The Evolution of ARC Raiders: Interviews with the developers

Fearless Raiders have been braving Topside for three weeks now, but the story of ARC Raiders goes back almost seven years… it wasn’t always smooth sailing!

While the core identity of the world emerged quickly, the development team faced struggles to wrestle a satisfying gameplay loop from the initial concept. Through experimentation, new technologies, and a laser focus on carving out a unique space in the extraction genre, ARC Raiders was born - we want to show you that journey. 

In our upcoming three-part series, documentary filmmaker Danny O'Dwyer explores the making of ARC Raiders: from initial sketches that sparked a world of climate collapse and malevolent machines, through the painful reset in 2021, and finally to the extraction adventure that millions of Raiders play today.

The documentary:

This series dives into some of the pivotal moments in ARC Raiders' development, including:

EPISODE 1: Finding ARC Raiders - from six developers chatting in an apartment to the very first designs, gameplay mechanics, and ARC enemies.

EPISODE 2: The Life of a Raider - pivoting to a PvPvE framework with a focus on building immersive worlds, realistic sound design, and a satisfying gameplay loop.

EPISODE 3: Building ARC Machines - pioneering new approaches to machine learning to build intelligent and cunning enemies, each with distinct attributes and threats.

Throughout these three episodes, you'll get to know some of the key players in ARC Raiders' development including the creative and art director, devs and designers, and our very own sound wizard! 

For now, we'll leave you with a taste of episode one - the full version will be available November 21st, with episode two dropping a week later.

With love,
The ARC Raiders Team