This article is a stub
It lacks sufficient information and needs to be expanded. You can help by adding more content.
SAND: Raiders of Sophie is an always-online PvPvE game. A run puts you on shared servers with other real players alongside the AI threats, so a stable connection and the online systems below matter as much as your build.
Online Requirements
The game requires a broadband internet connection and cannot be played offline. Matchmaking is based on your crew size, and the server population scales with it: 15 players on solo servers, up to 36 on small-team (2 to 3) servers, and up to 45 on large-team (4 to 6) servers.
Anti-Cheat and Controller Support
Feature | Detail |
|---|---|
Anti-cheat | BattlEye runs on the servers |
Controller | Full controller support |
Connection | Broadband internet required; always online |
Matchmaking | Based on crew size |
Supported Languages
At Early Access launch the game supports ten languages: English, Ukrainian, German, French, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Italian, Simplified Chinese, and Japanese.
Server Stability and the Server Slams
Server scaling shaped the launch timeline. Two pre-launch network stress tests, called Server Slams, ran in June 2026, drawing tens of thousands of players. The first surfaced server-scaling problems that were not visible at smaller test sizes and led the team to delay the launch and move to Early Access. A second Server Slam a week before launch served as a final check after the team shipped server-stability and bug fixes. Players who took part in a Server Slam receive an exclusive weapon skin in their inventory when they buy the game.
Launch Stability
The Early Access launch on June 22, 2026 drew a large player crowd and ran into heavy server problems, including outages and denial-of-service attacks. The team responded across the opening week. A server-side hotfix on June 23 added denial-of-service protections and corrected matchmaking that had placed solo players against teams, and a first update on June 26 added further protections while the developers continued investigating outages. A second update followed on July 3; the team briefly rolled back an earlier version of it after players hit connection and queue problems, then redeployed a corrected build. That update also tuned the BattlEye anti-cheat to reduce false-positive bans.
The team has continued to patch the live game after the opening week. A third update on July 10, 2026 added new content and fixes, and on July 12, 2026 a hotfix temporarily disabled the ability to capture rival players' Tramplers, a stopgap against a wave of cheating that relied on no-clip and teleportation exploits. The developers described the capture change as a temporary measure and said a dedicated update with protection against the most common cheats would follow.
One known matchmaking issue persisted past the first update: solo players could still be matched into larger crews. The developers acknowledged it was not fixed as of June 26 and, in early July 2026, said the fix was proving more complex than anticipated but remained one of their highest priorities. As with any Early Access release, the live service is being patched frequently, so expect both downtime and rapid fixes early on.
For hardware requirements, see System Requirements. For the launch date, pricing, and platforms, see Release and Platforms.