Extraction shooter fans have been waiting years for ARC Raiders, a sci-fi shooter where players explore post-apocalyptic Earth for resources to take back to the human colonies underground. Players have to choose what supplies to bring with them on each trip, knowing full well that if things go south, they could lose everything. The world of ARC Raiders is ravaged by robotic enemies called ARCs that can make quick work of unlucky players, but they are far from the only threat on the surface.
The driving force behind ARC Raiders is the social element. A PvPvE experience, players always have the chance of running into other human players when out on their runs. ARC Raiders gives players the option of fighting each other in PvP skirmishes or befriending their fellow raiders and working together to stay alive. ARC Raiders‘ brilliant use of proximity chat enhances the social experience and helps it stand out from other online shooters, which nowadays tend to be ghost towns with so many people using party chat over game chat.
I loved what I played of the ARC Raiders beta and so it was a day-one buy for me. I haven’t had nearly as much time to play it as I wanted this past week, but the fact that I have already had so many fun and memorable experiences in the game speaks volumes. After just one week in the game, I’m convinced that ARC Raiders has the potential to become the next big multiplayer phenomenon.
Day 1
After completing the ARC Raiders tutorial, my brother and our mutual friend completed a few runs together. Every encounter with human players resulted in an immediate shootout, some of which we won and some of which we failed. One particularly exciting run saw all three of us fill up our backpacks with loot and make our way to an elevator to extract. Along the way, we saw another squad fighting a giant robotic spider, known as a Leaper. We watched from a distance while the squad expended all their resources fighting the thing, but sadly, they were unsuccessful. Calling the elevator alerted the Leaper to our location, so we took cover in a nearby building and pelted it through the window.
I have at least six glitched achievements in ARC Raiders so far, which is annoying, but otherwise it’s been an impressively polished and fun time.
When the elevator doors opened, we all made a mad dash inside and started the exfil sequence. We kept shooting at the Leaper as we did this, and managed to bring it down. At the last second, my brother jumped out of the elevator and ran to the smoking spider husk. It was too late for me and our friend to follow him, but we would soon be glad we didn’t. As the elevator doors closed, we heard my brother’s screams as another team of players showed up and murdered him while he was busy trying to loot the mechanical spider corpse.
Day 2
On Day 2, my brother and I queued up again. We filled squad and were paired with a random who immediately abandoned us to go do his own thing. We were then attacked by flying drone-like robots, called Hornets and Wasps in the world of ARC Raiders, that electrocuted us, shot us, and killed us. We waited to see if our third was going to come back and revive us, but as their blip got farther and farther away, it became clear that they had no intention of doing so.
We queued up again and this time I quickly made sure to make friends with our random. We did the classic crouch/stand/crouch/stand/crouch/stand ritual to break the ice, and then we all started dancing. This, I knew, was a bond that could never be broken. We started looting the surrounding dam and didn’t run into much action until we heard people talking. Suddenly, a group of three other raiders burst into the hallway we were in. Since our previous interactions with other players consistently resulted in shootouts, we were all on edge, but the situation was quickly diffused. The other team promised they wouldn’t shoot, and we agreed. We all decided to team up and explore together.
Our new friends had acquired one of the ARC Raiders surveillance keys needed to open a locked room in the dam. Despite forming an alliance with us, they told us to stay back and that they didn’t want to share the loot.
I made eye contact with the random on our team. We knew what had to be done. I’m not proud of it, but we all opened fire on the backs of our friends. The random went around and punched them out with a melee execution to end their suffering as they hurled obscenities at us for the betrayal. We looted the room and successfully extracted with all the goodies.
Day 3
Unfortunately, I did not have much time to play on Day 3. I tried a solo run, was killed by a robot, and queued up again in a full squad. We successfully looted and exfilled.
Day 4
On Day 4, my group and I destroyed a bunch of robots, only to get shot in the back and killed by another group of players. Karma for the crimes we committed a couple of days prior? Maybe.
