Embark Studios’ Arc Raiders cheater purge is underway, and it appears common streamer Turner Tenney, a.ok.a. Tfue, has discovered himself in – and again out of – the road of fireplace.
The web character, who returned to common gaming content material creation for the primary time in two years in December 2025, introduced he had been hit with a 30-day ban (which was reversed after simply 24 hours) in Arc Raiders earlier this week. He uncared for to share any perception into why he believed Embark could have taken motion in opposition to his account on the time of his ban, as a substitute solely sharing screenshots of the notifications and a separate name to motion: #FreeTfue.
30 day ban?!?!? For what!?!? pic.twitter.com/LnfKmrcWJY
— Tfue (@Tfue) January 13, 2026
Why Tfue was banned within the first place stays a thriller, however followers on-line have theories. It’s not conventional cheats like aimbot that gamers consider landed him in sizzling water with what’s presently his go-to sport, although. As a substitute, it’s his promotion of a lately found visible exploit that some suspect is in charge.
Gamers caught wind of the exploit, which utilized developer instruments to make recognizing enemies simpler by forcing environmental results like fog to a minimal, simply final week, January 9. Embark was fast to patch console command entry at some point later, saying the function was “by no means meant to be participant going through” on the time – however some PC gamers had already tried it for themselves.
Practically 9 hours right into a stream that occurred final week, Tfue can be seen establishing the workaround and utilizing it when loading into Arc Raiders. The method takes only some minutes and leaves the streamer slack-jawed.
“F**ok, dude. That’s dangerous,” Tfue says when seeing how the exploit is used to light up a normally darkish hallway. “I shouldn’t have proven this. It’s over.”
The sport stream goes black, and he continues: “No, that’s so dangerous. I imply, persons are going to be utilizing that now, dude. What can we do?”
The section runs roughly 10 minutes and sees the streamer interact in a single battle with one other participant earlier than returning to plain Arc Raiders affairs for one more hour and a half. There’s no actual proof suggesting this incident is what led to Tfue’s ban, as many are merely seeking to join the dots as Embark works to make good on its pledge to make sure its extraction shooter is enjoyable and honest for all.
The studio behind each Arc Raiders and The Finals answered long-standing calls to take care of cheaters and exploit-users in a message printed January 8. It promised to implement “important adjustments” to its anti-cheat technique within the weeks forward, saying followers can stay up for a extra even taking part in subject because the staff deployed glitch fixes and new detection mechanisms. How profitable Embark’s actions have been simply 5 days on stays unclear, but it surely appears some – together with Tfue – could have already got been on the receiving finish.
Simply as onlookers had assumed Tfue had been dealt a prolonged timeout, he uploaded a YouTube video, explaining his personal principle behind the ban. Whereas many instructed use of glitches or exploits had brought on an Embark anti-cheat mechanism to take motion, some testing on his finish led him to consider the problem might be tied to a brand new PC setup. On the time, he believed the scenario was “a straight-up accident.”
“In case you guys suppose that I received banned for testing out an in-game brightness config, it is like… come on, now,” Tfue mentioned. “I believe it is only a straight-up accident. You understand, Embark, it has been dropped at their consideration that there was a whole lot of dishonest. [Cheaters have been] stream-sniping, folks exploiting out of the map, and taking pictures folks by means of partitions, and so they’re very conscious of that. I believe they’re cracking it down, however I believe they simply cracked down somewhat bit an excessive amount of.”
“It kinda sucks,” he added. “Truthfully it does. I simply caught a stray. We’ll hope and pray that it will get resolved.”
It did not take lengthy for Tfue’s pleas to be answered. Simply minutes after his video was uploaded, he reappeared with a Twitch stream, proclaiming, “I am free!” By means of the ban and unban course of, Tfue says his greatest guess relating to the reason for his ban is {that a} foot pedal peripheral might be in charge. In any other case, he is nonetheless at the hours of darkness as to why Embark initially delivered the short-term suspension.
“I do not know,” he mentioned in the course of the stream. “All I do know is all these f**king theories folks have made up of their head are all false.” IGN has reached out to Embark for remark relating to Tfue’s ban and its anti-cheat measures.
The previous Fortnite streamer’s break from gaming content material creation ended simply final month when he introduced “I’m again” with a retirement-ending video printed December 14. Within the four-and-a-half-minute assertion, he defined his spark for gaming had been reignited after lastly discovering a brand new sport that he actually loved.
“I’ve been taking part in Arc Raiders off-stream, and I’ve been having a extremely good time,” Tfue mentioned. “It’s like a refined model of [Escape from Tarkov], and I’ve been having a whole lot of enjoyable taking part in. Lastly, after years of not likely gaming or streaming, I really get pleasure from a sport. I’ve been grinding off-stream, and I’m similar to, ‘I simply gotta go dwell as a result of I get pleasure from it.’”
Arc Raiders launched for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Collection X | S October 30, 2025, to great success. It’s ridden its wave to at the moment, amassing greater than 12.4 million copies offered as its 1.11.0 patch makes its strategy to followers. For extra, you may examine one other Arc Raiders streamer, who was accused of dishonest earlier than gamers took a better take a look at purpose help.
Michael Cripe is a contract author with IGN. He is greatest identified for his work at websites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. You’ll want to give him a comply with on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).