I believed I used to be solely going to play 5 – 6 hours of ARC Raiders on launch day earlier than sitting down to write down this preliminary overview in progress, however after only a handful of matches, I immediately couldn’t pull myself away – and earlier than I spotted it, I’d been enjoying for 10 hours. That is with out query probably the most hooked I’ve discovered myself on an extraction shooter (and I’ve performed numerous them), with clear and tense gunplay, a development system that’s been extremely satisfying to this point, and a loot recreation that has me sweating over what to place in my backpack and what to depart behind. I’ve nonetheless obtained masses extra to do and see earlier than I can draw any ultimate conclusions, however what I have performed has made an extremely good first impression.
ARC Raiders follows the standard extraction shooter system of dropping you right into a zone to take down NPC enemies and scramble for loot, all whereas wanting over your shoulder for rival crews who would love nothing greater than to crack you open like a meat pinata and take all the things you’ve collected. From what I’ve seen to this point, ARC Raiders hasn’t performed a lot to iterate on these fundamentals, nevertheless it does completely nail them, and that’s more durable to do than it’d sound – for instance, a giant finances try like Battlefield 2042’s Hazard Zone principally fell flat, and the alpha for Bungie’s Marathon landed with such a thud it was delayed indefinitely.
One of many major methods it succeeds is in its tense gunplay, the place weapons solely have a number of rounds in every journal, take a great deal of time to reload, and the robotic NPCs are both a lot quicker than you or can rain down missiles to take you out in a single blast. This implies I’m often feeling like a rodent sneaking round to scavenge meals and provides from the world earlier than slinking again to base – however when fight does escape, it’s charged with pleasant anxiousness due to the high-risk, high-reward state of affairs of realizing you’re both about to lose all the things you’ve fought for or seize some superior gear off the corpses of these you’ve bested. This consists of each AI-controlled and human gamers, as each might be discovered and fought out on the earth, although it’s greatest to keep away from both of them until you’ve introduced the gear and abilities required for a struggle. That’s as a result of firing a shot has a very good likelihood of drawing all robotic enemies and loot-hungry gamers to your place, making the most of your vulnerability to do as a lot harm as attainable.
All 4 of the maps I’ve seen to this point have very cool and distinct vibes to them, from the ruined husk of a waterlogged dam to a metropolis buried in pink sand. It’s a very good factor that they’re so nice to take a look at, too, since you’ll spend a complete lot of time trekking backwards and forwards throughout them in quest of loot. I nonetheless really feel like I haven’t seen a lot of the nooks and crannies of those areas, regardless of having performed on them for dozens of matches already, however they’re beginning to really feel just a little acquainted to me. Right here’s hoping they’ve nonetheless obtained secrets and techniques to uncover that increase the period of time I’m keen to spend on every.
As I work towards exploring each final zone, one factor I’m nonetheless in search of is an enemy combatant I haven’t confronted but (apart from the huge tanks, which I’m simply steering away from at this early stage). Most of my NPC fight encounters have been towards the small roly poly bots and flying drones which might be pretty straightforward to destroy, with my fellow gamers being the one correct problem to this point. I’m wanting ahead to the purpose the place I’m highly effective sufficient to truly have interaction with among the chonkier enemies extra severely, nevertheless it nonetheless would have been good to have a greater diversity of low stage AI combatants to shake up the early recreation a bit.
Fortunately, at the same time as maps and enemies have begun to really feel acquainted, that hasn’t dampened my need to play simply due to how good the loot and progressions programs are. Each run, win or lose, has me excited to return to the comfortable sanctuary of Speranza, the place I can chat with distributors, flip in and settle for new quests, improve my amenities that enable me to craft gadgets and achieve entry to new upgrades, customise my character’s look, and spend ability factors that make me barely higher at issues like protecting quiet whereas rifling by loot throughout matches. There’s a lot to do and unlock that I really really feel I’ve solely scratched the floor on this regard, and that’s stored me glued to my controller and desperate to dive into new matches.
Anyway, there’s nonetheless tons to do and robots to slay, so I’ll be headed again out to the wastes for extra simply as quickly as I’m completed typing. You’ll be able to count on a full, scored overview early subsequent week!
