While playing Arc Raiders, Embark leads clarify they only added true "aggression-based" matchmaking fairly recently, and right on cue someone shows up pleading "Friendly"

You may have noticed some fluctuations in your rounds of Arc Raiders of late, as if players are either more aggressive than usual, or more timid. This isn't by accident, as developer Embark Studios has now confirmed it's using "aggression-based" filters to corral people together.

Patrick Söderlund, the CEO of Embark, spoke about the change with GamesBeat while playing some of the extraction shooter himself. "Obviously, first it's skill-based, of course, then you have solos, duos, and trios," he explains. "And then we also - since a week ago or so - we introduced a system where we also matchmake based on how prone you are to PvP or PvE."

Essentially, how likely you are to aggro other players and get into messy firefights versus trying to simply loot the area and take down drones will decide who you get placed with. He notes "it’s not a full science," perhaps because there's a large, hard-to-define middle-ground here, but agrees "aggression-based matchmaking" is "exactly what it is." Ironically, an opposing player shows up while they're talking in-game, pleading that they're friendly.

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A game like Arc Raiders can be trickier if you consistently find yourself at odds with the players you’re matched with. Getting dragged into firefights when you’d really prefer to explore can be frustrating, and there's a danger of always having your rewards diminished because you’re constantly getting shot at.

Introducing a spectrum based on how likely people are to pick a fight brings some balance, but as is implied, there needs to be ambiguity, both to prevent players from seeking out weaker targets and to keep things unpredictable. While this might make your experience generally more pleasant, it should still be challenging.

This comes as Arc Raiders comes out of an incredibly successful launch period. Despite launching amid Battlefield 6 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 fever, it became one of the biggest games of 2025, and shows no signs of slowing down in 2026. Tweaks like these will no doubt help maintain the community for months to come.

Arc Raiders left with a grand question after sacrificing their characters for light Expedition loot: "Was it worth it?"