Arc Raiders dev 'mutually parts ways' with co-founder over misconduct allegations
Content notification for mention of sexual misconduct.
Arc Raiders and The Finals maker Embark Studios has "mutually" parted ways with co-founder and CCO Rob Runesson over sexual misconduct allegations.
As reported by IGN, the decision came after public allegations that Runesson engaged in sexual misconduct with a popular The Finals streamer, as well as an external legal investigation that Embark claims "did not substantiate" the allegations.
"Our leadership team was recently made aware of allegations against an Embark employee," Embark told IGN in a statement. "We take these matters seriously, and as a part of our process for addressing any types of allegations, we immediately hired a law firm to conduct an external investigation. The investigation did not substantiate the allegations, but we found the situation unsustainable and mutually agreed to part ways with Rob."
These allegations, which were shared by an anonymous person, first arose around a month back via The Finals streamer Balise, who read them on stream. The anonymous allegations were shared later through multiple Google docs that were viewed by IGN. They were also shared across various The Finals social communities.
In the allegations, the anonymous person claims they were in contact with a popular female streamer of The Finals, who allegedly spoke to them frequently about engaging in a romantic and sexual relationship with Runesson.
The anonymous accuser says the female streamer reported becoming increasingly uncomfortable with Runesson's requests for sexual conversations and favors. The streamer was reportedly also concerned about the potential conflict of interest, but felt they could not push back due to financial dependence on Runesson's promotion of her streams.
Lastly, the anonymous accuser claims they eventually went to an Embark community lead to report the behavior, but was not made aware of any action being taken to investigate at that time, IGN reports.
IGN spoke with the streamer in question, who declined to comment on record, but stated that a number of the allegations circulated were out of context or misleading.
Runesson was one of the co-founders of Embark, along with fellow former EA DICE employees Magnus Nordin, Stefan Strandberg, Patrick Söderlund, Jenny Huldschiner and Johan Andersson.
Last month, Arc Raiders was branded a "blockbuster" franchise after hitting 14 million sales, peaking at 960,000 concurrent users in January.
