The much-anticipated Arc Raiders launched last week, but some players hoping to drop in on the extraction shooter have been left hanging. Suffering from success, the multiplayer game rocketed up the Steam charts, only for the servers to implode over the weekend, with Embark Studios now working to remedy the situation.
After launching to over 260,000 concurrent players on Steam, Arc Raiders only grew bigger in the days after, pushing out to a peak of 337,834. Impressive numbers for only the second game from the devs, but the infrastructure strained and the servers buckled.
Throughout Sunday, November 2, players posted about being unable to get in due to a game-wide crash. Embark has been working diligently to solve the problems, instituting some quick fixes in lieu of wider solutions.
"The team has implemented a login queue as a temporary measure in order to mitigate issues related to forming parties and using voice channels which will make your matchmaking longer than usual," says a post in the official Discord server. As you might imagine, it's been pretty intense there for the last while.
While unfortunate, this is often par for the course for online-only releases. A first-weekend surge is expected and hoped for, but although server slams and beta access gave some sense of buzz, data can only predict so much. Throw in a $40 price tag, a large contrast to Embark's last game The Finals being free-to-play, and there was uncertainty.
Considering Embark was founded by ex-Battlefield and Star Wars: Battlefront devs, the studio knows what it's about in handling all this. What's important now is the recovery, which is underway. If you're hoping to join the fray, exercise a little patience, and you'll get your chance.
