Embark Studios is a Swedish video game developer based in Stockholm, founded in 2018 by Patrick Söderlund and a group of former EA and DICE executives. The studio came together with a pretty clear goal, push what game development could look like by leaning hard into AI-driven tools and procedural content generation. They are best known for developing The Finals and ARC Raiders.

History and Growth

Embark got its footing fast. In 2019, Nexon dropped a $96 million investment into the studio, and Nexon would eventually go on to acquire Embark outright. That backing gave the team room to build ambitiously without rushing anything out the door.

The Finals arrived in 2023 as a free-to-play multiplayer FPS built around a game show format with fully destructible environments. It was a genuine surprise, the kind of game that felt different the moment you picked it up. ARC Raiders followed on October 30, 2025, a PvPvE third-person extraction shooter set in a post-apocalyptic world where teams drop into hostile zones to scavenge while fending off robotic enemies and other players.

Notable Games

The Finals put Embark on the map. It is a team-based multiplayer FPS where the environment itself is a weapon, walls collapse, floors give out, and buildings crumble mid-match. That level of dynamic destruction is still rare in the genre, and it made The Finals stand out in a crowded space.

ARC Raiders came next and represented a significant shift in genre for the studio. It is a third-person extraction shooter where you drop into hostile zones, loot for resources, and fight your way back out against both AI enemies and other players. The game launched at $40 and has been receiving regular updates and seasonal content since release.

Development Approach

Embark has been open about treating AI and procedural generation as core parts of their workflow, not gimmicks. The studio uses these tools to move faster and build more interactive environments than a traditionally structured pipeline would allow. Both of their games reflect that in different ways, The Finals through its physics-driven destruction and ARC Raiders through its reactive world design.

The studio also self-publishes under Nexon’s ownership, which gives them more control over release timing and live service decisions than most studios their size would have.