Folks are coming out of the cold and moving into… more cold… with ARC Raiders’ Frozen Trail update. It’s the one-year anniversary of the game, and it has ushered in the largest update ever, introducing a massive new map, a huge array of new weapons and ARC enemies, and renewed and revitalized gameplay mechanics.
It’s the single-biggest moment in ARC Raiders’ relatively short history, and it’s easily the most impactful turning point for the title since it hit the market last October. On Steam, the game’s player count has rocketed to a 24-hour peak of 131,388 users, and it continues to show stability as I write this breakdown.
Is ARC Raiders back?
ARC Raiders Recovers Beautifully with Frozen Trail
ARC Raiders was nursing some ill fortunes before Frozen Trail came and turned things around; that’s for sure. The game was in the pits a bit following several months of almost silence from Embark Studios. The team had committed to putting major updates on hold while it prepared Frozen Trail, but that hiatus of sorts meant that players were falling away thick and fast.
It was expected that Frozen Trail would be a revitalization point for the game, and now that it’s here, we can attest to that belief being realized.
On Steam, the game has managed a 24-hour peak player count of 131,388 users, and at the time of writing, it was still holding pretty firm. That’s the highest peak since Riven Tides, the last major update, dropped in April 2026. As we move towards the weekend, that figure could continue to grow, and there’s every potential for it to swell beyond the 200,000 mark.
That would be nice, as ARC Raiders emerged last year to an overwhelmingly positive reception, racking up millions of sales and fully disrupting the extraction space, before falling kind of flat and losing al ot of traction.
In my original ARC Raiders review, I gave the title perfect marks, stating it was the most refreshing extraction shooter ever made.
Have you returned to ARC Raiders to check out Frozen Trail? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
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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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