From 2K to PTSD: Vance Enters Arc Raiders

This week on Good2Game Radio, Tony, Vance, and Jaime dive headfirst into the beautiful chaos that is Arc Raiders—a game that doubles as a looter-shooter and a full-blown social experiment. Vance graduates from rookie hand-holding to level-30 menace, only to discover betrayal, “friendly” strangers, and the sacred art of getting shot in the back during boss fights. The crew debates PvE vs PvP, weekend warriors, rats (the human kind), and why trusting anyone in Arc Raiders is a terrible life choice. Loot is lost, lessons are learned, and nobody puts their gun away again.

Transcript

00:00.70
Tony Sisk
Hi folks, welcome back to good to game radio. Welcome to the, uh, Arc Raiders pod tonight. I've got, uh, Vance Vance.

00:13.91
Tony Sisk
How you doing?

00:15.74
Sentfrmheaven
I'm doing good. I am doing good, man. I'm almost done with this sickness. I'm fighting it.

00:22.42
Tony Sisk
Yeah. Right. Sick, sick of the pain being inflicted on you from other people. Uh,

00:31.64
Sentfrmheaven
Right. Right.

00:33.97
Tony Sisk
So Vance you picked up Ark Raiders about you know a week or so ago and you finally were able to to jump in get a few a few hours in I think you we played today and I think you said you were already at level 30 so you have definitely put in some time over the last few days and

00:49.85
Sentfrmheaven
Yes.

00:55.72
Sentfrmheaven
Yep.

01:00.63
Tony Sisk
what are you So what are your thoughts? What are your thoughts now that you've got to feel? yeah We kind of had it we we kinda had to do some hand-holding there the first couple of days, you know kind of walk you through things and stuff.

01:08.12
Sentfrmheaven
Right. Right. in

01:11.63
Tony Sisk
But now I feel like you're up and running. So what are your thoughts?

01:17.91
Sentfrmheaven
Oh. my initial thought was, okay, this is, you know, like a lot to unpack, to figure out, like to, to navigate the arc rare to society. And the first time we played, um honestly, like my, my, my take, like, know, you know, I went back to work and talked to guys and said, man, I said, I felt bad for Tony because he had to hold my hand through the process of, you know, just a, you know, and, and it's, it's born holding somebody's hand, you know, like it just is like, that's just the reality the situation. said, you know what?

01:53.06
Sentfrmheaven
I'm going to do my part and I'm going to look and see what, see what I can, you know, like kind of do myself and, You know, just just kind of like get into the swing of things. And I mean, like, a my initial thought is I love the concept of the game.

02:07.45
Sentfrmheaven
um It is a great, a great, a great, a great community game. So if you can, know, get a group, man of threes or you know, woman of three teams or whatever, like, it's going to be great. It's going to be around for the long haul. Like, it's going to be one of them Destiny cult games, but a whole lot bigger follow.

02:29.51
Tony Sisk
Right. So let's ah let's get Jaime in here. Jaime's joining us. We were just doing like a 10-minute pod on arc Raiders and listened to Vance's ah experience over the last week now that he has about 15 hours into the game.

02:47.67
Tony Sisk
So, Jaime, welcome to the Arc Raiders update pod. So...

02:58.17
Tony Sisk
And while he's working on his audio, so, ah Vance, ah what's the what's the ah what's the maddest you've been in the last couple of days?

03:15.71
Tony Sisk
I feel like this is a required question when you're but talking about Ark Raiders.

03:21.11
Sentfrmheaven
Yeah, um so going through online comments and when people talk about rats, okay, when i think about rats, i think about people that are waiting at the expir. You know, that's that's that's what I feel like You know, they talk about people who are just waiting at the exfil and, you know, trying to shoot you. Because, you know, we have that happen a couple times, whatever.

03:41.34
Sentfrmheaven
But no. We ran into some big New York sewer fighting bird rats. So, for the people that know, you know, we're fighting, I forget what it's called. But it's the big machine, not the bomber there.

03:56.58
Tony Sisk
matriarch

03:57.61
Sentfrmheaven
The matriarch. And we're fighting. And there's another guy fighting. Mind you, before we started fighting, we ran past this guy. And, you know, we did the don't shoot. He responded, don't shoot. Everybody was doing their part and taking out this matriarch because if we take it down, it helps the whole boy. It helps everybody involved.

04:14.65
Sentfrmheaven
hu Tony says, hey, you hear that machine gun fire? And I'm like, yeah, I think it's the guy that we passed that's doing the shooting. No, chap. It was two dudes in our back shooting us as we're fighting the matriarch.

