Arc Raiders PvE Mode: Embark Still Undecided After 30 Million Test Rounds

What Embark Actually Ran, and What It Proved

The beta window ran from 11:00 CEST on 13 October to 11:00 CEST on 20 October, offered as an optional queue sitting alongside the normal PvPvE playlist. Players who opted in got a markedly different arc raiders map experience: zero player-to-player damage, lower loot value, and several major map conditions stripped out.

Embark confirmed afterwards, in its "PvE Matchmaking Toggle Test: Thanks for taking part!" post, that more than 30 million PvE rounds were played across the week, describing it as "a huge amount of information to analyze." One important caveat: the figure counts rounds, not unique players, so it speaks to volume of engagement rather than the size of the audience behind it.

What it does not mean is a permanent mode. The toggle has been switched off, standard PvPvE is back, and Embark has announced neither a lasting PvE playlist nor a return date for the test.

Grøndal's Full Position: "Not Undermining the Premise of the Game"

Executive producer Aleksander Grøndal discussed the test's future in an interview with MP1st, with the quotes also reported by VGC and GamesRadar, and his language was carefully non-committal.

"Now that we've concluded the PvE matchmaking toggle test, we're doing a deep dive into what that means," he said. "Of course, we were a bit skeptical about bringing such a mode to the game for historical reasons, but now we need to discuss what we want to do going forward."

The "historical reasons" refer to the studio's earlier decision against a PvE mode, which Grøndal said made Embark skeptical of trying one, and the core design concern is stated plainly: the challenge is "not undermining the premise of the game." Arc Raiders is built on PvPvE tension - the constant possibility that the player who helps you clear an ARC patrol will shoot you in the back over your loot. Strip out the player threat and you are left with something that may no longer be Arc Raiders.

There is a counterweight in Grøndal's framing, though. He suggested the test may be "more a signal that the game could support more player types" - an acknowledgment that the audience is broader than the pure PvPvE crowd. The studio has not made an internal call, and Grøndal says so directly: "We need to understand what the need is here."

The "Dad Gamer" Origin Story

The PvE experiment did not come from a whiteboard. It came from watching players.

Executive producer Aleksander Grøndal said the PvE experiment grew out of something Embark was already seeing in its servers: players happily avoiding fights with each other. He described these casual players as "dad gamers," and said they helped convince the studio to try the test.

Notably, Embark had the same debates internally that the community is now having publicly. This was not a top-down feature decision pushed through by leadership; it was a response to observed behaviour, which shapes how the studio is likely to weigh the results. The question is no longer whether players want a less hostile Arc Raiders, but whether giving it to them formally changes what the game is.

A Polarising Test, Not a Clean Win

The 30 million figure tells you people showed up. It does not tell you they loved it.

Community reaction split along predictable lines. Players reported returning after months away, bringing friends and family into the game for the first time, and finally feeling able to bring expensive gear into a raid without losing it to a stranger - though those accounts come from community discussion rather than any survey Embark has published. Others found the missing player tension impossible to replace, arguing that the mode removed the very thing that makes an extraction shooter tick. Reward and loot balance also drew fire, particularly for Raiders spending keys in a mode with lower loot value - a problem any lasting version would have to solve.

High engagement and positive sentiment are different measurements, and Embark is now sitting on a large pile of one and a divided sample of the other.

The next data point is a player survey, with one report putting it on 22 October. Embark's Store Update 2.2.0 also asks players how PvE compared to their usual experience. Embark's 20 October update has been reported as pointing to a further update on PvE's future in November, though that timing should be treated as a signal rather than a firm commitment.

The Context: Frozen Trail 2.0 and a Six-Month High

The PvE test did not happen in a vacuum. It landed days after the Arc Raiders' Frozen Trail 2.0 Update on 8 October, which added Pendola Pass, a grappling hook, new weapons, enemies and quests, plus a free weekend. On the Arc Raiders Steam charts, that combination pushed the game to a six-month high, with a 24-hour peak of 131,388 concurrent players reported by several outlets (other trackers put the peak at around 185,000 on 11 October, with one outlet describing it as the highest since March 2026), though the surge is attributed to Frozen Trail and the free weekend, with some coverage suggesting the PvE test may have been partially behind the high.

The Decision Is About Identity, Not Demand

A week of data, 30 million rounds, a survey in the field and a reported November follow-up. Embark has more information than most studios get before making a call like this, and it is still saying it needs to understand the need before it acts.

The real question is not whether a PvE mode would be popular. Thirty million rounds demonstrate substantial appetite for it, even if they do not settle how widely that appetite is shared. The question is whether Arc Raiders can host a calmer co-op audience without diluting the PvPvE tension that has defined it - and whether the players who came for that tension would forgive a studio that softened it.

For now, the toggle stays off, and the survey and the reported November update are where the answer will surface.