ARC Raiders’ New Documentary Series Kicks Things Off by Talking About its Development and Evolution

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Embark Studios, the team creating the PvPvE shooter ARC Raiders, has partnered with Noclip to produce a documentary series detailing the game’s development. The first episode reveals the significant changes the game underwent during its creation and acknowledges the mistakes made along the way.

Patrick Soderlund, founder and CEO of the studio, explained that the first year of developing ARC Raiders was mostly spent creating the tools needed to build and maintain the game. He also discussed future planning, emphasizing the importance of allowing for potential errors and adjustments during development.

He explained that their first year was mostly focused on creating the necessary tools. He also anticipated they wouldn’t get everything right away, expecting plenty of errors. They deliberately built in some flexibility to allow for those mistakes and recover from them.

Stefan Strandberg, the creative director, explained that developing ARC Raiders began with a focus on making the robot battles enjoyable. This is interesting because the game initially started as a purely cooperative experience, then incorporated player-versus-player elements before evolving into the extraction shooter it is now.

According to Strandberg, they were building the fundamental gameplay and experimenting with the game mode simultaneously. They hadn’t yet considered broader systems like player motivation or the game’s economy, focusing instead on how it felt to play against the machines.

Every game, no matter how complex, needs to be enjoyable at its core. Even something as simple as kicking a ball in a game like FIFA has to feel good, or the whole experience won’t be fun. We tested our game by focusing on the basic, moment-to-moment gameplay and the visual spectacle, and we found a promising foundation.

Aleksander Grondal, the executive producer, discussed the game’s evolving title and explained how challenging it can be for developers to actually make a game enjoyable during the creation process.

He explained that making something fun isn’t as simple as just deciding it will be. Often, you’ll work on a project and realize it’s not quite right. When that happens, you need to go back, revise it, and even reconsider your original ideas. This process of improvement comes from experimenting and playing with what you’ve already built.

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2025-11-24 15:42