Studio Wildcard seem to repeatedly mess up Early Access for ARK: Survival Evolved [Steam]. First with a DLC for an unfinished game that caused a bit of an uproar and now this new eye watering price.
Previously, the game set you back a reasonable ~£22.99 but it has just increased by more than double to £54.99. That's priced higher than a lot of finished AAA titles and I really am struggling to comprehend their thinking here. This is what they said about it on Twitter:
QuoteARK: Survival Evolved has increased its price on Steam to ensure retail parity for the upcoming launch.
So essentially they're using the price of their console game to push up the price of the PC version, or else people would likely go for the cheaper version on PC. It's interesting that they haven't mentioned this at all on Steam itself, likely in fear of the backlash. It wasn't even mentioned in their release date announcement, but it is mentioned in the Early Access pull-out (if anyone ever bothers to read those).
The Linux version is, to be absolutely blunt, terrible. It looks nothing like the Windows version graphically, performs very poorly for me (lots of reports of terrible performance on Windows too though) and some of it is completely broken on Linux.
I've tried reaching out to the ARK developers many times through Twitter and Emails, no reply on either. I admit Twitter isn't the best place, which is why I also emailed them multiple times over the period of a few months. I've frequented their official forum to see them seemingly ignore all Linux graphical issues. Caves on Linux are basically impossible to do due to the graphical bugs, which makes other parts of the game impossible to do as well.
Honestly, if this wasn't one our streamer's favourite games there's absolutely no way I would continue running a server for it. Our current one is quite expensive so we will be looking for a cheaper option since a few people do enjoy it still. To be clear: Unless there's a mass exodus from it, our server will continue as normal.
Due to the massive price increase along with the awful quality and support of the Linux version, I suggest this goes firmly in your nope pile. I'm sad to say that, truly I am, as I was so very excited about playing this one, but they've done nothing to earn my respect. It could be a great game, who wouldn't want to tame and ride on a massive dinosaur? There's just too many issues right now and this new price I fear will lock out a lot of potential new players.
Quoting: TheBardOh no, we should not say such things ;) They might feel hurt and will likely abandon their port of ARK3 :p
Haha this made my day.
To be fair, they have done some work to improve the Linux version,
It runs better then ever before.
So to say its not been bug fixed and optimazed is wrong. And it still in EA so expect them to be there untill they leave EA. It still runs badly, but in my exp it has to do with the memory leak, but its gotten better, Windows have this memory leak problem aswell.
We are missing texters, but its gotten better aswell.
Ark dont freeze in the main menu or in the loading screen.
So i dont really agree on all the hate here. Its very playble at this moment.
But the price on the other hand is insane yes, and the extra dlc they sell.
Last edited by Zelox on 7 July 2017 at 3:29 pm UTC
Quoting: MagicMythI'm not saying I agree with it, it was just my thoughts on what I feel they're doing.QuoteQuoteQuote
ARK: Survival Evolved has increased its price on Steam to ensure retail parity for the upcoming launch.
So essentially they're using the price of their console game to push up the price of the PC version, or else people would likely go for the cheaper version on PC
@liamdawe I'm not sure if you are saying you agree with that sentiment or not but PC games should always be cheaper as the developer doesn't have to share anywhere near as much of the sale with Steam as they do the consoles which use the money to subsidise the cost of the hardware. PC gamers pay full wack on their hardware but make that back on the savings from the cost of games. And why would it matter if someone chose the PC version over the console? Its still (more) cash to the developer.
Quoting: GuestI bought it during the summer sales, and sadly it didn't work with Mesa 17 so I've hesitated to ask for a refund, and well now seen the increase of the price (70€ it's completly insane !!), I keep it in my library and hope one day the dev will fix the Linux version.
The Linux version has been broken from the start and will probably be until the end of time.
Quoting: 14I wish I could get rid of ARK or resell my Steam license to it.
In early 2016 I deleted it from my steam account.
Last edited by Aryvandaar on 7 July 2017 at 7:49 pm UTC
Their inexperience is also evident towards their customer base, as we have seen more than a few times in the past.
I recently got a Vive, excited to try it out on ARK...but I forgot that its VR was only for Oculus. But, they ARE putting Vive support into their upcoming Jurasicc Park ripoff??!?! Who the hell wants to walk through a theme park after actually playing with dinos??.
Ridiculous, I say. Again, displaying their affinity for backwards decisions.
As consolation, I saw Liam submitted a scathing review and I read through the subsequent spaz-attack of uninformed users that don't know that PC also == Linux or that SteamOS is Linux, or anything related to Liams complaints.
Fools and their money...
At least I am only half a fool now...
Addendum:
In trying to get Vive working with ARK (and other VR things for that matter), I decided to re-purpose one of my HDDs to Win 10 for VR. I have played ARK on Win again, and absolutely cannot go back to the Linux version. Although, I will continue my Patreon to GamingOnLinux as I still have hope for the future.
Last edited by Rolz73 on 11 July 2017 at 8:16 pm UTC
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