This ARC Raiders beginner guide covers the core extraction loop, loot zone system, skill tree, and the five vendors in Speranza so you stop losing gear to mistakes that aren't actually that hard to avoid.
Key Takeaways
- ARC Raiders is a third-person PvPvE extraction shooter from Embark Studios, available at $39.99 on Steam, Epic, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S — not free-to-play despite the original announcement
- Raids last up to 30 minutes; dying before extraction loses your full loadout except Safe Pocket items
- Five maps at launch: Dam Battlegrounds, Acerra Spaceport, Buried City, Blue Gate, Stella Montis
- Skill tree splits into three branches: Survival, Mobility, Conditioning
- Five vendors in Speranza handle gear categories separately — don't dump everything into weapons early
- Run Standard loadouts for your first 20 hours; save crafted kits for runs where you know the map
What Is ARC Raiders
ARC Raiders launched October 30, 2025, developed by Embark Studios — the team behind The Finals. The game released at $39.99, a notable shift from the free-to-play model announced during development. A Deluxe Edition costs $59.99 and includes cosmetic bonuses.
The setting: hostile machines called ARC drove humanity underground into a city called Speranza. You play as a Raider — a scavenger who ventures topside to gather components, complete quests, and survive long enough to extract. The surface is set across Italy-inspired post-apocalyptic environments, and the machines that roam them don't negotiate.
It's a third-person PvPvE extraction game. Squads support up to three players; solo play is fully available. Cross-platform matchmaking connects PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S players in the same lobbies. The ARC Raiders Steam page lists the full system requirements and edition details.
The Core Game Loop
Each session runs the same four-phase structure:
Prep. In Speranza, visit vendors, level workbenches, accept quests, and configure a loadout. Loadouts are consumable — they disappear when you die.
Drop. Select one of five maps. Raids have a 30-minute maximum timer, though most end before it expires.
Survive. Move through three color-coded loot zones — White (low threat, low reward), Orange (moderate), Red (hardest, best loot) — while managing ARC robot encounters and potential player squads in the same map.
Extract. Reach an extraction point and trigger it before dying. Items in your inventory carry back to Speranza. Items you didn't extract are gone.
This loop is unforgiving compared to something like the Elden Ring new player experience — there's no gear respawn, no tutorial section, and no way to preview what the map sounds like when you trigger an elevator exit for the first time.
How to Survive Your First Raid
1. Equip a Standard loadout: Before your first real map, use the Standard loadout option. These use borrowed gear with no resource cost on death. Run them for 10–20 hours. The inventory is smaller, but the zero-cost respawn cycle lets you study maps without the financial bleed that kills early progress.
2. Start with the Practice Range: The Practice Range is a live map that skips the countdown timer and active ARC threat. Use it to learn weapon handling, understand movement noise, and locate extraction points before a 30-minute clock is ticking.
3. Stay in White zones initially: White zones have minimal ARC density and predictable patrol routes. Orange zones require specific enemy knowledge to navigate efficiently — that knowledge takes several runs to accumulate. Go Orange only after you've learned how at least one enemy type moves and attacks.
4. Fill your Safe Pocket before extracting: Your inventory includes a Safe Pocket — one or two slots (expandable through progression) that survive death. Before heading to any extraction point, transfer your highest-value item into that slot. Quest items, rare blueprints, and high-tier crafting materials always go here first.
5. Use Raider Hatches over Elevators when you have items worth protecting: Cargo Elevators and Airshafts generate loud activation noise that draws ARC and reveals your position to every player in the map. Raider Hatches extract silently but require a single-use key from vendor Shani. Buy or craft Hatch Keys when you're carrying anything you'd rather not lose.
6. Holster your weapon while moving: ARC robots react to sound. Moving with a weapon drawn produces more noise. In Orange zones, this difference is measurable — unholstered movement alerts patrols two or three rooms ahead. Holster by default and draw only when contact is confirmed.
7. Extract when your Safe Pocket is full, not when the map is empty: Greed in Red zones is the primary cause of death for new players. Set a rule for early sessions: once your Safe Pocket slot is full and you have reasonable loot beyond it, head to extraction. The timer and the map's robot density both work against extended stays.
Understanding Loot Zones
Three tiers cover every map, with boundaries that shift depending on patrol density rather than fixed map markers:
| Zone | Threat | Reward |
|---|---|---|
| White | Light ARC patrols, basic robot types | Common materials, standard weapon parts |
| Orange | Mixed ARC types, occasional elite units | Uncommon components, blueprint fragments |
| Red | Dense patrols, boss encounters possible | Rare materials, exotic blueprints, top-tier gear |
Zone edges aren't labeled in-world. You identify them by how many patrol routes are crossing the same area, how many distinct enemy audio signatures you can hear simultaneously, and whether the loot containers you're finding are locked or unlocked. Three simultaneous patrol routes in a corridor is a Red zone regardless of which map quadrant you're in.
