I'm Not To Make Friends: I Will Fill You With Bullets If I See You...

In Arc Raiders, friendship might be magic, but I'm a man of science.

This week, I mostly ignored my PC in lieu of being on holiday, and now I am filled with rage.

I'm not really a PvP boy. It's not that I'm friendly, but I am absolutely cowardly. Gimme some AI to stomp, rather than a sweaty gamer who might—god forbid—actually be better at the game than me. This is why the only extraction shooter I've really vibed with is the striking, atmospheric, PvE-only The Forever Winter. But with Arc Raiders being all anyone can talk about at the moment, I thought I should at least check it out.

Arc Raiders shares some similarities with The Forever Winter, with its biggest threats all being robotic monstrosities, and with players all serving as desperate scavengers. And I was intrigued by what I heard about the community: that murder was not the end result of every meeting of players.

But the moment I met my first group of also-humans, I went into my default mode, more than three decades of gaming teaching me to shoot first, ask questions not at all. It was a fun encounter. My group, which included PC Gamer's global EIC, Phil Savage, only survived by the skin of our teeth, as we frantically tried to come up with a strategy on the fly. I ended up downed, as did our third compatriot, but we still managed to come out on top (thanks, Phil).

This fight set the tone for the rest of my confrontations. Sometimes I'd be the hunter, unloading a clip into an unfortunate soul just trying to climb a ladder; sometimes I'd be the hunted, losing an inventory full of loot to an absolute bastard. I've yet to hear a single word being uttered in proximity chat.

I've heard some great anecdotes about impromptu battlefield friendships, but the shoot first approach—whether it's me or my opponent doing the shooting—is just as capable of generating memorable moments.

After some extremely successful (and murderous) runs, my crew had found itself stuck in a rut, culminating in a particularly depressing match where, our bags filled with loot, we duked it out with another party, put them down, and too late realised that another trio was just outside, waiting to pick off the victor with a seemingly infinite supply of grenades.

Going into the next game, we were desperate, reduced to carrying only the most basic of equipment. We needed a win, not just for our confidence, but so we could actually escape with the loot we needed to feel any sense of progression.

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Source: PC Gamer