Arc Raiders seems to be finally getting a PvE mode to the delight of its least violent players, but it'll only be available in China. So, although they have a history of nonviolence, the rest of the players eager for PvE are seething.
Embark Studios' website for the Chinese version of its multiplayer game, which it co-develops with Chinese conglomerate Tencent, reveals a new safe zone mode, according to fan translations.
Arc Raiders fans in China will soon be able to opt into a map modifier where all players are friendly by default, though anyone can choose to defect from the group at the risk of becoming public enemy number one, revealed as a traitor by a red highlight That idea has seemingly also transferred to Arc Raiders' real-life audience, whose Chinese members have once again been marooned from everyone else.
Chinese gamers are sometimes known for especially severe Steam reviews – typically, both because internet restrictions in China give them few options for sharing their opinions, and because Chinese localization work can be uniquely awful. Tom Kaczmarczyk, CEO of business intelligence company IndieBI, touched on this phenomenon while talking to developers at a Digital Dragons 2026 panel recently attended by GamesRadar+, telling them that, "if the Chinese localization is bad," they can expect players "will roast you in the reviews."
Since Chinese players' problems can be so central to the fact that they live in China that global gamers have sometimes taken to dismissing their complaints as melodrama. To this attitude, an Arc Raiders player on Reddit who claims to have been invited to the new safe zone mode's closed beta test says, "Everyone used to mock Chinese gamers for giving bad reviews, but now it seems they genuinely have unique insights and design skills when it comes to games. Now, before buying a game, I check the simplified Chinese review sections."
This seems true here, as I can confirm that global reactions to the Chinese Arc Raiders' new modes are filled with yearning. They, too, want to opt out of PvP, which has always been a contentious aspect of Arc Raiders, and they'd like to try the new dual boss battleground also coming to China. That mode will see the Queen and Matriarch bosses appear at the same time, and, probably, block out all the light in the sky.
China is also getting fresh weapon and armor skins, one of which adds lopsided mouse ears to your helmet, so you can traverse Arc Raiders looking as pampered as a family sharing a big turkey leg at Disney World.
"There'll be some happy Era members if this mode comes to the global build," muses one reply in a discussion about Arc Raiders' exclusive PvE mechanism on ResetEra.
"Somehow China version got what a lot of PvE players have been asking for," says a more bitter comment in a Reddit thread on the topic.
The odds of this experimental mode coming to the mainline version of Arc Raiders are shaky. Embark has repeatedly gone to bat for a balance of PvP and PvE – it did, after all, pivot away from pure PvE to save the game from development hell – and the Chinese branch of the game is a bit wilder overall. But equally, the studio has been blown away by how many people like the peaceful life, and has discussed plans to lean into it outside matchmaking changes. Perhaps friendly raiders will get their wish.
