Fantasy beat ’em up Absolum brings a roguelike’s rinse and repeat formula to the arcade brawler

Bringing a +10 dmg potion to a fist fight

Image credit:Dotemu

When you die in Absolum , you are literally reborn from the glowing womb of a giant pregnant lady. This is not how beat ’em ups normally go. The newly announced left-to-right puncher from the developers of Streets Of Rage 4 plans to inject a bunch of roguelike fungus into the bulging musculature of the classic arcade brawler, then dress it in a big fantasy frog suit that’s been handcrafted by a traditional animation studio. It’s a tight squeeze, but having played an hour of a preview build, it certainly looks the part. Although I order you never to use the term “rogue ’em up” to describe it, an explosively upsetting term publisher Dotemu has cheekily tried to invent.

You play a quartet of cartoony adventurers, a bit inspired by the heroics of old Dungeons and Dragons arcade games like Shadows Over Mystara . They’re off to kill a red-masked dictator called Azra who has taken over the land and made magic illegal (he seems to have trouble policing that rule). A froggy mage and a nippy grapple-hookist are planned to appear, but I only got to play as two of the planned fightfolk - a blunderbuss-toting dwarf named Karl and warrior Galandra, who fulfills another fantasy archetype: killer with a sword as big as her own body.

They both have vanilla punch ‘n’ kicks, but also an “arcana” attack that does extra damage (provided you have the mana to cast it). I only saw one of Karl’s special gunblasts, but did unlock three of Galandra’s superwhacks: a spinning air attack, a screen-crossing wave of magic, and her default flashy upward slice. While I forgot to use them as much as I should have for keeping up pressure, they were at least effective crowd control panic buttons.

Stop. This is against the law. |Image credit:Dotemu

It handles for the most part as a beat ‘em up might. You clear the screen of enemies (goblins, hermit crabs, spearmen) and waltz ever rightward, occasionally getting face-stomped by a boss, such as a giant goblin champion or the skeleton of an accursed dwarven “Underking”. At which point its back to meet mama and try again from the start (although I’m not sure how death will work in the two-player co-op - we didn’t get to try it).

But in terms of moveset, it feels more nimble than the likes of Mother Russia Bleeds or Scott Pilgrim Vs The World . Frequent dodges put a spring in your step, and it has not one but two methods of parrying attacks. You can dodge right into an oncoming strike to “deflect” the hit, or you can attack with your own power move at the precise moment an incoming hit impacts to trigger a “clash", which leaves the enemy in a stunned state. I’ll be honest, this doubling of deflection techniques confused me at first. But after consulting with the orc woman who acts as a tutorial trainer in a very Firelinky hub zone, I did eventually figure it out.

My favourite small-yet-smashing touch in combat is the simple ability to sidestep attacks (eg. dodge into the screen) after which you can hit the attack button to slide right back in front of the enemy you just dodged. I haven’t played every beat ‘em up out there, but I haven’t seen such a simple and elegant way to get the player back onto the correct “plane” of combat they desire. So much of the beat ‘em up is about momentary depth perception, and it feels gratifying to instantly realign to a place where you can clobber who you wanna clobber. There might be those who think such agility goes beyond the trad stiffness of the arcade brawler. To them I say: stop hitting yourself.

Human troops will also fight other factions, like goblins, if on-screen at the same time. |Image credit:Dotemu

Anyway, thats all the “’em up” parts of this questionably named genre blend addressed. What about the “rogue” bit? It’s all quickly apparent. Swappable character abilities, multiple paths, back-to-the-start respawns, the gradual collecting of crystalbits to unlock new powers. Every few screens you get a choice between a couple of perks or items. I died a lot (fucking goblin champ) but in my heap of runs with swordswoman Galandra I got:

• dangerous divekick
• ring wot increases your mana
• goodness gracious great trail of fire when you dodge an attack

There were a bunch more, but my favourite was a basic flamey supplement that set baddies aflame whenever I deflected an attack. You can see how this might go together with the blazing trail - the startings of a toasty fire-based build.

Then there are the dribs and drabs of lore that trickle forth from your magical mama’s mouth with each rebirth. Her name is Uchawi, a fertility god who (along with her “root sisters”) is having none of this recent mage crackdown. There’s a dryness to the lore-heavy chatter, perhaps a case of following the cryptic world-building trends as popularised by Souls games. I kinda want to pat the characters on the shoulder and tell them to lighten up. Not least because it clashes somewhat with the colourful and expressive art direction.

