testing phase for Rainbow Six Mobile in the buildup to its release in 2022.