Embark Studios' popular extraction shooter ARC Raiders saw a bit of controversy surrounding the recent crackdown on a duplication bug that allowed players to create multiples of items in their inventory through unintended means. Loot is a big part of it ARC RaidersA gameplay loop where players spend most of their time upstairs searching for valuable items while trying to survive against PvE ARC enemies and other raiders in PvP. To that end, it's understandable why Embark would want to punish players who took advantage of this glitch to ensure a level playing field for all players and discourage others from trying to cheat the system in the future.
Duping items in ARC Raiders it gives some players a hugely unfair advantage as players can essentially create an infinite amount of powerful weapons like ARC RaidersLaunch Nades to attack your enemies. Part of the challenge ARC Raiders it manages a limited number of resources while exploring the topside, and the ability to endlessly reproduce a powerful item like Trigger 'Nade removes all skill from combat in the game. What's more, players were able to accumulate huge amounts of Coins by duplicating valuable items to be sold. ARC Raiders' traders, giving them an unfair economic advantage.
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 will have a hard time justifying duplicate bans
Duplication error ARC Raiders was patched as of February 10, when an OTA hotfix fixed the bug a few hours after the February update for ARC Raiders rolled out. However, there was a period when it looked like Embark Studios wasn't going to address the bug at all, as it wasn't initially mentioned as a known issue in the update notes. However, Embark later clarified on social media that it would quickly roll out a hotfix once it was notified, and it is now no longer usable in-game.
Drag your weapons to fill the grid
Start
Drag your weapons to fill the grid
Easy to medium hard
Why are some ARC Raiders players running into duplicate item issues?
The initial reaction from Embark was somewhat vague about the implications for ARC Raiders players who were caught using the duplication bug. Doing this glitch required players to take a consumable item to their quick use slot and hold it in their hand, then go to their inventory, split that item's stack, recombine the stacks, then split the stack again, and then be able to throw an unlimited number of those items. Players involved in the glitch already had any duplicate items removed from their inventory, but Embark is taking the next step to crack down on them. ARC Raiders cheaters by subjecting those who used the glitch heavily to further scrutiny with a potential ban for players deemed to have seriously abused the glitch.
This ARC Raiders The duplication bug primarily concerned quick-use consumables such as grenades and Familiar Ducks, the latter of which players could sell for infinite coins.
It seems unlikely that ARC Raiders content creators will get banned for using the duplication bug
Popular ARC Raiders steamer TheBurntPeanut is one of the most famous users of this duplicate issue, often using it to send Tigger 'Nades at opponents during matches. Probably TheBurntPeanut is part of the reason why the use of this glitch is so widespread in ARC Raiders before the patch, given that the content creator has more than 1.5 million YouTube subscribers and nearly 2 million followers on Twitch. However, it seems unlikely that TheBurntPeanut will be punished too harshly for his part in this glitch, given that he is one of the biggest ARC Raiders content creators out there, but this puts Embark in an awkward position regarding any potential bans due to the duplication bug.
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ARC Raiders players have discovered another revolutionary exploit, just 24 hours after Embark fixed a viral item duplication.
The ARC Raiders duplication bug deserves to be punished, but Embark won't be able to pick and choose who it affects
Since Embark is so vague about its criteria for punishing duplicate glitches and uses a non-specific term like “excessive” to indicate which users will be considered for a ban, there is a lot of uncertainty about how widespread the penalty for this glitch will be. On the one hand, it doesn't seem entirely fair to punish a player for a developer's mistake. It's not like ARC Raiders players hacked the game to achieve this exploit; it was simply a bug that players discovered organically.
On the other hand, Embark can discourage players from trying to exploit such bugs in the future by making an example of players who “excessively” duplicate items and banning or suspending their ARC Raiders accounts. However, this would create a problem without an easy solution as it would require the developer to ban massive content creators like TheBurntPeanut alongside regular players. It's largely up to Embark to determine what constitutes “excessive” use of the bug, but passing judgment either way has the potential to upset some ARC Raiders fan base.
If Embark bans anyone who has used the duplication glitch beyond a certain threshold, it risks driving some of the biggest content creators out of the game and potentially losing their followers as well. However, if these content creators are exempt from the bans, then banned players could see this as an unfair exemption or “streamer's privilege”, potentially giving these creators license to exploit future exploits without fear of repercussion. TheBurntPeanut is already somewhat controversial among them ARC Raiders players because of his Bungulators streamer war that plagued ARC Raiders back in November last year. Any special treatment given by Embark could serve to further fuel discord between players and the streamer's fan base and create a more toxic gaming environment in the long run.
- Released
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October 30, 2025
- ESRB
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Teen / Violence, Blood
