ARK: Survival Evolved

Professional Griefer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FW9vsrPWujI

As a man or woman stranded naked, freezing and starving on the shores of a mysterious island called ARK, use your skill and cunning to kill or tame & ride the leviathan dinosaurs and other primeval creatures roaming the land. Hunt, harvest resources, craft items, grow crops, research technologies, and build shelters to withstand the elements, while teaming up with or preying upon hundreds of other players to survive, dominate... and escape!

Looks amazing!:eek:
Its out on Early Access June 2nd and PS4/XB1 next year(?). Hopefully this isnt another Stomping Lands.

You can also apply for Alpha on their site, if chosen you'll get the game for free and a bit earlier than the rest.

Thargor

Was going to say meh, another Early Access Survival game, but that does look really good. Hopefully it will make it but I dont get too excited over EA anymore.

EazyD

This is out today at around 5-6pm, might be worth looking at.

ktulu123

Watched a couple streams of it last night to see what it's like. Looks decent enough so far.

Noxin

Bought it today just because...

Spawned, walked around. Found stone, wood etc.. Crafted an axe. Took a $hit (happens randomly). Laughed... continued on my journey.

Ran into plenty of dinos that did not attack unless I attacked first. All good. Kept walking, crafted some cloth gear and built a basic house.
Suddenly a t-rex type thing just started owning everything in sight. I stayed well back but he spotted me anyway (maybe because it was night and I was standing there holding a torch). He ran at me and owned me too.
Lucky for me I "random spawned" quite close by. Saw the T-rex thing taking on a brontosaurus type thing. It owned the t-rex.
Logged off shortly after that.

Overall:
I really enjoyed it and see huge potential. There have been 3-4 updates today alone trying to fix things.

Pros:
-Dinos - great addition to the already saturated survival genre. Great break away from the usual zombies too.
-Crafting
-Survival.
-Has both pvp and pve servers (if you can access one)
-Single player game.
-Can host your own server.
-Hugh map.
-Experience points. (You level as you loot, craft, kill etc...)
--Each level you can up some skills such as health, stamina, run speed, strength, crafting speed etc..)
---Each level you also gain Engram points which allow you to obtain new abilities such as the ability to craft new items. (I really love this system)
-Apparently you can tame and ride the dinos. I've not tried this yet but if it works well, this is beyond awesome. Taking includes flying dinos too. Deadly.

Cons:
-Needs work but this is obvious. It's been released two days ago as early access alpha. That said, it runs very nicely. Just needs a bit of optimization.
-There are not enough online servers yet. They were all full so I had to play solo. Hopefully they release more soon.
-You'll probably spend a lot of time on the beach in the beginning (can pick from four initial spawn sides). If you decide to venture inland early, you gonna die. Nothing for it. I stayed on the beach but even then, I ventured too far. Got attacked by a spitter (that dino in Jurassic Park who spits venom in the van). Got rekt. Decided to swim across water - got attacked by a megalodon - got mega rekt. Then there was the t-rex thing (really can't remember what it was called but it was a reking ball!!)

Overall I recommend the game, BUT - I do not recommend trying to go online just yet. If you fancy a single player shot or even hosting your own small server for friends then go for it. I've really enjoyed the single player so far. Will jump into
multiplayer once they've spruced it up a bit.

Professional Griefer

I cant join servers or start a local game. Spent 5 hours on loading screens :mad:

ktulu123

Absolutely loving this game at the moment. Built myself a nice wood cabin & have tamed a Trike. Not been so hooked on a game in a long time

Icyseanfitz

played rust but got bored/annoyed with it, friend is trying to convince me of this, whats yer opinion on it?

Varik

Don't like how the dinosaurs float a bit, same in most games but it stands out here more.

I've already got 2 EA survival game that i don't play so will wait on this, might even get our on console in the end.

Zillah

Looks like great fun, but this whole sloppy early access 'we're never really finished' sort of attitude is really annoying me about games these days. Even when they finally get to 1.0 they've developed such a low threshold for how polished something should be that they never lose the beta attitude.

I'll eagerly await the proper release for this but I'm not going to hold my breath.

Noxin

I take back what I said about going online earlier. Seems alot more servers have come online. I've had no problem connecting to them today.. even when they show full. Loving the game. Best survival I've played in a long time.

ktulu123

Addicted to this game now, met up with a group of lads that had their own village built & currently in the middle of building my own massive house. Last night we went on a bit of an exploring mission, we all have tamed dinosaurs(4 raptors, 1 scorpion & a Stegosaurus). Fecking great craic just wrecking most things we came across, I say most things because the T-Rex & Brontosaurus are still dangerous. We still haven't seen half the wildlife that is in the game. Will see more today when we venture farther in land.

The difference between this game and all other survival games is the fact that while I am playing I am not concerned about running into another player it is the fact that while off collecting wood I could be pounced on at any second by a velociraptor (Guaranteed to happen btw). The AI & wildlife in the world is an actual threat to me rather than just an inconvenience that Zombies are in DayZ, H1Z1 etc. There is still pvp though & once you reach the higher levels you can craft guns that are designed for pvp use but are also an absolute nightmare to maintain & make.

Yes you will have issues with performance or joining a server like I have but once you get a decent run in the game with little or no issues it is well worth it!

EazyD

Lads, I bought this the other day but can't play until my PC is ready next week. Now I know it's very unoptimised in it's current state but how difficult is it to run on reasonable settings?

Noxin

Di©kheads beginning to show online already though. Someone just put a signpost in front of my door so I'm blocked in.
pve server so no destroying the sign.

raze_them_all_

Noxin wrote: »

Di©kheads beginning to show online already though. Someone just put a signpost in front of my door so I'm blocked in.
pve server so no destroying the sign.

slightly funny to be fair.



