ARC Raiders announces account penalty following abuse investigation

After the recent duplication exploit, Embark Studios ended its investigation into the issue and gave ARC Raiders players will gain insight into this process while reporting “enforcement actions” to accounts believed to have taken advantage of it. From launch on October 7, 2025 ARC Raiders has been a huge hit for Embark Studios, achieving impressive player milestones, selling incredibly well and even winning numerous awards in the gaming industry. Despite all the success, the road is for ARC Raiders it wasn't always smooth sailing.

While there were minor frustrations here and there, especially with some balance changes, ARC Raiders has seemingly managed to avoid the major controversies and pitfalls that some games fall into. However, things have changed recently ARC Raiders hit its first major controversy with the February update, which introduced a glitch that allowed players to duplicate items. Many in the community were frustrated and disillusioned with the glitch, as some players took the opportunity to generate items like Trigger Nades and spam them, which generally hurt the game's gameplay. Even worse, players then discovered an infinite ammo bug after a hotfix that was supposed to fix the duplication issue, compounding the community's frustration.

Arc Raiders fans are clamoring for a change to default lighting.

Over 16,000 ARC Raiders fans agree that the game is in desperate need of 1 patch

Thousands of fans are urging Embark Studios to fix one issue with ARC Raiders ASAP, not exploits or bugs.

ARC Raiders reveals account bans and penalties

While Embark quickly set about repairing the ammo infinity again ARC Raidersthe studio announced plans to review accounts it believed duplicated an excessive amount of items. The vague wording left many players wondering how the studio would assess accounts on a case-by-case basis and determine a specific threshold for punishment. Others argued that the exploit was a mistake by Embark itself, nothing the players did maliciously, making a punishment or ban seem unfair.

Regardless, Embark has confirmed that its lengthy investigation is finally over and it is ready to hand out the punishments. In an effort to be transparent, Embark's blog delved into why the investigation took so long despite many in the community calling for swift action. Embark wanted to be fair and accurate, taking action based on what it could “define, prove and stand by,” including data validation reports, confirming exploit use, its impact, and removing any random or marginal behavior. Ultimately, the blog suggested that the studio only wanted to act once, with intent and confidence that it did the right thing, as this is the first time Embark has had to deal with an incident of this magnitude ARC Raiders.

Who is that character?

Identify the silhouettes before time runs out.

Who is that character?

Identify the silhouettes before time runs out.

Easy (7.5s) Medium (5.0s) Hard (2.5s) Permadeath (2.5s)

Following the conclusion of the investigation, the studio is now taking action against accounts found to meet the above criteria. Penalties are based on severity and overall impact on the game, ranging from a simple warning for those who have had little impact or limited abuse of the bug, to suspensions for more severe cases where the impact was more substantial on the game's economy or other players. In addition, all coins obtained by using exploits are also removed. Embark ended his blog by thanking players for reporting the issues, assuring everyone that not only are they taking it seriously, but the studio has already improved its detection and tracking systems, security, as well as internal review tools to hopefully prevent similar issues in the future.

Reaction to the news was mixed, with some fans thanking the studio for cracking down on exploiters and trying to protect and preserve the experience. However, as expected, there has also been a wave of backlash from others with a penchant for punishment ARC Raiders players for using a glitch introduced by Embark is harsh, especially if the number of suspensions is higher than expected. The argument is that the exploit was introduced and not addressed quickly enough, giving players time to exploit it. There's even a small faction that feels the suspension isn't enough, pushing Embark to take stronger action against certain streamers and YouTubers who have been exposing exploits for others.