Announced in April, the remaster of Ark: Survival Evolved has had its release date pushed back from August. Expect Ark: Survival Ascended to appear in October…
Ark: Survival Ascended, the Unreal Engine 5-powered remaster of the dinosaur-tastic Ark: Survival Evolved, has had its release pushed back from August to October, Studio Wildcard has announced.
In a newsletter published on its website on Saturday (thanks, PC Gamer), the studio wrote that, “We’ve found it challenging working with Unreal Engine 5.2, but […] it’s clear that we need more time.”
Ark: Survival Ascended was first announced back in April, and it’s fair to say that Wildcard’s handling of the whole situation won’t win any public relations awards. The remaster, developed for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, was originally only set to be available to purchase as part of a $50 ‘Respawned Bundle’ that also included a pre-order of its delayed sequel, Ark 2.
Then, as Ark fans reeled at that bit of news, Wildcard further announced that the game’s original incarnation, Ark: Survival Evolved, would be taken offline – meaning players wanting to keep enjoying their favourite open-world survival game would be forced to cough up for the above-mentioned bundle.
Following a vocal backlash, Wildcard relented and scrapped the Ark Respawned bundle (“Our bad,” the studio wrote) and announced that Ark: Survival Ascended would be available as a separate purchase. The initial asking price for Ascended was, however, now $59.99 – almost $10 more than the scrapped bundle deal. Go figure.
In its latest newsletter, though, Wildcard has announced a price cut – it’ll now be available for $49.99, while a launch discount will bring the price down further to $39.99. The same post also tells us that some of Ark's DLC, once billed as being available at launch, will now be released separately.
“We’ve also decided to separate the release date of The Island and Scorched Earth [DLC],” the studio wrote. “With what we’ve learned about remastering The Island from the ground-up, it wouldn’t be feasible to complete Scorched Earth to a standard we’re happy with. So for now, we’re going to plan that Scorched Earth will be coming to ASA in December this year, Ragnarok and Aberration will follow in Q1 2024, and the rest of the maps beyond then.”
Ark: Survival Ascended's delay does mean that Evolved is getting a stay of execution, though. The original game’s servers will now shut down on 30 September.
You can read Studio Wildcard’s full newsletter – including an FAQ about its Ark plans – right here.
