News

ARC Raiders Says Queue Teaming Fell 85% in 5 Days

Embark says spoiled raids fell from about 1 in 50 to 1 in 300, with no meaningful effect on queue times.

0 3 1 minute read

A raider sits at a control console in a blue-lit room, with ARC Raiders anti-cheat update text beside them.

Queue teaming in ARC Raiders fell 85% five days after Embark began keeping known groups apart in matchmaking, the studio says in its anti-cheat update. Spoiled raids fell from about 1 in 50 to 1 in 300, with no meaningful effect on queue times. In August, Embark engineer Tom van Dijck described the wider challenge as an $8 billion cheat industry in a Gamescom Dev talk.

The change targets players who coordinate before a raid to enter the same solo lobby and attack Raiders who queued alone. Meeting someone during a raid and teaming up through proximity chat remains allowed. Embark shared the results ahead of a major game update scheduled for October 8.

Embark says its detection now combines Denuvo’s kernel-level protection, which reached all players by June 30, Anybrain detections, and an expanding set of in-house machine-learning models. The systems assess suspicious behavior before sanctions, while the appeals process includes human review.

Permanent bans are now standard for all known cheat programs, and Embark says any account caught cheating receives a permanent ban without a warning or second chance. License restrictions prevent a sanctioned copy of the game from being used through another account. Accounts ever associated with a banned copy also face permanent bans.

The studio has lowered the threshold for hardware bans and is working to extend them to almost all systems caught running cheat software. Embark hopes to put that broader system in place later in 2026, though it cautions that hardware bans are not foolproof and can be circumvented.

Bans may not happen as soon as suspicious behavior appears. Embark says its systems review behavior across multiple instances to reduce the risk of penalizing legitimate players, and its team also reviews videos and streams when they provide clear evidence of cheating. Elytra, the studio’s in-house anti-cheat, is being tested on a small scale in THE FINALS. Early results look promising, and Embark is working toward testing it in ARC Raiders.

Has queue teaming disrupted your solo raids? Share your experience, and follow us on X, Bluesky, YouTube, Instagram, Steam, and Telegram.

ARC Raiders is a multiplayer extraction adventure, set in a lethal future earth, ravaged by a mysterious mechanized threat known as ARC. Enlist as a Raider and scavenge the surface to thrive in a desolate world. But beware of the machines. Beware of Raiders preying on others.

ARC Raiders blends the tension from extraction shooters with atmospheric settings from the adventure genre. Lurking threats—from deadly machines to other Raiders—create a constant ebb and flow of intensity, where every moment is charged with the thrill of high stakes. Extract valuable loot and explore the unfolding mysteries of a vibrant, lethal world.

ARC Raiders supports seamless social play across PlayStation, Xbox, and PC. Play with your squad and thrive as a team, or rise in the ranks as a lone ranger.