Embark Studios has continued looking for ways to improve ARC Raiders since its release, regularly rolling out updates with new content, gameplay changes, and fixes. One of its biggest updates yet arrived yesterday in the form of Frozen Trail, also known as version 2.0, and it appears to have given players a strong reason to return.

ARC Raiders has been dealing with a steady decline in players over the past several months. The game once had more than 400,000 concurrent players on Steam, but its numbers have been dropping month after month since December 2025. Last month, it recorded only 33,543 concurrent players, showing just how much activity had fallen compared to its earlier highs.

Huge player spike for ARC Raiders on Steam

However, things changed significantly following the release of Frozen Trail on October 8. According to SteamDB data, ARC Raiders reached a peak of 131,388 concurrent players on Steam on October 8, making it the game’s highest player count in around six months. The last time its numbers were around this level was back in April, around the Riven Tides update.

That’s a significant jump compared to where ARC Raiders was only a month ago, and the timing makes it clear that the new update has brought plenty of players back. Frozen Trail introduces a large amount of fresh content rather than simply focusing on balance changes and bug fixes, giving returning players several new things to experience.

The update isn’t the only reason behind the sudden spike, though. ARC Raiders is also free to play from October 8 through October 12, allowing anyone interested in the extraction shooter to jump in right now. As such, we can probably expect the player count to peak even higher over the weekend period.

Frozen Trail itself brings several major additions. One of the biggest is Pendola Pass, an entirely new map featuring a Dynamic Loot Zone system that can change the value of certain areas between raids. There are also two new map conditions, Frigate and Redirection, as well as three new enemies called Bully, Skulker, and Hydra. Players have new weapons and equipment to try too, while the Skill Tree has been redesigned to provide more meaningful choices when creating different builds.

Another major addition is The Outpost, which players can unlock and expand with different modules. The update also adds new quests, a Reward Pass system, Weapon Stencils, additional items, more Stash upgrades, gameplay balancing, performance improvements, and a long list of fixes.

About the Author

Abdul Haddi

Abdul is a tech writer and Editor for PC Guide, specializing in all things tech, gaming, and hardware.