Extraction Methods Explained
Standard extractions — Cargo Elevators and Airshafts — are free to use and require no key. The activation sequence takes 15–30 seconds and generates audio that broadcasts your location. Use these in White or low-threat Orange areas where player squads aren't likely to be nearby.
Raider Hatch extractions are instant and silent once activated. Each use requires one Hatch Key. Keys come from vendor Shani in Speranza, Orange/Red zone containers, and player corpses. They cost resources upfront; they pay back every time another squad is in your sector of the map.
Matchmaking factors aggregate aggression into lobby composition — players who consistently hunt other Raiders get matched with similarly aggressive squads over time. This isn't a guarantee of quiet lobbies, but players focused on PvE tend to encounter fewer hostile players on average.
Your Five Vendors in Speranza
Each vendor handles a distinct category. Spreading resources across all five tracks the actual progression bottlenecks better than front-loading everything into weapons.
- Celeste — raw materials, base crafting components, farming supplies
- Shani — extraction keys, Raider Hatch keys, binoculars and reconnaissance tools
- Tian Wen — weapons and weapon parts; upgrade your primary loadout weapon here before branching elsewhere
- Apollo — gadgets, traps, deployables; ziplines, proximity traps, and grenades come from this vendor
- Lance — augments and medical supplies; passive stat modifiers that accumulate across runs
Vendor relationships level up through purchases and quest completion. Higher levels unlock better stock tiers and crafting recipes. Tian Wen and Lance typically provide the most visible early impact; Shani becomes critical once you're regularly running with crafted gear.
The Skill Tree — Three Paths
The skill tree branches into Survival, Mobility, and Conditioning. Early progression can't max all three simultaneously.
Survival covers looting speed, movement noise reduction, and ARC detection radius. The most impactful path for solo players relying on stealth over combat. The detection radius reduction alone changes how freely you can move through Orange zones.
Mobility handles sprint speed, climbing efficiency, zipline velocity, and stamina pool. Relevant for players who rotate between loot zones aggressively or depend on fast extraction timing.
Conditioning increases carry weight, health pool, stamina recovery, and status effect resistance. The primary branch for a squad member assigned to hauling high volumes of materials.
Put the first five or six skill points into Survival before branching. The ARC detection reduction pays off immediately. If you're interested in how extraction games compare to other progression-heavy genres, the best roguelike games of 2026 cover some systems worth understanding.
Beginner Tips to Survive Longer
Listen at doors before opening them. ARC Wasps and Hornets have distinct engine audio you can identify through geometry. Two seconds of listening at a door before entry changes survival rates in Orange zones by a substantial margin.
Don't run a loadout you can't afford to lose. Losing a well-crafted kit to a bad decision in the first few hours creates a resource hole that takes several Standard loadout runs to recover from. Treat expensive personal loadouts as something you earn access to through map knowledge, not something to bring in on day one.
Buy binoculars from Shani. Binoculars let you scan buildings and patrol routes before committing to an entry. In Red zones with multiple Sentinels, pre-scanning saves more time than the purchase costs. Most new players skip this purchase for three to four hours and consistently lose time to preventable contact.
Squads can split extraction. One player can take the group's most valuable items through a Raider Hatch while others continue looting. Coordinate who carries what before the extraction timer forces the decision under pressure. The best free-to-play co-op games list covers some comparable team-coordination models if you're new to this genre structure.
ARC Raiders has 14 distinct enemy types at launch. Learning two or three per session is more useful than trying to absorb all of them before your first run. Wasps, Hornets, and Ticks are the highest-frequency encounters in White and Orange zones — start with those.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is ARC Raiders free to play? No. Embark Studios originally announced ARC Raiders as free-to-play but changed the model before launch. It released October 30, 2025 at $39.99 on Steam, Epic Games Store, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. A Deluxe Edition with cosmetics costs $59.99.
What happens when you die in ARC Raiders? You lose all items in your inventory that aren't in your Safe Pocket. Your equipped loadout is consumed. Your character doesn't progress backward — no permanent death — but you return to Speranza without the gear you brought in.
How many players are in each map? Squads support up to three players. Multiple squads occupy the same map simultaneously. The exact lobby count per instance hasn't been publicly disclosed by Embark.
What is the best map for beginners? Dam Battlegrounds is the most-cited starting map due to open sightlines that give more warning before ARC encounters escalate. Stella Montis and Blue Gate have tighter corridors that are harder to navigate without knowing enemy behavior patterns.
Can you play ARC Raiders solo? Yes. Solo play is fully supported. The aggression matchmaking system applies separately to solo players running PvE, which tends to produce lobbies with fewer hostile squads — though this isn't guaranteed.
Do I need to buy gear before every run? No. Standard loadouts use borrowed equipment at zero cost. You can run unlimited Standard loadouts without spending resources. Personal crafted loadouts are optional and used when you want larger inventory space or specific weapon configurations.
References
- ARC Raiders on Steam — store page with system requirements, editions, and patch history
- ARC Raiders Official Site — Embark Studios' official game page with lore, faction details, and announcements
