Summary
- The surprise release of Ark: Survival Ascended is great news for players and even better for the upcoming title Ark 2.
- The end of support for the original Ark: Survival Evolved indicates that the release of Survival Ascended and Ark 2 may be on schedule.
- Survival Ascended serves as a test for Unreal Engine 5 and provides valuable data for optimizing performance in both games, ensuring a stable launch for Ark 2.
Ark: Survival Ascended has just pulled off the surprise of a sudden PC release, and although this is great news for anyone interested in playing it, it’s even better for the upcoming title Ark 2. Following up on the 2015 title Ark: Survival Evolved, Survival Ascended is a remake of the game in Unreal Engine 5. It’s intended to act as a complete and definitive experience, including the content from all of the DLC that the original title racked up as part of its $45 price tag.
Although the new tech in Survival Ascended offers an exciting new angle on Ark, not everything leading up to the launch has been sunshine and roses. Support for the original Ark: Survival Evolved ended on September 30, 2023, to pave the way for the remake, forcing anyone who wants to keep playing on official servers to cough up the money for its successor. It’s still possible to play the original Ark on unofficial servers or in single-player mode, but the shift in support follows the recent trend exhibited by games like Overwatch 2 and Counter-Strike 2 in essentially overwriting one online experience for another.
Survival Ascended Indicates Ark 2 Is On Schedule
Ambitious game projects often take much longer than planned to release, as any manner of even minor delays can ultimately stack up until a product is months or years past its intended launch. Delays have already struck Ark 2 on multiple occasions, and this very well could have been an indication that both it and Ark: Survival Ascended were slipping further and further behind in the schedule. Although it’s still impossible to say exactly when Ark 2 will be released, the release of Survival Ascended shows that the future for the latter is unlikely to be in any worse shape now than when delays were first announced.
Development of the two titles is doubtless more complex than the same team and the same resources going toward both games simultaneously but wrapping up principal development of Ark: Survival Ascended can only be a good sign for Ark 2. The servers for the first game shutting down at the end of September acted as some indication that the shift should be imminent, and the surprise release on Steam fulfilled expectations perfectly. Although Ark: Survival Ascended isn’t out on consoles quite yet, it’s now been confirmed that it will be making the transition in November, a date that seems likely reliable under the circumstances.
Ark: Survival Ascended Could Have Delayed Ark 2
Ark: Survival Ascended wasn’t originally announced until years after the reveal of Ark 2, and the timing of its unveiling wasn’t great. Developer Studio Wildcard revealed it in a post on March 31 that also announced a delay for Ark 2 that would see it launch around the end of 2024. Although news of a remade Survival Evolved was potentially exciting, these two pieces of news coinciding made it difficult to avoid the implication that the existence of Survival Ascended could be part of the reason for Ark 2‘s delay, and the announcement of an end to official servers for Survival Evolved didn’t make the pill any easier to swallow.
Making any kind of definitive statement about the impact that Ark: Survival Ascended might have had on the development cycle of Ark 2 is pointless, but it does seem reasonably likely that some resources that might otherwise go to Ark 2 would have to be allocated to the remake. As Survival Ascended has now released less than seven months after its announcement, the end of 2024 promise for Ark 2 looks fairly reliable. Although Survival Ascended still has post-launch plans involved in bringing all of the original game’s content in, the development priority should now comfortably be on Ark 2 if it ever did diverge.
Ark: Survival Ascended Is An Unreal Engine 5 Test
It’s actually possible that the launch of Ark: Survival Ascended will now help to prepare Ark 2 for release, as the title effectively serves as a test of Unreal Engine 5 for Studio Wildcard. The biggest negative response to the Steam release has been performance issues that players are struggling with, proving that there’s still some work to be done in terms of optimization. Survival Ascended should give Wildcard a lot more data to work with in terms of the biggest performance problems, hopefully enabling them to patch the game up while implementing improvements to Ark 2 ahead of its own release.
Having a stable launch for Ark 2 is of even more importance than it is for Survival Ascended, as the longer public development cycle has built anticipation that needs to be met at release. As an online multiplayer experience, building a wide player base will be critical for Ark 2, and it can be hard to regain steam if too many players find themselves unable to effectively run the game when it first arrives on the market. None of this makes struggling with Survival Ascended‘s performance any more pleasant for those who can’t wrangle a steady framerate, but quashing those issues now would certainly be better than handling them later.
Survival Ascended Paves The Way For Ark 2
Ark: Survival Ascended is also a way for Studio Wildcard to generate some cash flow in the middle of a long development cycle for Ark 2, and the thousands of reviews that the game has already generated on steam show that there is certainly a major influx of purchases already. It’s entirely possible that funding hasn’t been an issue for Ark 2, but it isn’t uncommon for studios to push out comparatively minor projects in the interest of sustaining the budgets of bigger ones. Regardless, sales for an extra game definitely won’t hurt the resources available to Ark 2.
No matter what the future holds for Ark 2, the release of Ark: Survival Ascended serves as a nice marker that indicates Studio Wildcard is moving along steadily in overall development. Its successor will hopefully arrive before the end of 2024, leaving a significant but manageable wait up ahead. Ark: Survival Ascended might not have been what everyone was asking for, but it could be the perfect stepping stone to reaching that final goal.
This story originally appeared on Screenrant
