ARC Raiders seemingly cracked letting pirates play online even without buying game

Despite being an always-online multiplayer game, ARC Raiders may have just been cracked. The pirates are saying that they can even matchmake with players using purchased copies.

One of the biggest multiplayer games of 2025 may have just been cracked by pirates. Embark Studios' ARC Raiders is the game in question, and surprisingly enough, the responsible parties are claiming that players who have not bought the game are able to matchmake into legitimate matches that are populated by players with purchased copies.

The crack, or the workaround to bypass the authentication systems, seems to originate from cs.rin.ru, a forum dedicated to bypassing DRM systems and piracy. The exploit seems to target the latest update that hit ARC Raiders today, January 13, just as it crossed the 12 million players mark.

ARC Raiders does not use any high-profile DRM systems like Denuvo Anti-Tamper for protection against pirates. Being an online game, the title only seems to authenticate players using Embark IDs from the studio's own systems. It does utilize multiple anti-cheat technologies like Denuvo Anti-Cheat and Easy Anti-Cheat to try and keep the experience a fair one across platforms.

Developed by Embark Studios, ARC Raiders is an always-online, multiplayer-only experience. Landing as a more laid-back extraction shooter game, the game has players jumping into massive maps looking for various resources, with both robots and other players being possible hostiles.

A Reddit thread in the /r/Piracy subreddit is already spreading the message about this ARC Raiders debacle. While many commenters in the space are excited about the development, there are already some voices calling for Embark to patch the exploit and keep the pirates out. Considering the multiplayer focus of the game and crossplay with consoles, an influx of players using pirated copies could quickly devolve the experience, especially if they do not care about losing their accounts for cheating. ARC Raiders usually costs $40 to purchase.

If the crack and its online claims are legitimate, Embark Studios is sure to take action to block the exploit with future updates.

Neowin does not recommend or promote using such unofficial and pirated ways of activation.