04:29.80
Sentfrmheaven
I'm like, why? You know, like, why? Like, why? Like, there was literally no reason, no threat whatsoever. It's like, this is the first time I've experienced it. It's like, you know, usually it may be some some ah some backstabbing after we kill it, after everybody's looted.

04:51.54
Sentfrmheaven
I get that because somebody have got something that you need whatever. But during the fight, oh, but I got so quiet. I'm just like...

05:01.82
Tony Sisk
Yeah.

05:05.27
Tony Sisk
This is one of those things. Why? How dumb are you as a player? Like the whole board, usually 90% of the time, 99% of the time, everybody's working together to take down this boss team.

05:22.50
Tony Sisk
everybody's working together to take down this boss Enemy. And it takes everybody. To take it down. And when you take it down. There's plenty of loot.

05:35.44
Tony Sisk
There's some really really good legendary loot. Not everybody can get. Right. There's only like three four of those pieces. That will drop. So not everybody's going to get it. You got 20 people running up and looting at the same time.

05:47.96
Tony Sisk
Right. But why would you kill people. As they're trying to take this thing down. Because. the loot that you're going to get off the bodies of the people that you shot in the back is not going to be near as good as what you're going to be able to get off the main boss character.

06:10.65
Tony Sisk
But you're not going to get a chance to do that because you just killed the people that were trying, that were going to kill it. So the, the levels, there's so many levels of like idiocracy, uh,

06:27.74
Tony Sisk
ah That is just hard to explain. It's like the whole game is a social experiment on people and how they behave. And like, yeah, you kill me. Yeah, good for you.

06:41.69
Tony Sisk
You got some bandages and the same gun you probably already had. so But you missed out on an opportunity to get something you you probably needed to advance the game.

06:54.20
Tony Sisk
But, you know we've seen this. I've seen this. There's a lot of people that are coming into the game that that's what they get their kicks on is just ruining people's day. So this is the perfect game for them. They can come in and they can grief people.

07:08.82
Tony Sisk
By shooting them in the back. So there's going to be people that get lots of kicks out of that. So. um It's just something you have to deal with. Fortunately it's not something. As far as when you're killing a matriarch.

07:22.63
Tony Sisk
I've only had that happen to me twice. um So. More often than not. everybody on the map is great. Even when you take it down, you would think there would be a bloodbath when everybody runs up to try and grab stuff. But more often than not, it is not.

07:41.37
Tony Sisk
People ah share the loot and and there's no fragging each other ah as you're trying to loot and stuff like that. More often than not.

07:52.43
Tony Sisk
i'm sure there's a I'm sure there's people out there who have done that. so ah yeah So, yeah. So, uh, you experienced, uh, you experienced that shooting in the back today.

08:04.41
Tony Sisk
Was it today yesterday that happened? It was today.

08:06.81
Sentfrmheaven
Today.

08:07.51
Tony Sisk
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

08:07.58
Sentfrmheaven
Today. Yep.

08:08.54
Tony Sisk
So, but you know, it, and it's some days it's really bad.

08:08.86
Sentfrmheaven
ye and right

08:12.89
Tony Sisk
It's really bad on weekends. I don't know what it is about weekend players, but I'm,

08:19.90
Sentfrmheaven
Yep.

08:20.12
Tony Sisk
i

08:21.43
Sentfrmheaven
You know, it's just one of the things where like the time of day that it was, it's like, okay. Just like you said, it's a social experiment. A social experiment.

08:32.67
Sentfrmheaven
Everybody's back to school. So these are grown Adults doing this. Not little kids, is not not people that are like 10, 12 years old. was like, hey, man, you know, these are grown or adults who probably got a day from work or probably not even working.

08:50.26
Sentfrmheaven
You know, some college kids or something just like hey let's shoot him in the back because I've never aimed. You know, it's funny. Like I've I've I've stayed and and kind of watched whatever like that.

09:02.75
Sentfrmheaven
I've never seen anybody survive. So if we were outside, you know, just like the one guy was fighting that and they would have did that. Like they wouldn't have survived. Like, you know, even able to get loot.

09:13.66
Sentfrmheaven
But I'm just like, just like you said, like you didn't get anything worthwhile, you know? And I'm like, you know what? Whatever. You know what saying? Like now, ah now I know, but it's, it's all good. It's all good.

09:29.19
Jaime G
Gotta love it, guys.

09:30.42
Tony Sisk
there you go got that audio working ah where is Jaime where is

09:31.99
Jaime G
I know, right?

09:32.02
Sentfrmheaven
Hey, a Hey, we need Jaime.

09:34.26
Jaime G
Right.