That artwork is courtesy of French animation studio Supamonks, who normally stick to making trailers (eg. this one for Endless Dungeon ). Until now they haven’t worked directly on a game as developers. It’s been rewarding, they say, if challenging. It takes some readjusting to get used to the beat ’em ups ever-awkward use of perspective, for example (exactly which bushes can be punched?). And they were mildly dismayed after an early build saw a lot of their original work on the main character “put in the trash" because of changes in the game’s design. Turns out game development demands a kind of quick-footedness that isn’t ordinary for a traditional animation studio.

I died before I even saw the Underking do this flamethrower attack. GG, soil monarch. |Image credit:Dotemu

“The world of animation and video games are not working the same way,” says lead artist Maxime Mary. “Video games is very organic, you have to test what you’re going to do - sometimes it doesn’t work. In animation you have to stick to: first step, the script, then storyboarding. Everything is very linear. "

So they’ve had to pump a lot of skillpoints into agility, it seems, with a lot more back and forth between themselves and the designers at Guard Crush. And maybe they learned something in all that ducking and diving. Because it’s the animators who’ve pushed the game in its nippier direction. They didn’t want to be shackled by the groundedness of something like Streets Of Rage 4.

“We proposed as animators to explode that,” says Mary. “Can we run? Can we dash? Can we jump? The references were… outside the beat ’em up. We looked at Dead Cells and the rest. We pushed the explosivity of the poses, the fluidity of the animation, just to make sure the final look… and the movement of the gameplay was a step up compared to the classic beat ’em up.”

There are secret routes, one of which leads to a cave with this beefy fella. |Image credit:Dotemu

What can you say? They’re animators. They like when things go whoosh. I appreciate this decision, not least because it is a direct answer to every complaint I had about the otherwise sturdy Streets Of Rage 4. I liked that game for its hardy co-op bruising, but also felt it was an ultimately unambitious reheating of the arcade turkey leg. In dashing, even gingerly, upon roguelike sands, Absolum offers something that feels at least a little different in form. You can argue all you like about the roguelike steering us into a kind of video games homogeneity. But I’m glad the designers of Absolum listened to their animators. I guess if you hire an entire professional art studio to do all the combat poses for your game, you should get your money’s worth of dropkicks.

On the one hand, it’s not a foolproof idea, to smoosh together the grounded and sometimes hit-detection fussy beat ’em ups to a genre that is often about mobility, speed, and dextrous exploration. There are a lot of ways this could just feel wrong in your hands. Graham also tells me there have been mash-ups of RPG and beat ’em up in the past, notably the hideous caricatures of 2013’s Dragon’s Crown . Which is, um, quite different in art style from what Dotemu are going for. Still, the publisher is confident Absolum fits its own niche. Even if they’re still struggling to come up with a soundbite worthy way of explaining it.

The art style is inspired by French comic books, say the devs. |Image credit:Dotemu

“The lines between genre are getting blurry,” says Micke Moïsa, a producer at Dotemu. “We were thinking of how to name this genre. We thought of ‘rogue ’em up’ and things like that because it’s a mix of a lot of different things. Beat ’em up has been here for ages, people know how a beat ’em up works… so what can we take from other game genres, put it into the beat ’em up, and create something new? Something we don’t really have a name for yet.”

Whatever we call it, I refuse to utilise the suggestion of “rogue ‘em up” , which is a car crash of a moniker. There would be something batshittedly rococo about labelling it a “roguelike ‘em up” but, please, let’s not use this either, not even as a joke. Sadly, for everyone involved, the name Streets Of Rogue is already taken.

It’s fine. Probably “roguelike beat ’em up” is good enough. We’ll have time to find other words to describe the arcade-departing roguebiffs of Absolum anyway. It’s not due out until sometime later this year. I’ll take another gander when it arrives, my beat ‘em up muscles having atrophied enough to welcome this prospect, a thorough power-hosing of the genre.

Update: The original article of this story mispelled the game’s name as “Absolom” instead of the correct “Absolum”, and referred to the game as having four-player co-op, when it is really planned to have two-player co-op. We’re sorry for the errors.

Absolum

PS4 , PS5 , PC , Nintendo Switch

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All 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints and where to get them

These areas have the highest chance of giving you Blueprints

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Looking for more Arc Raiders Blueprints? It’s a special day when you find a Blueprint, as they’re among the most valuable items in Arc Raiders. If you find a Blueprint that you haven’t already found, then you must make sure you hold onto it at all costs, because Blueprints are the key to one of the most important and powerful systems of meta-progression in the game.

This guide aims to be the very best guide on Blueprints you can find, starting with a primer on what exactly they are and how they work in Arc Raiders, before delving into exactly where to get Blueprints and the very best farming spots for you to take in your search.

