ARC Raiders First Impressions: Is It Worth Playing?
▼ Summary
– The reviewer found ARC Raiders incredibly addictive, playing for 10 hours straight due to its tense gunplay, satisfying progression, and engaging loot system.
– It follows the standard extraction shooter formula of looting and fighting NPCs and players but executes these fundamentals exceptionally well, unlike some competitors.
– Gunplay is stressful and high-risk, with limited ammo, slow reloads, and tough robotic enemies, making combat encounters tense and rewarding.
– The game features four distinct and visually appealing maps, though they may become familiar over time despite initial exploration.
– The loot and progression systems are highly compelling, offering extensive customization and upgrades that keep players engaged and eager to continue playing.
My initial plan was to spend just a few hours with ARC Raiders before jotting down some early thoughts, but the game had other ideas. What began as a brief session quickly stretched into an entire day, with its compelling loop of high-stakes combat and rewarding progression proving impossible to step away from. As someone who has explored numerous titles in the extraction shooter genre, I can confidently say this one has its hooks in me deeper than most. The gunplay feels crisp and deliberate, the loot system creates genuinely tense decisions, and the overall sense of advancement is deeply satisfying. While my journey is far from over, the first impression is overwhelmingly positive.
The core premise will feel familiar to genre veterans. You are deployed into a hostile zone, tasked with eliminating robotic enemies and gathering valuable resources, all while remaining vigilant for other player squads eager to relieve you of your hard-earned gear. ARC Raiders doesn’t attempt to reinvent the extraction shooter wheel, but it executes the established formula with remarkable polish. Getting these fundamentals right is a significant achievement in itself, especially when considering high-profile stumbles from other major studios in this space.
Where the game truly excels is in crafting a palpable sense of tension. Your weapons carry limited ammunition and require a deliberate, time-consuming reload process. The robotic adversaries you face are often swifter than you or possess devastating area-of-effect attacks. This combination forces a playstyle that feels more like a cautious scavenger than an unstoppable soldier. You’ll spend much of your time sneaking through the environment, carefully weighing the risk of engagement. When fights do erupt, they are electrifying, driven by the knowledge that a single misstep could mean losing everything you’ve collected, or securing a windfall from a defeated foe. This applies to clashes with both AI and human players, though picking a fight is a serious decision, as the sound of gunfire acts as a dinner bell for every enemy and opportunistic player in the vicinity.
The maps themselves are a visual treat, each boasting a unique and striking identity. I’ve explored a crumbling, waterlogged dam and a cityscape slowly being consumed by crimson sands. Their impressive design is a good thing, as you’ll be traversing them repeatedly in your search for loot. Even after numerous matches, I feel I’ve only seen a fraction of what these environments have to offer, though certain paths are beginning to feel well-trodden. I’m hopeful that deeper exploration will reveal hidden secrets that prolong the sense of discovery.
One area where I’m hoping for more variety is in the enemy roster. So far, my encounters have primarily been with smaller, rolling bots and aerial drones, which are relatively straightforward to dispatch. The real challenge, at this stage, comes from other players. I’ve wisely avoided the colossal tanks patrolling the zones, knowing I’m not yet equipped for that fight. I look forward to reaching a power level where I can confidently engage these heavier units, but a wider array of lower-tier AI enemies would help keep the early-game combat from feeling repetitive.
Thankfully, even as the environments and adversaries start to become familiar, the superb progression and loot systems continue to provide a powerful incentive to keep playing. Every excursion, successful or not, ends with the rewarding return to Speranza, your personal hub. Here, you can interact with vendors, manage quests, upgrade crafting facilities, customize your character’s look, and invest skill points into subtle but meaningful perks. The sheer volume of things to unlock and improve creates a compelling meta-game that has me constantly thinking about my next session. I’ve barely scratched the surface of what’s possible, and that potential has me eagerly grabbing my controller for just one more run.
There are still many robots to dismantle and secrets to uncover, so I’ll be diving back into the fray shortly. A comprehensive, scored review will be available early next week.
(Source: IGN)