09:35.54
Sentfrmheaven
We need Jaime out there gunning.

09:36.52
Jaime G
Hey, I was late. Producer Vance was already, I had missed my my ah my time with Producer Vance to get my audio set up proper.

09:49.02
Tony Sisk
no it's funny Vance it's interesting because like your background on call of duty i've seen your competitiveness in basketball and stuff i thought for sure that when you started playing arc raiders that um that you would be emphasizing pvp uh based on your your personality traits in other games but to hear you talk about man i'm trying to get work done people up here shooting me

10:20.90
Jaime G
Thank

10:21.20
Tony Sisk
I'm like, okay, there's a little PVE advance, a little, I want to, I want to do the quest. I want to get the, I want to build something whatever. I'm surprised. So yeah. So there's a, there's a, there's a, a shift that I did not expect to see.

10:38.62
Tony Sisk
What do you got to say for yourself? Yeah.

10:40.70
Sentfrmheaven
yeah Well, so, you know, um my dad always said a wise man increases his learning. So, you know, like I talked to you about Arc Raiders. I watch you play Arc Raiders.

10:53.02
Sentfrmheaven
So I understand there is a time for PVP. There's a time for PVE. I was only a level, you know, really like 10 getting into it, whatever like that. So that's the time for PVE because now I understand why people, you know, was working so hard to upgrade their gun bench because now I can make better weapons, you know, stronger weapons, you know, like I can i can take on the bigger guys, like, you know, the Matriarch and get legendary pieces to handle business, you know? So that's why, you know, I was like...

11:23.13
Sentfrmheaven
Okay. And then also my stash. So my goal is to get, you know, my, uh, my character into expedition so I can get more slots because you fill up fast and it costs a lot to, you know, you know, uh, expand your stash.

11:38.46
Sentfrmheaven
So, but once I get the way I need to be, Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I'm coming back with blood in the eyes. I'm coming back for everything they took from me.

11:49.14
Tony Sisk
Right. Okay. Well, so it's good to see you on there playing and we're starting to see a lot more people that we work with playing, been doing duos, trios, you know, people watching the streams on Twitch. You know, i've had a lot of people at work comment, you know, hey, I've been watching you play on Ark Raiders.

12:09.91
Tony Sisk
We need to play together. so those are those are ah those are great. It's ah great to have those conversations and and hear about people enjoying watching the streams and seeing us get you know ambushed and killed. And and people agree, Burrell, you did not say anything when those guys jumped us.

12:31.29
Tony Sisk
Not anything. ah

12:33.43
Sentfrmheaven
Nothing. All he was talking about was the robot. That's it.

12:36.47
Tony Sisk
Oh, you said it was a robot. Man, this robot's shooting me. you come across Come around the corner to help him out.

12:39.93
Sentfrmheaven
All

12:43.26
Tony Sisk
get shot by dudes that he said nothing about. So I have witnesses on the stream who've watched the stream and said, man, he didn't say anything. So Terrell, we got to work on this communication.

12:56.04
Tony Sisk
All right.

12:57.40
Sentfrmheaven
to work on it.

12:57.66
Tony Sisk
ah All right. So thanks. for That's it. Really. We just wanted to kind of get this short pod out there and let everybody know that Vance is playing Arc Raiders. And if you're not playing Arc Raiders, then you should be playing Arc Raiders.

13:10.34
Tony Sisk
I mean,

13:11.75
Sentfrmheaven
Jaime.

13:11.86
Tony Sisk
ah

13:12.18
Jaime G
i I'm sorry.

13:13.34
Tony Sisk
We were in a Mexican standoff the other day and we didn't have our Mexican.

13:13.58
Jaime G
I'm sorry. But

13:19.45
Jaime G
i it's very critical that you have one of those, Van, if you're going to have a ah proper Mexican standoff.

13:19.70
Sentfrmheaven
And they knew it.

13:22.84
Tony Sisk
Right. It gives us as an advantage. It gives gives us an advantage.

13:25.95
Jaime G
Yeah.

13:26.36
Tony Sisk
And I know.

13:27.35
Jaime G
but I don't know if you get an advantage, but you you just do it right.

13:34.14
Tony Sisk
Did you guys watch the video I sent to you um on what is a Mexican standoff?

13:38.62
Jaime G
Yes, I did.

13:40.60
Tony Sisk
ah

13:41.88
Sentfrmheaven
Oh, man. oh hey

13:44.70
Jaime G
i found I found it to be quite educational, to be honest.

13:48.82
Tony Sisk
Yeah.

13:51.42
Tony Sisk
So yeah.

