ARC Raiders was a new game reveal at The Game Awards 2021, and while details are still a bit scarce, some world-building has already been teased, including information on some of the game's characters. The game from new developer Embark Studios will be a cooperative third-person shooter, which pits players against a machine army invading from outer space. Players will take on the role of a Raider fighting against the machines, but it's so far unclear whether or not they'll be any specific character in the ARC Raiders universe, or if the game will have custom characters.
A cobbled-together early warning system lets the Raiders know when the next wave of the machine invasion is coming. Known as ARC, the robots appear relentless and answer opposition by the Raiders with even more force. It would appear that ARC Raiders uses this narrative justification to fuel its horde gameplay, with increasingly difficult waves of ARC machines descending from the sky.
The enemies may be machines, but ARC Raiders hopes to innovate by using machine learning to bring its robots' AI believable reactions to its environment. The setting is clearly at least somewhat in the future, as evidenced by the space-faring robots with a proclivity for genocide, but also because one of the revealed characters is referred to as a "droid" on the ARC Raiders website. This droid character is just one of two that have been revealed, the other being a human.
ARC Raiders Revealed Character - Celeste
Celeste seems to be an archetypal character in ARC Raiders, with a history not uncommon in the game's setting. She "lost everything to ARC" and has now found a new family and home amongst the Raiders, the remnants of humanity. She's featured heavily in the explosive ARC Raiders gameplay trailer, and will likely be a major character in the game's story - in whatever form that may take.
ARC Raiders Revealed Character - Lance
Lance is a character that so far serves to make the ARC Raiders setting a bit more complicated. He's a droid that fights against the invading machines, bringing an interesting dynamic to the story. As a proficient scavenger and tinkerer, Lance uses the components of destroyed ARC machines to make new weaponry. With presumably plenty of robots being decommissioned by his handiwork, Lance is targeted by ARC just like his human companions. Lance supposedly has a keen sense of style, since according to the ARC Raiders website, he's put on a fashion show that is remembered fondly.
Source: ARC Raiders