Arc Raiders Sounds Incredible, But the Directional Audio Is Lying to You (And How to Fix It)
The sound design is a masterpiece, but the vertical audio is a death trap. Here is the one setting that levels the playing field.
I need to give credit where it’s due. Embark Studios has created one of the best-sounding games I have ever played. The atmosphere in Arc Raiders is thick enough to choke on. The distant whine of a drone, the crunch of snow, the terrifying bass of an orbital drop, it’s audio candy.
But there is a massive, glaring issue that is currently getting me killed, and if you’ve been to the new map, you know exactly what I’m talking about.
The directional audio, specifically the verticality, is completely broken.
The Ghost in the Basement
The moment you step into a multi-story building in Stella Montis, your ears become your worst enemy.
The game seems to struggle desperately with the Z-axis. I was looting a room on the third floor yesterday and froze because I heard footsteps directly to my right. I spun around, pre-aiming the door, heart pounding.
Nobody was there. The footsteps were loud, clear, and sounded like they were two feet away. It turns out, the other player was three floors down in the basement.
There is currently almost zero audio distinction between above, below, and next door. It flattens the entire building into a single 2D plane of noise. In a game where sound is your primary survival tool, this is a panic-inducing nightmare.
Why 'Night Mode' Is Mandatory
While we wait for Embark to tune the vertical occlusion, there is a way to mitigate the chaos. You need to go into your audio settings right now and switch your Dynamic Range to Night Mode.
I know, I know. You want the cinematic "Home Theater" experience with the booming explosions. But if you want to survive, you need compression.
Night Mode crushes the dynamic range. It makes the quiet sounds (like footsteps) louder and the loud sounds (like your own gun firing) quieter.
The Competitive Advantage
It doesn't magically fix the Z-axis bug, you’ll still hear the basement ghost, but it makes the audio information much more readable.
With the standard mix, the ambient wind and distant combat can muddy the soundscape. Night Mode brings the crucial "intel" sounds to the front. You stop getting deafened by your own grenades and start actually hearing the guy sneaking up the stairs.
It’s a bit of a "sweat" setting, stripping away some of the cinematic beauty for raw information, but in a high-stakes extraction shooter, information is everything.
Embark will likely fix the vertical audio soon. They’re good at listening to feedback. But until that patch drops, stop trusting the cinematic mix and turn on Night Mode. It’s the only way to stop chasing ghosts.