Straight Record in ARC Raiders is Celeste’s quest involving an old EMP trap on Dam Battlegrounds. The useful distinction is between reaching Victory Ridge, finding the actual machine, cutting its three power feeds and returning for the final shutdown. Arriving in the named area is only the start.
There is also an important correction to some walkthroughs: the published gameplay accounts say you do not have to survive extraction after completing the trap objective to turn the quest in. That does not protect carried loot or complete unfinished objectives. Check the quest tracker after the last interaction, then visit Celeste when you are back in Speranza.
Accept the quest before looking for its switches
Open Celeste’s quest list and confirm that Straight Record is available and active. The community-maintained quest entry records Broken Monument as the preceding quest. If Straight Record is missing, look at your earlier Celeste objectives rather than assuming a particular spawn will unlock it.
Its recorded objective sequence moves from the Victory Ridge area to the EMP trap, through three switches and back to the device. Those are separate checks. Read the objective currently displayed in your client before leaving a location; a map label by itself is not confirmation that you have finished the next step.
This is a source-checked guide, not a claim that we replayed the mission on the latest build. The gameplay references include John Schutt’s illustrated November 2025 walkthrough and TroubleChute’s updated January 2026 chapter list. If a later update changes a prompt or objective, use your current in-game text rather than forcing an old instruction to fit.
Finding the EMP trap at Victory Ridge
Look around the ruined-building clearing between the West Broken Bridge and Ruby Residence points of interest. In Schutt’s documented route, the trap is east of the Power Generation Complex. Treat those names as orientation aids, not as a promise that the quest will place an exact navigation pin on the machine.
Once you locate the device, use its interaction prompt to advance to the switch objectives. Do not skip that initial inspection and start wandering between unrelated electrical boxes. Equally, do not expect the first interaction to shut the trap down: the power sources are a separate part of the task.
Before moving away, remember how to return to the clearing. It is easier to reason about the three branches from a known central point than to keep changing your reference to whichever building you passed most recently.
The three switch references
| Reference | Where to look | What to check before leaving |
|---|---|---|
| Northern branch | The ridge overlooking the clearing | The switch interaction has registered in your objective list |
| Eastern branch | The upper level of the ruined red building | You reached the actual switch, rather than stopping at a lower electrical box |
| Southern branch | The ground cable leading away from the clearing | You followed it to the control point and completed its interaction |
For the northern branch, look above the clearing rather than only at ground-level props. For the eastern branch, examine the climb to the upper platform; the photographed route uses an electrical box as part of the approach. Follow the southern cable to its switch instead of treating the cable itself as something you can disable anywhere along its length.
These references do not establish a universally safest order or a fixed completion time. Your position, visibility and other players can affect the route you choose. We would use the tracker after each stop, so a missed interaction is noticed before making another trip across the clearing.
Return to the trap for the shutdown
After the switch objectives register, return to the central apparatus and use its final interaction. Checking three boxes and walking straight toward an exit leaves out the last task. Confirm that the tracker has advanced before treating the mission work as finished.
TroubleChute’s updated walkthrough page provides a short chapter sequence you can compare with your progress. Its January 7, 2026 chapter list places the area at 0:30, the trap at 0:40, switch segments at 0:50, 1:02 and 1:20, and the final shutdown at 1:40. These are timestamps within that creator’s guide, not a speedrun target for your raid.
If the tracker still names a switch, revisit that objective. If it names the final device, return to the trap. Do not assume that every incomplete mission is a server bug or that the southern switch is always the one you missed.
Does Straight Record require extraction?
Schutt’s illustrated account explicitly says survival is not required after finishing the quest objective. Billy Givens’s GameSpot walkthrough reports the same extraction distinction. Neither supports an instruction to restart the whole mission merely because you died after shutting down the trap.
Separate quest progress from the contents of your loadout. A completed objective is not a guarantee that carried equipment or collected items are safe. Decide what to do next with that distinction in mind; there is no need to turn a straightforward objective guide into a promise of a risk-free loot run.
If the raid ends before you finish, inspect the tracker back at the hub. Continue from what the game actually records rather than assuming that every step either always persists or always resets between deployments. This guide does not promise a particular recovery result after a disconnect or a later game update.
Rewards and the return to Celeste
Return to Celeste and open the quest panel to claim the completed task. The community entry lists five Medium Gun Parts and three Advanced Mechanical Components; the completion-panel screenshot in Schutt’s article shows reward stacks of five and three. Check the names and quantities in your current game panel before planning a specific craft around them.
We are describing one quest completion. Re-entering the area is not evidence that Celeste will pay the same rewards repeatedly. Do not plan a repeatable materials farm from this walkthrough, and do not count an unclaimed reward as something already available in your inventory.
The featured image is an AI-generated editorial illustration of a fictional industrial apparatus. It is not an ARC Raiders screenshot, an accurate version of this trap or a map of the switches. Use the cited gameplay references and the actual quest prompts for navigation, not the number or arrangement of boxes in that illustration.
Checks that save unnecessary backtracking
- Confirm that Celeste has offered the quest and that you accepted it.
- Distinguish entering Victory Ridge from locating the EMP device.
- Use the initial device interaction before treating the switch stage as active.
- Read the tracker after interacting, rather than assuming that approaching a box was enough.
- Return for the final shutdown once the three feeds are disabled.
- Check the completed task at Celeste instead of inventing an extraction requirement.
There is no special weapon, grenade count or guaranteed quiet spawn prescribed here. Choose equipment you are prepared to risk and adapt to the match in front of you. A distant start does not make the quest invalid; re-queuing is your choice, not a requirement in the objective list.
Questions about this walkthrough
Why did the area objective finish before I found the trap?
The named area and the device are different objectives. Keep following the task list rather than searching only at the point where the area notification appeared.
Should I click once or hold a particular key?
Use the interaction prompt and binding shown in your client. A written instruction to interact is not a platform-specific guarantee about a mouse click, controller button or hold duration.
Can I use the illustration to locate the switches?
No. It is decorative artwork with no reliable game geography. The directional references in the table come from the cited illustrated gameplay account, and the creator’s chapter timings belong to the linked guide.
Other walkthroughs are collected in our Game Guides section. Keep the quest name and your current objective visible while comparing references: they are more useful than a generic instruction to search every electrical prop on Dam Battlegrounds.
