ARC Raiders

Embark Studios released it at the end of 2025 on PC, PlayStation and Xbox. Since then the game has grown on free content updates and a store that refreshes most weeks, so the question is less whether there is new stuff than whether the trip itself is worth the gear you bet on it.

What you are actually playing

ARC Raiders is a multiplayer extraction adventure from Embark Studios, and the whole game sits in one idea: the action flows between the surface, ruled by lethal machines, and Speranza, the underground city where the Raiders live. You go up, you scavenge, you come back, and everything you carried is part of the bet.

It is a paid game rather than a free one, and the edition split is a straightforward one. The Deluxe Edition adds a Wanderer Set (the Valente outfit, the Pathfinder backpack and the Blanket Roll backpack attachment), a character cosmetic, a rapid-fire Finger Gun emote, a Cowboy Scrappy body type and skin, and 2,400 Raider Tokens. It is out on PC through Steam and the Epic Games Store, on PlayStation 5 and on Xbox Series X|S.

You can go in alone or with up to two friends, and the game supports cross-platform play across PC, PlayStation and Xbox, so a mixed squad is a normal way to play rather than a workaround.

The half of the game you play indoors

The loop has two halves, and the quiet one matters as much as the shooting. Back in Speranza you craft, repair and upgrade in your own workshop, which means many of the decisions that shape a raid are made before you leave the city. Scavenged loot has two destinations: sell it for coin, or feed it into crafting. Blueprints unlock new gear, and the workshop stations themselves are upgraded over time.

Progression reaches further than a gear treadmill. A skill tree branches into Survival, Mobility and Conditioning, Traders hand out quests with their own agendas, and Raider Projects are personal, staged goals: you work through a short track of objectives — hunting a set of machines, salvaging a list of parts — and claim the reward at the end of it.

Expeditions are the strangest of those systems, and the one worth reading twice before you sign up. Departing means starting again as a new Raider on a fresh run through the game — a voluntary reset you complete in order, inside a scheduled departure window. Not everything goes with it: cosmetics, Raider Deck progress, unlocked map regions, leaderboard position, Trials standing and Raider Tokens all carry over, and you can now choose to keep your quest progress instead of resetting it too. Departure rewards include extra stash space and bonus skill points. Check the current Expedition terms before committing to a reset. The fifth Expedition closed in September, and the studio has paused the system until early 2027 to rework the reward structure and the departure windows.

What a raid actually costs you

The stake in a raid is the kit you carry. Get knocked out far from home and you do not get to keep it: the fight is loud, and the Raiders who hear it are eager to claim what you leave behind. A successful extraction is what turns a run into progress; without one, the gear you brought is the price of the trip.

Getting out is its own choice. Maps run ordinary extraction points — the elevators and metro routes some of them open — and they also carry Raider Hatches that need a key you brought with you, so the quick exit is only quick if you planned for it.

Being downed and being eliminated are different outcomes. A downed Raider may still be revived, but remains vulnerable to other players. Once you are eliminated, the run is over. Choosing whether to attempt a rescue means weighing your teammate against the equipment you are both risking.

There is one small place your kit can sit outside the worst of it. The safe pocket is a slot treated separately from your backpack: keys you place there stay there even when you unload the backpack, and a weapon only fits if you are running the Safekeeper augment. That is a narrow protection for a few items, not insurance on the whole loadout.

If you would rather not risk your own gear at all, the game also offers a free kit — the free loadout a Raider can take instead of carrying in their own equipment. Two map conditions, Night Raid and Close Scrutiny, currently switch that option off with a "No Free Loadout" requirement, so those runs ask you to bring something you would miss.

Machines, and the other people

Two threats share the surface. ARC is the obvious one: the machines range from drone swarms to mechanical giants, each with its own tactics, and learning their weak spots helps you decide where to aim and when to commit. The other threat is a Raider with a rifle. The noise of battle carries, and the players who hear it are often there to claim what you leave behind.

Matchmaking is worth understanding, because it is not a simple skill ladder. Fairness is the stated goal — matching Raiders who have a similar likelihood of succeeding, and prioritising equal squad sizes where the game can — alongside enjoyment, which comes from grouping people whose recent playstyle sits close to yours on a continuous scale. A few common assumptions do not hold: there are no PvE-only lobbies where nobody can attack you, your loadout does not influence who you meet, looting a body does not either, and switching crossplay changes who is in the pool rather than the mood of the round.

That makes the solo question easier to answer honestly. Solo is a supported way to play, and equal squad sizes are prioritised where the system can manage it. If you want the harder version, there is a Solo vs Squad toggle that opts you into the squads queue for a bonus at the end of the round, win or lose. Either way it is the same dangerous map with the same players on it.

Maps and conditions

Four maps shipped at launch, and the world has grown since. Stella Montis, a research site in the mountains, arrived with the first November update, and the coastal Riven Tides map came with the sixth free content update.

Maps do not sit still once you know them. Evolving conditions change weather, enemies and mechanics between sessions — Hurricane, Cold Snap, the Locked Gate state, night raids and Riven Tides' Beachcombing sweep for buried loot are all states a map can roll — so a route you learned last week is not one you can run on autopilot.

The next update, Frozen Trail, is announced for 8 October: a frozen settlement at the edge of the Rust Belt, a large new ARC Operation aimed at experienced Raiders, and new machines at both ends of the size range.

What it costs, and what it gives back

You buy the game once, and the paid extras sit on top of that. The store refreshes most weeks, sometimes with something as small as two colour variants of an outfit already on sale, and Raider Tokens are the currency behind the Raider decks, bundles and other cosmetics it carries. Raider Decks have a separate progression system: they are progression tracks you unlock with the earned currency, Cred, and their pages can hold gameplay rewards as well as cosmetics. The free deck includes gameplay rewards; that does not mean those rewards are being sold for money.

New content, meanwhile, has been free. Riven Tides was the sixth free content update since launch, and the things around it — new maps, condition states, ARC types, projects, events and quality-of-life work — arrived at no extra charge. Events and Expeditions also hand out Raider Tokens and cosmetics for playing, so the paid currency is not the only route to a new look.

The tradeoffs are the live-service ones, plus a few specific to this game. Content updates now land twice a year, with smaller live updates for fixes, balance and the store in between. Trials runs in seasons, with a reward outfit you earn by climbing the ranks before the season's window closes. Cred is being retired with Frozen Trail, and any balance left on the account expires when that update lands. Expeditions are on hold until early 2027. If you like to set your own pace, the calendar here is one you will occasionally run into.

Should you play it

Yes, if the tension is the appeal. The machines are worth learning, the workshop gives extracted materials a purpose, and each loadout asks you to decide how much equipment to risk.

Skip it if losing a kit you spent an evening assembling sounds like punishment rather than tension, or if live-service calendars put you off. ARC Raiders runs on its own clock — Expedition windows, Trials seasons and a store that refreshes every week — and it is built on the assumption that you will make time for it.