Embark Studios' smash success of 2025, ARC Raiders, had a long development road that got it to being one of the most popular games on the market today. It was initially meant to be the studios' debut project, before it was delayed, and Embark focused on releasing what would become The Finals first.
All the way back in 2021, when it was first announced, it was intended to be a free-to-play co-op shooter where you worked together with other players to take down the giant ARC robots. Less than a year after its reveal at The Game Awards 2021, it was delayed, at which point Embark pivoted to The Finals.
When ARC Raiders re-emerged in 2023, it had been reworked to be a PvPvE extraction shooter that you'd have to pay for, and ultimately stayed that way through several playtests to become the game we know today.
Most ARC Raiders historians know all of this, and Embark's willingness to make these crucial changes to the game is a huge part of the success it's enjoying now. What we didn't know before but have now learned thanks to a talk that the studio's production director, Caio Braga, gave at GDC 2026 this week, is that Embark almost pivoted back to full PvE after its initial pivot to PvPvE.
Per PC Gamer, during Braga's presentation, in its initial playtests that came after it introduced PvP, the feedback Embark received showed "substantial negative PvP sentiment." The message from participants, as Braga put it, was clear: "They didn't like the PvP."
"A lot of our initial conversation was about whether we should have even done this reset. Should we add PvP to this?" Braga added. But ultimately, we know where things landed. Embark stuck to its guns and found that the real frustration playtesters had against PvP came more from weapon balancing than it did actually having to engage in PvP fights.
The back and forth Embark went through in ARC Raiders' development makes it even more interesting that players found PvE naturally by simply deciding for themselves not to engage in PvP combat. Embark has even leaned into it with PvE-focused events, though it still feels unlikely that it'll ever release a full PvE mode.
It feels like the best balance for ARC Raiders is the one that's been found by the community on its own. Not engaging with PvP has brought together one sub-section of the community, while another will stick to its PvP ways.
Both experiences are there, and while you'll get the odd player who pretends to be friendly only to kill you before you can both extract, the original PvE spirit of the game of Raiders against the ARCs instead of each other is very much alive and well alongside the PvP gameplay. And ARC Raiders is a better game with both elements included.
For more on ARC Raiders, check out our hub page for all of our coverage, and for help with your own runs Topside, check out our complete walkthrough and guides hub.
About the author: David has been writing about videogames, technology, and culture since 2020, with a focus on reporting daily news across multiple publications, including GameDaily.Biz, GameSkinny, and PlayStation Universe before joining Wccftech in 2025. David started contributing as Canada/US reporter for Wccftech's gaming section in 2025. Besides being up-to-date on the industry's movements, he loves interviewing developers, reviewing games, and writing intricate essays about the symbolism and layered meanings to be found in rich narratives as he's done for publications like GamesIndustry.Biz, LostInCult, and others. Outside of games he loves movies, music, theatre, his hometown, and his family, though not necessarily in that order.
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