Some ARC Raiders Players Are Using the Game’s Config Files to Cheat

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Players of the PC game ARC Raiders discovered a way to increase their field of view by changing a hidden setting. This gave them a significant advantage in the game. The issue was caused by a recent update, but the developers at Embark Studios have already released a fix.

Since its launch, ARC Raiders, like many popular online games, has dealt with players cheating. Over time, a lot of this cheating has been linked to paid programs sold online that give players unfair advantages. Sometimes, though, cheating happens by accident, and players quickly exploit the situation. Recently, this happened when players discovered and misused some settings related to field of view.

Recently Discovered ARC Raiders Exploit Allowed Ridiculous FOV

So, over the past week or so, people started figuring out how to mess with the field of view in ARC Raiders. It got pretty bad – I started seeing cheaters on Twitch with ridiculously wide FOVs, clearly exploiting it. Game Rant checked out some videos, and it looks like the new Stella Montis map was hit the hardest. It wasn’t because it was harder to cheat on anywhere else, but because Stella Montis is designed for a lot of player-versus-player combat. That means any advantage, even a cheat, is super valuable there, so that’s probably why we saw so many cheaters flocking to that map.

Embark Reportedly Already Fixed ARC Raiders FOV Exploit

Dominik Bošnjak / Game Rant

Embark Studios quickly addressed a cheating issue in ARC Raiders that allowed players to unfairly change their field of view. According to a notice on the game’s Discord server, they found a solution as early as January 10th, just a day after the exploit became widely known. The problem stemmed from an accidental ability to use a hidden command, originally intended for internal use, in the PC version of the game. Embark has already released a patch to fix this specific method, and they are continuing to monitor the game for any similar exploits that may still exist.

Changing the field of view (FOV) was just one way players could unfairly improve their gameplay using console commands, if they knew how. The game, built with Unreal Engine 5, allowed players to disable things like shadows, dust, and fog through the console, which made it easier to see opponents in competitive shooting games. On PC, enabling the console was as simple as changing a settings file. While this isn’t uncommon, developers usually prevent it by disabling console access in the game. Although ARC Raiders typically blocks console access with updates, this safeguard was accidentally left out of the latest patch.

This feature was never meant to be player-facing.

It’s still unknown exactly how many players were impacted by cheaters in ARC Raiders who took advantage of this glitch. While the fact that the exploit showed up on Twitch suggests it was happening for a while, it’s hard to determine its specific impact because the game already had widespread cheating problems. Embark Studios, the game’s developer, is reportedly giving refunds to players who lost items in matches with confirmed cheaters, but this process seems uneven and relies on the studio being able to identify those cheaters after the fact.

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2026-01-11 03:04