13:52.25
Jaime G
um I'm going to say something here now. I jumped in late to this conversation. i have seen a shift in the force. i It went from like Vance is playing 2K26 every day in the evenings.

14:06.81
Jaime G
So like this whole week, and i was like, Tony, what are you going be playing? Tony, what are you going to doing this? Tony, let's play art creators. And I'm like, am am I the only one who's missing out on this gold mine of a game or what's up?

14:22.75
Sentfrmheaven
You are missing out. Jaime, let me tell you, you are missing out. You are absolutely missing out.

14:28.06
Tony Sisk
yeah i liked your and I like your analogy.

14:28.99
Sentfrmheaven
All

14:30.86
Tony Sisk
There's been a shift in the force.

14:33.05
Jaime G
Exactly.

14:33.41
Tony Sisk
It's like Obi-Wan on the Millennium Falcon.

14:33.76
Jaime G
Exactly.

14:36.33
Tony Sisk
you know yeah

14:37.78
Sentfrmheaven
right.

14:38.04
Tony Sisk
ah just i felt i felt something. like that's That's the entire NBA 2K crowd feeling Vance not logging in.

14:49.82
Jaime G
Right.

14:51.48
Sentfrmheaven
Yeah, because there's people that I play with.

14:51.99
Jaime G
I don't know.

14:53.49
Sentfrmheaven
it' It's funny because there's people that play with from 2K and, ah um you know, Arc Radius. It's like, man, you don't play 2K anymore?

15:04.06
Sentfrmheaven
It has to be like, you know, like one of the ones where it's like, sometimes I'll i'll load it up, you know, I'll just go back Arc Radius. Like, no, I'm not even going to dabble in it.

15:13.40
Jaime G
Yeah, you're you're like, that ship has sailed.

15:16.02
Sentfrmheaven
That ship has sailed. I'm like, Arc Raider is like, not even just one of those trendy games, but it's a really, a really, really, really great built game.

15:29.24
Sentfrmheaven
Like, you know, you just have to understand there's three different types of players. There's the PvP, there's the PvE, and then there's the ones that just are just trolling. Like, they're just out there, like, not even doing nothing.

15:41.34
Sentfrmheaven
They're just out there. You know? But...

15:45.21
Tony Sisk
theyre they're this ah It's almost like Fortnite. The early, early days of Fortnite. People are trying to figure it out and stuff. and It's like...

15:55.48
Jaime G
Thank you.

15:56.25
Tony Sisk
what is this and then it just kind of like sticks with you and yeah there's there's a certain skill level involved in this game it's not as like uh up in your face with the building and stuff like people who could build in fortnite had the advantage i i feel that there's something like that here we just like i don't know what it is yet like But there's something it's I think it's it's got the to deal with the crafting of the more advanced gear sets and stuff. I think that that is.

16:31.19
Tony Sisk
That is something, but it's just the overall. The whole way the world, the whole world is kind of built. and the And how people kind of work with each other and or not.

16:44.63
Tony Sisk
the the the the friction that can exist and that in the gameplay where you don't even trust somebody. Like, why are you standing behind me? Like I had like, what?

16:55.00
Jaime G
i think that's I think that's why you want to play like white the crew here has been wanting to play with people you know because you kind of hope you're not going to get double-crossed.

17:05.53
Tony Sisk
Right. It really enforces those social bonds that you already have. Because like, you know, you don't always trust the people you run into, even though they might be friendly, ah apparently friendly. You just don't know. Like one of them going to shoot you. so Because there's been times when somebody acted like they were friendly and then they shot you.

17:29.27
Tony Sisk
So it's like, i don't I just can't trust you.

17:29.76
Sentfrmheaven
Right. Right. Right.

17:31.30
Tony Sisk
like I ran into a guy after he got off today, Vance. I did some just looting because I was trying to get back some stuff that I had lost. And I ran into one of the buildings on the damn battlegrounds. And i heard a whole bunch of shooting coming from this building. Now, typically, I would not have gone into that building.

17:49.72
Tony Sisk
But because I was running a whole bunch of cheap stuff anyway, was like, okay, if I die, then I die. No big deal.

17:56.70
Jaime G
so So you're running towards fire.

17:56.82
Tony Sisk
So I go in. I ran toward fire, which is, you generally breaks one of our rules, right? I ran toward fire, ran into the building, saw a guy at the of the hallway.

18:03.85
Jaime G
Yeah.

18:08.98
Tony Sisk
He looked at me and he's like, I'm friendly. He's like, I'm friendly. and I'm like, yeah, sure you are. And then he's like, I'm friendly. I'm friendly.

