During the Escape From Tarkov Arena tournament at TwitchCon, BattleState Games CEO Nikita Buyanov revealed the release window for the Escape From Tarkov Arena beta that will be open to everyone who pre-orders the game.
While being interviewed on stream Nikita was asked if he could give a release date for the Escape From Tarkov Arena beta, and while he did not commit to a specific date, he did reveal that the current plan is to launch the beta in early December 2023.
“Early December is a good period of time that we want to release it,” said Nikita.
While this may not be a specific release date, it is the closest indication of when we can get hands-on with Arena yet. So far the only timings given for the beta release has been this year, but with silence for some months, some fans were getting worried that it may be delayed. However, the news from TwitchCon will reassure many fans, with a December release date now very likely.
Anyone who pre-orders Escape From Tarkov Arena will get access to the beta, but if you have already purchased the Edge of Darkness edition of Escape From Tarkov you will get the game and beta access for free.
The announcement came during the Escape From Tarkov Arena streamer tournament at TwitchCon. Top streamers from the Escape From Tarkov scene have been competing against each other in the first official public tournament for Arena. The tournament is still ongoing at the time of writing, but the early footage looks good. The combat is instantly recognizable for Tarkov players and some of the maps look great.
Perhaps the only downside so far has been how difficult it has been to follow on stream, with the spectator tools being somewhat limited and not conveying all the information viewers need to figure out who is winning a round. However, Nikita also confirmed in his interview that the final version will have much better spectator tools for esports. He also teased that the company wants to run massive esports events similar to Majors we see in Counter-Strike when Arena launches.
Nikita also revealed that the version of Escape From Tarkov Arena that we are seeing at TwitchCon is not the most up-to-date version, with the internal build the team has back at the studio including things such as kill cams. With that functionality being added to Arena, we can hope that it will also be added to the main Tarkov game sooner rather than later.
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