Whats the fps on this?? been hearing bad things

EazyD

Noxin wrote: »

Di©kheads beginning to show online already though. Someone just put a signpost in front of my door so I'm blocked in.
pve server so no destroying the sign.

Can't be any worse than rust back in 13/14, will always be present tho

Noxin

Ahh was my own fault for not putting a foundation in front of the door.

Pro-tip for anyone trying to join a full sever. Go to steam client - click view -> Server. Select game - Find server - Auto retry to join and use Join the server asap. You'll eventually get in that way."

@Raze, i'll check my average fps when/if I get back in before I have to leave. Will let you know. It's not great right now no but they are working on a gfx patch afaik.

EazyD

Noxin wrote: »

Ahh was my own fault for not putting a foundation in front of the door.

Pro-tip for anyone trying to join a full sever. Go to steam client - click view -> Server. Select game - Find server - Auto retry to join and use Join the server asap. You'll eventually get in that way."

@Raze, i'll check my average fps when/if I get back in before I have to leave. Will let you know. It's not great right now no but they are working on a gfx patch afaik.

What's your system? I'm wondering whether I can run this relatively smoothly at a minimum of medium settings.

Noxin

EazyD wrote: »

What's your system? I'm wondering whether I can run this relatively smoothly at a minimum of medium settings.

i5-3570k @ 3.4GHz
GTX 970
16gb ram.

I run everything at high except textures which are at ultra. It's smooth enough. Not great, but enough that it doesn't cause me problems and makes the game very pretty.
Shadowplay didn't want to work so I couldn't get an fps count.

Won't get back online until tonight or tomorrow.

EazyD

Noxin wrote: »

i5-3570k @ 3.4GHz
GTX 970
16gb ram.

I run everything at high except textures which are at ultra. It's smooth enough. Not great, but enough that it doesn't cause me problems and makes the game very pretty.
Shadowplay didn't want to work so I couldn't get an fps count.

Won't get back online until tonight or tomorrow.

That's great thanks, I'll be running an older Amd 750k with r9 270x so hopefully it'll be up to the task

TerrorFirmer

Are ye all playing in one particularly server? Thinking aobut getting this but not sure if it'd be as much craic on your own.

Also will be using my laptop for the next week or two with a GTX850 so not sure how it'd run either, hear it's pretty crappily optimised at the moment.

EazyD

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Are ye all playing in one particularly server? Thinking aobut getting this but not sure if it'd be as much craic on your own.

Also will be using my laptop for the next week or two with a GTX850 so not sure how it'd run either, hear it's pretty crappily optimised at the moment.

The most recent updates only addressed the lack of servers issue so id imagine its a bit scattered at the moment

jaggeh

vendetta gaming 30 man server, 32gb ram run by yours truely. all welcome.

5.152.220.202:18732

irishmover

Noxin wrote: »

Di©kheads beginning to show online already though. Someone just put a signpost in front of my door so I'm blocked in.
pve server so no destroying the sign.

To be expected hence why I'll be renting a private server for my mates and I.

Just as a side you can knock your own wall down and get out that way. Sucks but not the end of the world.

ktulu123

The server I play on is Proton Gaming, European server with a decent player base. Now have a level 45 Raptor called "Clever Girl" absolutely beasts everything . Went exploring yesterday, the volcanoes are fecking class. Found one of the caves and absolutely ****e ourselves going into it, no Titanoboa this time though, just some crocs & spiders. Really wana see a Titanoboa but I hate snakes, especially that one haha. Knowing that they actually existed freaks me out

Drexel

Gave this a go. It's a good laugh. There is four of us playing. Have a hut built and we managed to tame a raptor but it
Glitched and we lost him. Promising game tho I have to say

ktulu123

Must take some photos of my dino army later, so far I have 3 raptors, a trike, scorpion, turtle & managed to get a sarco(crocodile) last night. The croc is a genuine idiot though but he is quick in water which should be fun. Still addicted to the game. Has anyone ventured into any of the caves yet? Slightly terrifying & tough. Even with my max level raptor "Clever Girl"

Edit: Also, raw prime beef is key for taming, makes it go so much quicker

Noxin

Not been able to get online in a few days. Might get on later if I'm lucky.

Is it not difficult to get enough prime meet though? Doesn't it spoil quickly? I've not actually tamed anything yet. Not a clue what to do but I'll figure it out. Maybe have a go later if I get time.

irishmover

Two big graphics boost patches out this week for those of you complaining about poor performance.

Robert ninja

This game now performs a lot better for me. I can play it at 1920x1080 w/ 1:1 scaling and up the textures now. Looks and feels a lot better. The movement and combat is still extremely janky, though. Very difficult to fight anything because of this. Good to see progress being made, though.

EoinHef

Robert ninja wrote: »

This game now performs a lot better for me. I can play it at 1920x1080 w/ 1:1 scaling and up the textures now. Looks and feels a lot better. The movement and combat is still extremely janky, though. Very difficult to fight anything because of this. Good to see progress being made, though.

Was playing last night and at 1080p a single overclocked 970 was averaging about 33-45 fps. At 1440p the game was more or less hoveing between 23-35fps but mostly in the 20's,weirdly enogh the game is better than most in how it plays with very low framerates. Not much screen tearing etc so thats a plus. Only been playing locally so far to get the hang of things. Not sure if it would run better online.

Was the patch today?

I may leave playing it for awhile till performance improves a bit more. It is pretty bad at the moment IMO.

The game its self looks very good,the crafting and engram system looks good so far imo. Also seems like there is plenty of content there for a early access game,which is nice to see.