18:19.82
Tony Sisk
He's like, put your gun away. I'm like, really? I've never actually heard somebody say, put my gun away. I'm like, I was like, really? I'm like, okay.

18:34.20
Tony Sisk
So put my gun away just to see what he would do. And then he was like, okay, cool. He's like, thanks, man. Then he took off. I'm like, I wonder if I am I the first person to actually put my gun away?

18:46.26
Tony Sisk
Makes me wonder. Like,

18:50.49
Tony Sisk
about ah How many times he's been shot for saying that just for saying that I'm like, who's going to put my gun away?

18:50.72
Sentfrmheaven
Right.

18:56.65
Tony Sisk
Like, that's pretty trusting.

18:57.37
Sentfrmheaven
Right.

18:57.97
Tony Sisk
I don't even know who you are. i'm like now that somebody is going to hear that they're going to go out there.

19:01.01
Sentfrmheaven
Right.

19:02.18
Tony Sisk
I'm going ask people to put their gun away and then I'm going to shoot them. ah

19:07.61
Sentfrmheaven
hey But, man, you know, it just just just thinking of like different experiences we had today. So, homie, like ah Tony, um he had to step away. so So, I had to go get like something from pharmacy, but like that, but he's catching up to me.

19:21.30
Sentfrmheaven
So, there was a guy that came into my building and he was like, oh man, you scared me. He was like, a no, don't shoot. I said, yeah, cool. All right. So, he runs out the building. So, I run out and I go to the left. So, we go in the opposite directions.

19:34.97
Sentfrmheaven
Two shots in the back. Bow, bow. I kept running because I'm like, well, by the time I turn around to see who's shooting, I'm going get shot a third time. So then Tony, so Tony come over there. And think he might get shot the back. He said, hey, man.

19:47.86
Sentfrmheaven
He said, ah you know, what the guy looked like. I said, i don't even know. but Like, I kept running. But Tony had downed that guy with him. his homeboy starts shooting whatever like that. so to So to say that is, you know, like Tony's saying, one of them could be friendly, one of em could be jacked up, right?

20:04.09
Sentfrmheaven
So like a game later, me and Tony, you know, we looking, oh man, two guys are down. He was like, hey, man, ah you know, there' two guys running up. said, yeah, I see him. So he's like, all right, come on, come on. He was like, so one of the guys, he's looking at me, but he's not saying nothing.

20:20.12
Sentfrmheaven
So I shot first. So Tony was already running. He was like, oh, but I didn't know you were shooting. He said, I would have shot too. But Tony was the friendly guy. I was the bad guy. yeah Like, hey, man, you may threaten the movements that I had to shoot first.

20:36.40
Sentfrmheaven
You know what I'm saying? Like, can't wait.

20:37.29
Tony Sisk
Well, I told Vance, I'm like, oh, man, I wish I'd known you were going to shoot. Because I had that guy dead to rights, man. I had my crosshairs on his head. And I had the pharaoh. I would have dropped him.

20:48.36
Tony Sisk
Probably in one shot, probably would have dropped him.

20:51.35
Sentfrmheaven
yeah man

20:52.02
Tony Sisk
But it was like, no, you said got...

20:58.05
Tony Sisk
Vance was running a freeload out and he had just done a quest. So he had an item in his backpack that he needed to get off the map with. So he said, i don't know. I got stuff in my bag.

21:08.62
Tony Sisk
and I'm like, okay, to me, I'm like, okay, we're not going to engage.

21:10.27
Sentfrmheaven
right

21:12.60
Tony Sisk
So I backed off.

21:13.05
Sentfrmheaven
i

21:13.72
Tony Sisk
And then next time hear, bam, bam, bam. I'm like, oh, you shooting? Yeah.

21:20.16
Sentfrmheaven
I was like, hey, man, he was looking at me like the guy was looking at me, man. Like, you know, like, oh, hey, man, this guy's looking threatening.

21:25.14
Jaime G
Guys, you should first ask questions later.

21:28.31
Sentfrmheaven
Right?

21:29.50
Tony Sisk
yeah anyway but yeah okay so it was fun it's run fun running advance today uh and over the last couple days bunch different times so um it's fun yeah right but yeah so we you know we could yeah we're gonna drop some more of these shorter episodes uh to talk about you know

21:33.11
Jaime G
Anyway.

21:42.10
Jaime G
I know I have the text messages to prove it.

21:46.12
Sentfrmheaven
Hymen, you got to get on, Hymen.

21:52.38
Tony Sisk
ah ah some more arc raiders so be sure to check those out anyway thanks for joining us and we'll we'll catch you guys later

22:02.85
Sentfrmheaven
Later.

22:04.09
Jaime G
Later. eder