The Maw: what’s new in PC games this week?

Blops 6, The Axis Unseen, Factorio Space Age and, you guessed it, more

Image credit:Old Book Illustrations/Carlo Chiostri

Happy this week, everybody! In my efforts to achieve the absolute tranquility needed to spend five days shovelling PC game news stories into a ravenous otherworldly monster, I often go for an early morning walk. I tend to do this while wearing my trusty, enveloping Honcho Poncho, because the UK summer is thoroughly behind us and the very air has begun to squelch. Anyway, while walking this morning I think I actually scared somebody into crossing the road. It turns out roaming around at sunrise near Halloween looking like a ringwraith is a great way to become a figure of menace. Sorry, neighbour! I’ll wear that nice top hat and opera mask from my socialite days in future. Anyway, let us FEED THE MAW.

We open Monday 21st October with a fat nourishing dollop of infrastructure: the early access launch of Railroad Corporation 2 and the debut of Factorio ’s Space Age expansion. On Tuesday 22nd October, The Axis Unseen is here to spill heavy metal all over your Skyrim , while No More Room In Hell 2 caters to the undead-fanciers. Wednesday 23rd October is the birthday of the almost offensively chillaxed picture-puzzler Wilmot Works It Out , together with sumptuous deck-and-city builder Technotopia , but perhaps you’d prefer to be a horrible fly . Thursday 24th October sees a small army of indie releases and relative obscurities weathering the blast clouds generated by the launch of Call Of Duty: Black Ops 6 - that’s smalltown Japanese life sim Shin Chan: Shiro And The Coal Town , the enchantingly dreary FPS Straftat , dynasty management RPG remake Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge Of The Seven , and Dead Cell’s dashing younger sibling Windblown . As for Friday 25th October - well, let’s keep it straightforward and pick just the one game, anime Star Foxer Rogue Flight .

Our live coverage of this event has finished.

• 08:00 am 10/25/2024 FRAWT FRIDAY
• 08:07 am 10/24/2024 THAWTFUL THURSDAY
• 07:58 am 10/23/2024 WAWFUL WEDNESDAY
• 08:12 am 10/22/2024 TAWRRIBLE TUESDAY
• 08:28 am 10/21/2024 MAWNFUL MONDAY

MAWNFUL MONDAY

The final trailer for Factorio’s Space Age expansion. We shall build ourselves a conveyor belt that girdles the universe.

Strinova is an upcoming free-to-play anime shooter in which your characters can transform into 2D objects - turning themselves sideways to shrink their profiles, or wafting through the air like paper planes. It’s got a demo.

Fachewachewa says: Tormenture releases today! It’s a cool mix of Inscryption and Adventure (the game). You’re a kid playing on your not-atari in a creepy room at night. It’s full of secrets and the cursed game obviously starts leaking into reality

Oh yeah, I should have included this one in the round-up. Seems like a goer.

Our strange bedfellows the Ian Games networkers have been talking to Black Ops 6 developers about the game’s campaign, which has apparently had more time on the hob than Modern Warfare 3’s poorly received singleplayer. “I do feel like we had good opportunities to keep crafting and recrafting the missions until we were happy with them,” says Jon Zuk, associate creative director.

Total conversion mod Fallout: Vault 13, which aimed to rebuild the original Fallout inside Fallout 4, is, alas, no longer in development.

TAWRRIBLE TUESDAY

As reported by VGC , Dave The Diver is getting some proper story DLC, and developers Mintrocket are also thinking about spin-off games for particular characters.

Dungeons Of Hinterberg has been updated with a New Game+ mode. To celebrate, it’s also 50% off on Steam till 4th November.

Here’s the launch trailer for Romancing SaGA 2: Revenge Of The Seven.

Delta Force’s open beta commences on 5th December.

The date is set: Operators can officially begin their #deltaforce journey when our Open Beta kicks off on PC from Dec 5🗓️⏳ But what do YOU want to see in the game when it launches? Let us know below👇 #DeltaForcePCOpenBeta #DeltaForceGenesis pic.twitter.com/98cAkkX9zH — Delta Force Game (@DeltaForce_Game) October 21, 2024

WAWFUL WEDNESDAY

Hark, a new trailer for the Soul Reaver remasters, showing us the redesigned bosses.

State Of Decay 2 has received its final update , as developers Undead Labs switch over to full production on State Of Decay 3. “In this update we are addressing long-standing issues, introducing various Quality of Life improvements, and permanently unlocking previously gated or seasonal content, such as the Wizard Van and Winter outfits,” they write.

Lethal Company is one year old . To celebrate, the developer has temporarily added birthday hats. Also, an “8% chance of a hoarding bug infestation”. What’s more, “buying and keeping furniture in the ship now gains you ’luck’, which is factored into the amount that the quota increases when you fulfill it.”

THAWTFUL THURSDAY

SeekerX says: In free updates to existing games – on Thursday 10/24, Slay the Princess is releasing a big update called The Pristine Cut, expanding the base game by like 35%. This sounds cool! And it totally justifies me having bought the base game and never gotten around to playing it because the friends I wanted to play it with got to it before I did. I was just saving the experience for the definitive version, really! https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1989270/view/4661877875513622264

I have yet to Slay Any Princesses despite seeing the game before launch and thinking ’this is probably going to be a Thing’. Perhaps I’ll manage to give the Pristine Cut a whirl.

Stardust Demon looks like a very swish action-platformer.

Game Developer have a lengthy insider report on the blockchain company Forte Labs’ purchase of Dauntless developers Phoenix Labs and Towers and Titans developers Rumble Games. According to unnamed former employees, Forte asked studio staff to keep the acquisition secret, even describing it as confidential information in hiring contracts. Game Developer suggests that one motivation may have been to avoid bad press regarding games with blockchain functionality.

Here’s that Dragon Age: The Veilguard launch trailer for you, then.

And here’s the early access launch trailer for Windblown, the new roguelike actioner from original Dead Cells devs Motion Twin.

FRAWT FRIDAY

A SURPRISE NEW BEHEMOTH GAME . It’s out 31st October, and it’s sort of… Flappy Birds X Lemmings with a dash of Katamari Damacy? BEHEMOTH 🥚 Announcement & Release Date Trailer Watch on YouTube

Vile is a found doc horror game from DreadXP dev Cara Cadaver in which you look through a serial killer’s computer to learn the fate of adult film star Candy Corpse. Here’s the trailer. Maybe don’t watch it if you’re feeling glum or frazzled, as it’s obviously rather disturbing. Here’s the Steam page .

Some splattergun footage from Nightdive’s remaster of The Thing video game.

As PCGamer note , Baldur’s Gate 3 does look surprisingly convincing as a first-person RPG.

A modder has recreated slicey touchscreen game Fruit Ninja as a Counter-Strike 2 aim trainer, via Percy Coswald Gamer .

I made Fruit Ninja in CS2 Workshop below pic.twitter.com/ZvAlD51e48 — Lillykyu (@LillyKyu778) October 24, 2024

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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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