ARC Raiders has almost nothing in the way of peer-to-peer trading, unlike the leading extraction game in the space. At the top of the table sits Escape from Tarkov, but it’s fast being rivalled by Embark Studios’ new extraction adventure game that was released in October 2025.
Once upon a time, Embark Studios planned to closely rival Escape from Tarkov with one major mechanic: an in-game ‘auction house’. With this, players would have been able to buy and sell items for tokens, trading with other players as they saw fit. The feature was ultimately scrapped, but why?
Why Does ARC Raiders Not Have Trading?
ARC Raiders players are free to venture into Speranza’s storefronts and secure all kinds of items. They can buy explosives, weapons, crafting materials, augments, healing items, and much more. But that’s where the trading system in ARC Raiders ends, and for some, it’s to the detriment of the game.
Escape from Tarkov, the spearhead extraction game that has been around for a decade, operates a ‘Flea Market’ that players can use to buy and sell almost anything to other players. It’s a core part of the game, and it makes some things, like building kits, completing quests, and securing rare items, much easier.
Fans of the all-new extraction game from Embark Studios have often wondered why there’s no Flea Market mechanic in ARC Raiders, and in a recent interview, it was revealed that it almost happened.
Speaking to Games Radar, Virgil Watkins, design lead on ARC Raiders, explained that an auction house nearly surfaced in the full game:
We’re not building an auction house or anything like that. Currently, I think it’s more leaning into the aspect of social facilitation in that sense of our design.
We put a lot of very, very deliberate effort into making the game about the items. We previously explored and even partially built a trading system like an auction house. But what it ended up doing is it turned the game into just being about coins.
ARC Raiders thrives on RNG loot, and that means that no two raids are guaranteed to be the same. Every new room, every box opened is a fresh opportunity, and that sense of finding something rare in a container offers a sizeable dopamine hit for players. The ability to saunter into a P2P trading platform and just buy that thing negates that feeling entirely.
There’s also a keen focus on building workbenches and crafting items in ARC Raiders, and while you can do that in Escape from Tarkov, and must to complete some tasks, having the Flea Market there takes away from the importance of crafting a little.
Battlestate Games, Escape from Tarkov’s developer, has spent years tuning the Flea Market and trying to balance it. When the game hit 1.0 in November, it came with an optimization that locked down much of the trading function until players reached certain level milestones.
For instance, you can’t trade keys until you’re at least level 25 in Escape from Tarkov.
Perhaps ARC Raiders can one day take on peer-to-peer trading as a way for players to lighten their load or spend an excess of cash on things they want but can’t find. For now, it remains an issue that kind of promotes RMT (real-money trading), and that’s another problem for ARC Raiders fans everywhere.
Do you want an in-game trading platform like this in ARC Raiders? Let us know on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
For more Insider Gaming coverage, check out the news that Ubisoft has teased new Far Cry 60 FPS updates
Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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