Arc Raiders Playtest Impressions: This Tense, Immersive Extraction Shooter Could Be the Next Multiplayer Hit

Very few games are able to bottle the essence of playing online with strangers. Helldivers 2 recruited players for a common cause, and more recently Battlefield 6 underlined the squad in a squad-based online shooter. Free-to-play Battle Royale titles like Fortnite and PUBG: Battlegrounds attract a vast player base through their ever-changing offerings. But it takes more than a few checklist features to hook players in a saturated field.

Arc Raiders, the upcoming third-person extraction shooter from Embark Studios, combines some of the best ideas of the genre with that hard-to-pin-down online experience to cut through the crowd and stand out. The developer held an open playtest server slam for the game from October 17 to October 19 across PC, PS5, and Xbox Series S/X, opening limited gameplay features to all players. The playtest hit nearly 200,000 concurrent players on Steam alone. I poured a few hours into the extraction shooter over the weekend and came out wanting more.

The small slice of Arc Raiders I experienced reminded me of some of the best multiplayer experiences I've had in recent years. It captures the same kind of multiplayer magic that Helldivers 2 did, too, where the game allows players to find their own experience online rather than carefully crafting one for them. Arc Raiders is what you make of it. It's an extraction shooter where you scavenge supplies, find what you're looking for, and dip out. It's a multiplayer shooter where you take on other players looking for valuables. And it's a convincing post-apocalyptic survival title, where you take on deadly robots alongside other raiders.

Arc Raiders is a PvPvE extraction shooter set in a futuristic Earth where civilisation fell after robots took over the planet. Humanity has gone underground, living in cities buried deep below the surface of the planet. You play as a raider, the people tasked with going to the topside and scavenging essential resources. Every time you travel to the surface, you risk running into killer robots and other raiders. You get 30 minutes to scour the map, find items that help you craft or upgrade weapons, gear, and medicines, and return to the underground city of Speranza with your loot.

Just like other extraction shooters, however, if you die topside, you lose your inventory. And there are many ways to die on the surface, from deadly drones and giant spidery robots to other players online. The server slam playtest featured one of five maps that will be available when Arc Raiders launches on October 30. But it was enough to get a taste of what the larger experience would look like. Each time you head topside, you can take on quests from traders in Speranza that task you to find specific items and resources on the surface.

Loot as much as you can and leave
Photo Credit: Embark Studios/ Screenshot - Manas Mitul

You either squad up in teams of three or two or go solo, look at your map for points of interest that contain loot, and traverse through the dangerous terrain taking on other players and robots. Where things get interesting, however, is your interaction with other teams out on the surface looking for loot, as well. While the PvP component means you can take down other players and steal their loot for yourself, the game almost encourages you to avoid confrontation and team up with them in a mutually beneficial endeavour. In addition to proximity voice chat, you also have the option to broadcast emotes that say, “don't shoot” and “team up” to other players near you. And while not everyone will choose the path of non-violence and cooperation, many will.

I encountered several players online who were willing to work together, find and exchange loot, and get the hell out before the time runs out. I also got into some PvP shootouts that were interrupted by Arc robots, forcing players to pause shooting at one another to shoot at a common enemy. Moments like these elevate Arc Raiders above standard extraction shooters and multiplayer shooting games in general. Each player will interact with the game's world differently, and if you stumble upon someone inclined to interact with the game as you do, it can be an incredibly rewarding experience.

Stick with your team, or find a new one
Photo Credit: Embark Studios/ Screenshot - Manas Mitul

And it helps that Arc Raiders' fundamentals are robust, even if they're not without flaws. Perhaps its biggest strength is how immersive and intense going topside is. Sound design is at the core of that immersion. Every bullet fired rings out and echoes across the map, and every metal container you open for loot shrieks. Other players can easily hear you engaging drone robots and are likely to run to your location. Animations across the board are convincing, too. Embark Studios has packed a ton of detail in the simplest of player actions, whether you're breaking into a sprint or vaulting over obstacles.