We’ll also go over how to get Blueprints from other unlikely activities, such as destroying Surveyors and completing specific quests. And you’ll also find the full list of all 75 Blueprints in Arc Raiders on this page (including the newest Blueprints added with the Cold Snap update , such as the Deadline Blueprint and Firework Box Blueprint), giving you all the information you need to expand your own crafting repertoire.

In this guide:

• What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?
• Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes
• Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders Blueprints obtained from quests Blueprints obtained from Trials Best Blueprint farming locations

What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?

Blueprints in Arc Raiders are special items which, if you manage to extract with them, you can expend to permanently unlock a new crafting recipe in your Workshop. If you manage to extract from a raid with an Anvil Blueprint, for example, you can unlock the ability to craft your very own Anvil Pistol, as many times as you like (as long as you have the crafting materials).

To use a Blueprint, simply open your Inventory while in the lobby, then right-click on the Blueprint and click “Learn And Consume” . This will permanently unlock the recipe for that item in your Workshop. As of the Stella Montis update, there are allegedly 75 different Blueprints to unlock - although only 68 are confirmed to be in the game so far. You can see all the Blueprints you’ve found and unlocked by going to the Workshop menu, and hitting “R” to bring up the Blueprint screen.

It’s possible to find duplicates of past Blueprints you’ve already unlocked. If you find these, then you can either sell them, or - if you like to play with friends - you can take it into a match and gift it to your friend so they can unlock that recipe for themselves. Another option is to keep hold of them until the time comes to donate them to the Expedition.

Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes

Below is the full list of all the Blueprints that are currently available to find in Arc Raiders, and the crafting recipe required for each item:

Note: The missing Blueprints in this list likely have not actually been added to the game at the time of writing, because none of the playerbase has managed to find any of them. As they are added to the game, I will update this page with the most relevant information so you know exactly how to get all 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints.

Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders

Below is a list of all containers, modifiers, and events which maximise your chances of finding Blueprints:

• Certain quests reward you with specific Blueprints .
• Completing Trials has a high chance of offering Blueprints as rewards.
• Surveyors have a decent chance of dropping Blueprints on death.
• High loot value areas tend to have a greater chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Night Raids and Storms may increase rare Blueprint spawn chances in containers.
• Containers with higher numbers of items may have a higher tendency to spawn Blueprints. As a result, Blue Gate (which has many “large” containers containing multiple items) may give you a higher chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Raider containers (Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, Medical Bags, Grenade Tubes) have increased Blueprint drop rates. As a result, the Uncovered Caches event gives you a high chance of finding Blueprints.
• Security Lockers have a higher than average chance of containing Blueprints.
• Certain Blueprints only seem to spawn under specific circumstances: Tempest Blueprint only spawns during Night Raid events. Vulcano Blueprint only spawns during Hidden Bunker events. Jupiter and Equaliser Blueprints only spawn during Harvester events.

Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, and other raider-oriented container types have a good chance of offering Blueprints. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints have a very low chance of spawning in any container in Arc Raiders, around 1-2% on average. However, there is a higher chance of finding Blueprints in particular container types. Specifically, you can find more Blueprints in Raider containers and security lockers.

Beyond this, if you’re looking for Blueprints you should focus on regions of the map which are marked as having particularly high-value loot. Areas such as the Control Tower in Dam Battlegrounds, the Arrival and Departure Buildings in Spaceport, and Pilgrim’s Peak in Blue Gate all have a better-than-average chance of spawning Blueprints somewhere amongst all their containers. Night Raids and Electromagnetic Storm events also increase the drop chances of certain Blueprints .

In addition to these containers, you can often loot Blueprints from destroyed Surveyors - the largest of the rolling ball ARC. Surveyors are more commonly found on the later maps - Spaceport and Blue Gate - and if one spawns in your match, you’ll likely see it by the blue laser beam that it casts into the sky while “surveying”.

Surveyors are quite well-armoured and will very speedily run away from you once it notices you, but if you can take one down then make sure you loot all its parts for a chance of obtaining certain unusual Blueprints.

Blueprints obtained from quests

One way in which you can get Blueprints is by completing certain quests for the vendors in Speranza. Some quests will reward you with a specific item Blueprint upon completion, so as long as you work through all the quests in Arc Raiders, you are guaranteed those Blueprints.

Here is the full list of all Blueprints you can get from quest rewards:

• Trigger Nade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Sparks Fly”.
• Lure Grenade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Greasing Her Palms”.
• Burletta Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Industrial Espionage”.
• Hullcracker Blueprint (and Launcher Ammo Blueprint): Rewarded after completing “The Major’s Footlocker”.

