ARK 2, the successor of ARK: Survival Evolved, was announced during the Game Awards 2020. The game will be released exclusively for Xbox Series X/S and PC. The community hopes that developer Studio Wildcard can address the performance issues of the predecessor.
What happened? During the Game Awards, ARK 2 was announced with a Cinematic Trailer. Reactions to the trailer, featuring Vin Diesel and recorded in the future engine, are mixed. Many users on reddit are already speculating and hoping that the performance in the new installment will be better than in ARK: Survival Evolved.
Does ARK 2 solve known issues?
These are the community’s concerns: On reddit, the announcement of the new ARK 2 trailer was met with mixed feelings. In the thread with over 2,300 upvotes, there are numerous voices from the community.
The majority of users hope, as NicoTheBear64 and BradyT1314 do, that the trailer shown was indeed recorded in the game engine and that the game itself will be better optimized from the outset than ARK: Survival Evolved.
User Snow0031 is convinced: “In the trailer, you can see flickering shadows on a person in the background; it is 100% in-game!”
In another thread on reddit, concerns are raised that the shown orcs distract too much from dinosaurs and the actual theme of ARK. Users also doubt whether the balance between casual and hardcore survival players can be found in ARK 2.
ARK 2 will be released exclusively for Xbox Series X/S and PC. Through the collaboration with Microsoft, many users hope that the performance on next-gen consoles will be significantly better than in ARK: Survival Evolved.
This is what players are excited about: The appearance of Vin Diesel has been very positively received. Vin Diesel is not only the protagonist but also the executive producer of ARK 2 and the also announced series “ARK: The Animated Series.”
A small hype arose on reddit when it was announced that the Hollywood actor would be involved in ARK 2. Under the post by Scotte8797, a collection of quirky and funny ideas emerged:
- Vin Diesel kills all mobs on the beach with his level 10,000 wyvern
- He will guard metal deposits on his giga
- A dodo or penguin army will definitely not follow Vin
In a tweet, Studio Wildcard confirmed that ARK 2 will have a full focus on next-gen. ARK 2 will feature an online multiplayer function, which will likely function as a sandbox similar to ARK: Survival Evolved.
ARK has been struggling with performance issues for years
The early access release of ARK: Survival Evolved in June 2015 was actually quite well received. Studio Wildcard continuously released new updates over time and brought more content to the game.
Between 2015 and 2017, Studio Wildcard continuously worked on the dinosaur survival. Many players complained during that time about FPS drops, long loading times, and overloaded systems. The community hoped at that time that performance would improve with the full release.
On August 29, 2017, ARK left early access and was released as a full-priced title on Steam. The negative reviews on Steam after release consistently report on lags and performance issues.
Steam user “Pusteblume” sums it up in his review of ARK: “After so many years still massively full of bugs… countless gameplay errors that just aren’t fixed […] The game is still in an alpha/beta state.”
In the last 30 days, ARK: Survival Evolved still received 89% positive ratings on Steam. Nonetheless, many reviews complain about poor performance, lags in multiplayer, and bugs.
This is already known about ARK 2
With ARK 2, Studio Wildcard aims to deliver a next-gen spectacle not only for ARK veterans but also for dino and survival fans.
With top performance and a well-told single-player campaign, both ARK veterans and new players could be convinced. Those who had difficulties with the predecessor might dare a fresh start with ARK 2.
Despite all performance issues, ARK remains one of the best survival games. This is primarily due to the large community and a variety of mods. It remains to be seen whether ARK 2 can build on this popularity and solve the major problems of its predecessor.
What is your opinion on ARK 2? Are you looking forward to the new title from Studio Wildcard, or do you have concerns about the massive undertaking?
