Escape from Tarkov

Escape from Tarkov is a hardcore first-person extraction shooter from Battlestate GamesPublisherBattlestate GamesBattlestate Games is the Russian developer and publisher of Escape from Tarkov, the hardcore tactical extraction shooter. Tarkov uses BattlEye for kernel-mode anti-cheat.1 game in this family →, a Russian studio with a London-registered holding entity. It entered Closed Beta in 2017 and spent nearly eight years there before its 1.0 release on November 15, 2025. For most of that run it was sold only through Battlestate's own launcher, with no Steam presence; the 1.0 release added a Steam version alongside the launcher. The loop is unforgiving: players drop into a map with their own gear, try to extract with loot, and lose everything they brought if they die. It is one of the genre-defining titles for the extraction-shooter category.

Tarkov is Windows-only and requires either the Battlestate launcher or the Steam client (since November 2025). BattlEyeAnti-cheatBattlEyeBattlEye is the kernel anti-cheat from BattlEye Innovations GmbH (Reutlingen, Germany), founded 2004. One of the longest-running kernel anti-cheats in PC gaming. The kernel driver (bedaisy.sys) and user-mode service (BEService.exe) are both catalogued in the Field Guide.5 games in this family → is mandatory and cannot be disabled for online play. Uninstalling the game does not remove the BattlEye service automatically; BattlEye publishes an uninstall script for that. The launcher runs an updater service of its own that stays resident between sessions.

Tarkov runs BattlEye, a kernel-mode anti-cheat. The kernel driver (bedaisy.sysDriverbedaisy.sysBattlEye kernel-mode minifilter driverOpen plate →, catalogued in the drivers section) loads when the game launches and unloads when the game exits. The user-mode service BEService.exe and per-game client BEClient.exe are also catalogued in the processes section. For the first eight years of the game's life the Battlestate launcher was the only legitimate way to play, so the install carried both the launcher's update service and BattlEye's driver. The 1.0 Steam release adds Steam's own client to that stack but does not change what BattlEye does at the kernel level.

Two specific stories are worth knowing. In April 2024, Battlestate announced an Unheard Edition at $250 that gated a new single-player PvE co-op mode and several in-raid advantages behind it; Edge of Darkness owners, who had paid $150 on the understanding that future content was included, were not initially given access. The community response was severe enough that Battlestate partially walked it back within days, granting Edge of Darkness owners six months of PvE access. The second is cheating: independent reporting and the developer's own ban waves document a persistent problem at the top of the player base. Battlestate is also a Russian studio; reporting since 2022 has raised questions worth looking into directly for buyers who weigh country of origin.