Alas, that’s only 4 Blueprints out of a total of 75 to unlock, so for the vast majority you will need to find them yourself during a raid. If you’re intent on farming Blueprints, then it’s best to equip yourself with cheap gear in case you lose it, but don’t use a free loadout because then you won’t get a safe pocket to stash any new Blueprint you find. No pain in Arc Raiders is sharper than failing to extract with a new Blueprint you’ve been after for a dozen hours already.

One of the best ways to get Blueprints is by hitting three stars on all five Trials every week. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints obtained from Trials

One of the very best ways to get Blueprints is as rewards for completing Trials in Arc Raiders. Trials are unlocked from Level 15 onwards, and allow you to earn rewards by focusing on certain tasks over the course of several raids. For example, one Trial might task you with dealing damage to Hornets, while another might challenge you to loot Supply Drops.

Trials refresh on a weekly basis, with a new week bringing five new Trials. Each Trial can offer up to three rewards after passing certain score milestones, and it’s possible to receive very high level loot from these reward crates - including Blueprints. So if you want to unlock as many Blueprints as possible, you should make a point of completing as many Trials as possible each week.

Best Blueprint farming locations

The very best way to get Blueprints is to frequent specific areas of the maps which combine high-tier loot pools with the right types of containers to search. Here are my recommendations for where to find Blueprints on every map, so you can always keep the search going for new crafting recipes to unlock.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Dam Battlegrounds

The best places to farm Blueprints on Dam Battlegrounds are the Control Tower, Power Generation Complex, Ruby Residence, and Pale Apartments . The first two regions, despite only being marked on the map as mid-tier loot, contain a phenomenal number of containers to loot. The Control Tower can also contain a couple of high-tier Security Lockers - though of course, you’ll need to have unlocked the Security Breach skill at the end of the Survival tree.

There’s also a lot of reporting amongst the playerbase that the Residential areas in the top-left of the map - Pale Apartments and Ruby Residence - give you a comparatively strong chance of finding Blueprints. Considering their size, there’s a high density of containers to loot in both locations, and they also have the benefit of being fairly out of the way. So you’re more likely to have all the containers to yourself.

Buried City

The best Blueprint farming locations on Buried City are the Santa Maria Houses, Grandioso Apartments, Town Hall, and the various buildings of the New District . Grandioso Apartments has a lower number of containers than the rest, but a high chance of spawning weapon cases - which have good Blueprint drop rates. The others are high-tier loot areas, with plenty of lootable containers - including Security Lockers.

Spaceport

The best places to find Blueprints on Spaceport are the Arrival and Departure Buildings, as well as Control Tower A6 and the Launch Towers . All these areas are labelled as high-value loot regions, and many of them are also very handily connected to one another by the Spaceport wall, which you can use to quickly run from one area to the next. At the tops of most of these buildings you’ll find at least one Security Locker, so this is an excellent farming route for players looking to find Blueprints.

The downside to looting Blueprints on Spaceport is that all these areas are hotly contested, particularly in Duos and Squads. You’ll need to be very focused and fast in order to complete the full farming route.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blue Gate

Blue Gate tends to have a good chance of dropping Blueprints, potentially because it generally has a high number of containers which can hold lots of items; so there’s a higher chance of a Blueprint spawning in each container. In my experience, the best Blueprint farming spots on Blue Gate are Pilgrim’s Peak, Raider’s Refuge, the Ancient Fort, and the Underground Complex beneath the Warehouse .

All of these areas contain a wealth of containers to loot. Raider’s Refuge has less to loot, but the majority of the containers in and around the Refuge are raider containers, which have a high chance of containing Blueprints - particularly during major events.

Stella Montis

On the whole, Stella Montis seems to have a very low drop rate for Blueprints (though a high chance of dropping other high-tier loot). If you do want to try farming Blueprints on this map, the best places to find Blueprints in Stella Montis are Medical Research, Assembly Workshop, and the Business Center . These areas have the highest density of containers to loot on the map.

In addition to this, the Western Tunnel has a few different Security Lockers to loot, so while there’s very little to loot elsewhere in this area of the map, it’s worth hitting those Security Lockers if you spawn there at the start of a match.

That wraps up this primer on how to get all the Blueprints in Arc Raiders as quickly as possible. With the Expedition system constantly resetting a large number of players’ Blueprints, it’s more important than ever to have the most up-to-date information on where to find all these Blueprints.

While you’re here, be sure to check out our Arc Raiders best guns tier list , as well as our primers on the best skills to unlock and all the different Field Depot locations on every map.

ARC Raiders

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

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