Active Matter PvE only: how Isolated Raid works

The short answer

Yes. Active Matter has a dedicated PvE-only mode called Isolated Raid. You pick it instead of Open Raid, and you will not meet other human players. You can run it solo or with up to two friends — a three-player squad.

There is one honest caveat and one caveat people get wrong:

• The real caveat is that Isolated Raid is the mode where the developer's own zone restriction bites: the official FAQ confirms that some locations are PvPvE-exclusive, some are PvP and some are PvE-only, and the developer has not published which is which. So PvE-only play covers a large part of the game, but it is not guaranteed to cover every zone.
• The misconception is that PvE is a tutorial bolt-on. It is not: it is a full mode with its own pacing, its own difficulty curve and its own progression path.

How to play PvE only

1. Open the raid selection screen.
2. Choose Isolated Raid rather than Open Raid.
3. Set your squad — solo, or up to three players in total.
4. Read the raid conditions before you commit: the list shows which anomalies you will meet, and anomalies are marked on the in-raid map.

If you are setting up a group, note that Open Raids queue solo players and squads separately, so a mixed group should all use the same route from the start.

Is PvE limited?

Players report that Isolated Raid is gated by isolated-raid tokens, with something close to one free token per day, a stockpile cap, and an option to buy an additional token using crystallized active matter. We are printing that as community-reported, not confirmed: the game's own patch notes and store pages do not describe the current token economy, and the rates reported during the early version may not be the rates today.

What we can say with confidence is the direction of travel: a search query specifically asking whether the PvE limit still applies in September 2026 shows this is a live question, and the honest answer is that the gate exists in some form but its current parameters are published nowhere we can cite.

Do I still progress in PvE?

Yes. Monolith tokens — the currency that unlocks your equipment tree — come from end-of-raid quests and investigations on both PvE and PvP. PvP pays more per objective, so the open mode is the faster progression route, but PvE is not a dead end. Zones, character shells and crafting recipes unlock through investigations, which you can complete in Isolated Raids.

Are there bots in the normal mode?

Yes, and this surprises people. Open Raids can contain bot versions of enemy operatives in addition to real players. That means a "PvP" raid is not always a pure player-versus-player experience, and conversely that a low-population lobby does not automatically feel empty.

What is actually harder about PvE

PvE is not the easy mode, for three structural reasons:

• Ammunition economy. With no player kills to loot, your ammo budget is what you carried in. Experienced players advise bringing far more magazines than instinct suggests — one widely shared write-up suggests six to eight for a serious PvE run.
• Creature density and tuning. The enemies are the whole threat, and the most common complaint from the early version was durability: creatures that absorb a great deal of damage. Melee is genuinely useful — several anomaly types can be finished or one-tapped in the head with a melee weapon while they close on you — and damage-over-time tools such as flamethrowers and incendiary grenades are the standard answer to the tougher ones.
• Fewer shortcuts. In PvP, fights resolve quickly and loot is abundant. In PvE, the raid is a long resource-management problem.

Two habits that come up in every serious PvE guide: keep your heart rate and your noise down, because noise draws groups rather than single creatures; and keep one grenade back for the extraction, because there is usually a small group of creatures waiting near the exit.

Playing solo

Solo Isolated Raids are the purest version of the mode and are also the harshest: everything above lands on you at once. The practical advice from the guides is to move slowly, bring a shotgun as a secondary regardless of your primary, and treat extraction as a fight rather than a formality.

A short history note

Early in development, solo PvE did not exist. A developer answer in the Steam discussions during the closed tests said plainly that there was "no such possibility" at that time. The mode was added later and shipped in the full release. If you find an old forum post saying Active Matter has no solo PvE, that is why.