The atmosphere topside is oppressive, too. Arc Raiders is also one of the most tense multiplayer experiences I've had in a while. Each encounter, whether with other players online or with AI-controlled Arc robots, can be deadly, and you could end up losing all your hard-earned loot. And survival feels satisfying when you do make it back to Speranza with your limbs and loot intact. The map is peppered with spots that let you call a lift or a train to take you back underground. As the 30-minute timer ticks down, the number of exfiltration spots on the map reduce. So, the longer you stay on the surface looking for more loot, the more likely you're going to run into other players looking to extract out.

Every encounter in Arc Raiders is tense and can be deadly
Photo Credit: Embark Studios

The topside gameplay is supported by the underground trade and upgrades cycle. Different tiers of loot are of different value to traders – the rarer, the better. Components you find on the surface also help you craft necessary gear to head out on a raid. You will die several times, and each time you do, you will lose your weapons, ammo, healing kits, shield rechargers, and every other inventory item. So, it's necessary to complete a few successful runs and bring back crafting materials so that you at the very least have a firearm in your backpack the next time you head out.

You can buy weapons, ammo, and other gear from Speranza traders, too, but you must bring back high value items that you can sell for cash to enable your shopping habits. Over multiple runs, you also get to level up and upgrade your character by investing points in three separate skill tree specialisations that impact your conditioning, survival skills, and movement abilities. Arc Raiders also lets you install more workbenches to unlock various gear upgrades and enable wider crafting, but most of these were not available in the server slam playtest over the weekend.

You can trade your loot for better gear at traders in Speranza
Photo Credit: Embark Studios/ Screenshot - Manas Mitul

Arc Raiders' composite gameplay loop across underground upgrades and topside exploration and combat kept pushing me to play one more match, even though I'm not a big fan of extraction shooters — I've never played Escape from Tarkov. It reminded me of tense risk and reward systems of early Battle Royale games. Extraction shooters remain a niche and slightly hardcore territory for casuals, but it feels like Arc Raiders has the potential to be an accessible and fun entry point for players new to the genre.

The server slam playtest did throw up some concerns about the game. Arc Raiders' character customisation is quite shallow, especially for an online shooter. The server slam also didn't have dedicated queues for two and three-player squads, but this can easily be added when the full game launches on October 30. And while the playtest only presented a limited early section of the game with only just one map, Arc Raiders' progression systems seem to be limited. The full game will surely bring a larger questline, but it remains to be seen how it evolves beyond fetch quests for traders, which was largely the state of affairs during the server slam.

Arc Raiders' server slam only featured limited early game sections
Photo Credit: Embark Studios

The playtest, however, established Arc Raider's credentials on the visual front. The game is built in Unreal Engine 5, but it runs surprisingly well on PC. We tested the game on a rig provided by CyberpowerPC India, which features a 13th Gen Intel Core i5-13400F processor, 16GB DDR5 RAM, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 graphics card, and 1TB NVMe M.2 SSD (PCIe Gen4). On ‘Epic' settings at 2K resolution with DLSS frame generation on, I was easily getting over 80fps on average. Lowering the graphical preset to ‘High' returned over 100fps consistently.

Arc Raiders' environments are atmospheric and ominous. The abandoned outposts and installations, the overgrown vegetation, and the desolate landscapes conjure a convincing post-apocalyptic setting that's immersive, tense, and enjoyable. The server slam only came with one map — Dam Battlegrounds, and four other maps at launch will add much needed visual variety. Character models, too, look detailed, but desperately require more options in terms of customisation and cosmetics.

Arc Raiders features a convincing post-apocalyptic setting
Photo Credit: Embark Studios/ Screenshot - Manas Mitul

The playtest was an impressive preview for a game that I'm now looking forward to playing when it launches across PC, PS5, and Xbox Series S/X on October 30. With its robust gameplay loop, intense online matches, and rewarding player interaction, Arc Raiders could become the next big online shooter. It could also hand extraction shooters in general a much-needed boost. The genre has largely been dominated by one title, and its punishing mechanics have kept mainstream audiences away. Arc Raiders could change that if it plays its cards right.