Many people fondly remember the launch period of Arc Raiders. The game's world was magnificent yet filled with underlying horror, offering some of the best community interactions I've ever experienced in gaming, and playing with friends felt especially refreshing and enjoyable. However, this goodness didn't last as long as many players had hoped. Executive Producer Alexander Glendal admitted that Embark Studios had overestimated its production capacity.
"The difficulty of transitioning to a live-service model is beyond imagination. Everyone told me this, and I've said the same to others. I was mentally prepared for it to be 'hard'—but I never expected the actual difficulty to be this extreme," Glendal said in an interview with Game Developer. "During pre-launch development, the workflow was a cycle of development, testing, fixing, and verifying results. That had always been our approach to making games—but now player expectations are so high that we simply couldn't accelerate our pace any further."
Unfortunately, Arc Raiders is a textbook example of how hype can be both a blessing and a curse. Admittedly, the development team had anticipated the game's popularity, but I don't think anyone predicted it would reach such heights. Embark has never hidden the fact that its scale and production capacity fall far short of top live-service giants like Activision Blizzard or Riot Games, yet the team still pushed itself to keep up with external expectations for update speed.
This approach undoubtedly planted the seeds of trouble. Glendal explained, "The team was already exhausted to the limit, but we still pushed ourselves to release content faster. Not only did the quantity fall short, but the content also lacked engagement." Players completed events, progressed through the story, and explored the map far quicker than Embark could update new content, leading to a prolonged period of content drought and a significant drop in player numbers.
"I'm proud of what we achieved in the first four months of this year," Glendal added, "but at the same time, we must face the various negative consequences. We simply had no time to spare. Moreover, daily game operations consume a huge amount of energy—fixing bugs, addressing cheat exploits, and handling all sorts of miscellaneous tasks. We were constantly operating at maximum capacity, with a backlog so large it was impossible to plan properly. A significant amount of maintenance and cleanup work took up too much of the team's time."
The negative impact wasn't limited to game quality; the development team also paid a heavy price for overextending themselves. "The entire team was in very poor shape. To be honest, everyone was grinding relentlessly to hit milestones, with no fun or sense of growth throughout the process, so we knew we had to make a change. Players were voicing their frustrations, and the completeness of our game content was inconsistent."
This vicious cycle only came to a halt when the team started asking themselves, "What are we really doing this for?" and reevaluating the long-term roadmap for Arc Raiders. "All signs pointed to the fact that our pre-launch development model was actually more sensible, so we decided to return to our areas of strength... This way, the content we produce will be overall higher quality, more engaging, and more polished. We'll have time to refine details instead of just rushing to launch and constantly pushing out builds. We can truly focus on iterative improvements."
Glendal also emphasized the need to put an end to this persistent state of overwork. "Protecting our employees is a top priority," he said. "I can speak from personal experience. I suffered from burnout myself. Back when I was at EA, right after finishing a Battlefield title, I had been crunching hard for so long that my body completely broke down, forcing me to take five months of sick leave. Everyone says overwork is bad, but honestly, when you're actually burned out, it feels terrible. It's awful, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Plus, it means we lose talented people who may be unable to return to work for a long time."
For a live-service game like Arc Raiders, there is always endless work to be done. Although the game still has plenty of content that needs major adjustments and urgent issues to resolve—such as the anti-cheat system—I absolutely do not want anyone to prioritize content updates over their own health. At the end of the day, it's just a game, and well-rested, happy teams tend to create better products. New content may roll out at a slower pace, but taking a more relaxed and focused approach to polishing Arc Raiders will ultimately result in a superior game—the latest "Frozen Trail" update has already shown the effectiveness of this strategy.
"For us, establishing a development framework that safeguards creative freedom while maintaining a healthy work-life balance is crucial," Glendal added. "If we consider the product's long-term perspective—not just incremental small updates, but the overall direction—we cannot do without these talented individuals. After all, they are the ones who originally created Arc Raiders."