A breakout hit faces pressure as its community demands fixes for spawns, glitches, trials, and weapon tuning.
ARC Raiders had a great start thanks to its stylish atmosphere, strong PvP and PvE base, and quickly growing community of players. But as the early excitement wears off and more of the game’s details become clear, players are pointing out more problems that could slow the game’s amazing speed.
Many experienced players are wondering what to do next after reaching level 75, finishing quests, and getting ready for high-level adventures. Also, why does the experience feel uneven all of a sudden?
As the “honeymoon phase” ends, there is less praise and more criticism online. When big games come out, the small problems with the design, balance, and features become clear. Even though Embark Studios built a strong base, there are still some problems with ARC Raiders that are keeping it from becoming a truly great game in the long run.
Many people still really like the game, but players are increasingly speaking out about certain systems that need immediate attention—especially if the game wants to keep its rapid rise going over the next few seasons.
Cracks are starting to show, and the players want things to change before momentum is lost.
One thing people don’t like about ARC Raiders is the rolling spawn system. Every queue leads to either a new 30- to 40-minute map or a match that is already going on, sometimes halfway through. On paper, the goal of making sure full maps and constant PvP conflict sounds good. But players say that the execution is very bad when it comes to real life.
The issue is not with the idea of late birth, but with how they are distributed. Players who enter with custom loadouts are usually thrown into the middle of a match, while players who enter with free loadouts are more likely to land on new maps with loot that hasn’t been used yet. This throws off the balance of risk, benefit, and experience as a whole.
There isn’t much risk in free-loadout runs; rush rounds for easy targets or farm loot early before extraction waves. Geared players who log in with goals like bosses, trials, or farming components often find that the best loot spots have already been taken, enemies are on cooldowns to respawn, and extraction camps are waiting.
Veterans say that free loadouts should fill late-spawn places and custom loadouts should be used for new maps first. Just making this one change would make things much fairer without slowing the game down.
It’s clear that ARC Raiders’ maps are well-made; they have interesting shapes and fun ways to get involved. But spawn points are still one of the most annoying parts of the game, no matter how good they are.
When players spawn in areas like Stellantis, they often have a clear view or can hear multiple teams right away. Other spawn areas, on the other hand, have no close enemies or threats, which is very unfair. Similar issues show up in the middle of a match when new teams are dropped right behind current engagements, allowing unfair third-party ambushes.
Some players say the spawn algorithm needs to be changed to keep track of team paths and battle zones on the back end. Some maps need to have all of their start points moved around, especially those that send everyone to the same two high-value points of interest.
A well-designed map doesn’t mean anything if spawns put players at a disadvantage right away.
ARC Raiders had a well-known bug with key rooms before Patch 1.4 that let players into locked loot rooms without keycards. First, it was barriers, then team exploits, and the problem was still there a month after the game came out.
This not only made the key system less useful, but it also stopped advancement completely. Some players took advantage of the glitch to farm top-level items at an unheard-of speed, while others wouldn’t use real keys because rooms were often already broken into or set up by ambushers.
Patch 1.4 finally fixed the problem, but it took a long time to do so, which hurt community trust and changed how early meta development unfolded. Many people think that more content will lead to more exploits like this, and they say that future problems should be fixed right away, not weeks from now.
The weekly trials are supposed to make things more competitive, but players say the system has two big problems right now: tasks that are given over and over again, and unfair times for switching between maps.
For weeks, players had to deal with almost similar flying enemy challenges, which made teams want to farm hundreds of snitch scanners to get ridiculously high point totals. Because 3-stacks topped every score, solo players were pretty much unable to compete.
The second problem is worse: certain map conditions only show up at set times. The important 40-minute “hidden bunker” condition only shows up at 2 P.M. and 5 A.M., which are times when most working adults can’t play.
Players say these rotations should be random and protected so everyone has an equal chance to get to high-value trial times.
Trials should be competitive, not a lottery of when they happen.
Movement flexibility is important in a PvPvE shooter, but ARC Raiders’ inconsistent terrain and mantling are still a problem. There are rocks, ledges, and roofs that look like they could be mantled but can’t be. Meanwhile, the same things that are only a few inches away work fine.
Characters lose momentum all the time, have trouble moving around, and can even die in firefights when they get stuck on small items in the environment. A full polish pass would make the moment-to-moment gaming better right away.
When ARC Raiders first came out, the balance of the weapons was mostly good, but since then, a few major problems have come up:
- Even though its shooting rate and weight have been lowered, the Venador is still by far the best tank. Still, it’s more effective and takes less time to kill than most weapons. Plus, each burst fires two shots while using only one ammo unit, making it the most power-efficient weapon ever.
- A short-lived animation cancel allowed Il Toro to fire guns quickly, throwing off the game’s balance for a week.
- Players who counted on PvE tools, especially the Hullcracker, have been upset that they have been made less useful against tougher enemies.
- People in the community want more reliable testing tools for the shooting range and more careful tuning that fixes problems in PvP without making PvE less useful. Players wish for fair play, not nerfs that hurt the wrong systems all over.
Desync is a technical problem that players think breaks the game.
Desync is one of the worst problems ARC Raiders is having right now. Players often die behind cover, take damage after losing line of sight, or are knocked out a full second after getting back to safety. This problem gets worse in third-person shooters, where corner peeking is necessary.
Many people think that keeping players will suffer more than any content or balancing problem if this isn’t fixed right away.
Long-term progress is possible with blueprints, but the present system has made people angry. They are hard to find and rely too much on luck, and the seasonal wipe mechanic undoes all progress made on blueprints by people who are on expeditions.
Players are worried that the next season will be unfair to wipers, as non-wipers will still have significant benefits. A lot of people think that seasonal progression should make some blueprints forever unlocked.
The last point of disagreement is how ARC Raiders’ quests and rewards work. When players die, they often lose rare things or are sent into dangerous PvP zones as part of quests. But the rewards for finishing these dangerous tasks aren’t very good and aren’t worth the trouble, especially since they have to be done every season.
Players see a chance here: connect quests and blueprints more directly, offering important incentives that link different systems and keep them interested over time.
