Since indie developer Studio Wildcard launched its open-world dinosaur adventure ARK: Survival Evolved on Steam’s Early Access two days ago, the island has had an influx of amazing survivors who are exploring the vast, formidable environment and its many secrets. Powered by Unreal Engine 4, ARK takes on the survival genre with a unique blend of emergent multiplayer cooperation and competition. Here’s a quick recap of island activity so far:
The Numbers
• Within the first 48 hours of Early Access release, more than 200,000 survivors have started their island adventure.
• Within 24 hours, there were over 100 official servers, 2,300 community servers active.
• Reached a peak of over 36,000 concurrent players in ARK, with over 1 million hours played thus far [Steamcharts.com]
The Platforms
• Mac and Linux platforms are launching by end of June 2015!
• Performance-boosting DirectX 12 implementation for Windows 10 will be launching in July 2015
• Performance updates happening on a rapid-iteration basis with daily game updates:
o Increased Framerate and Loading Speeds
o Reduced Memory Usage
o Added DirectX 10 Shader Model 4 Support
o Every day brings a faster, more optimized game. Content and gameplay systems have been the focus first, but now it’s on to speed!
The Plans
• Today from 2-3pm EST Studio Wildcard will host its first developer FAQ onwww.twitch.tv/survivetheark
• Watch Epic Games’ discussion with Studio Wildcard co-founder/co-creative director Jesse Rapczak on its Unreal Engine Community stream chatting about the experience of developing on UE4 and ARK’s upcoming mod tools.www.twitch.tv/epicgames
• Follow updates for the game @SurviveTheArk and journey over to the Steam page to check out the detailed feature list and Monday-Wednesday-Friday reveals of new dinosaur dossiers.
• Stay connected for fun Dinosaur events leading up to the launch of a certain dinosaur cinematic experience in the coming weeks!
Come see the open-world dinosaur survival game everyone has been talking about! Tame and ride one of 70-plus amazing dinosaurs and other prehistoric beasts, including gargantuan creatures on a scale never before seen in video games! Fly a Pterodactyl squadron over snow-capped mountains, race through the deep jungle with your pack of trained Raptors, tromp through a fortified enemy base along a convoy of gigantic Brontosaurus, or chase down prey on the back of a raging T-Rex.
ARK: Survival Evolved will launch in summer 2016 on PlayStation®4, Xbox One via the ID@Xbox program and Steam, including Oculus Rift VR support and a thorough integration of Steam community features such as Steam Economy and Steam Workshop for custom maps and mods.
