Introducing the Gigantopithecus and ARK Digest Issue #7

[Jat]

Hello Survivors!

Welcome to the seventh issue of the ARK Digest! For those who missed the previous issues, check out the Announcement section on the Steam Community Hub and be sure to catch up with what you’ve missed there is tons for you to catch up on!

State of the Game

It’s been an interesting week for the game! We recently came back from E3, which was very successful for us! We had done multiple interviews, had a segment hosted by Twitch TV during their primetime show, where over 120,000 people had tuned in! Throughout the rest of the week we spoke to a lot of media outlets and gamers at the event, who hadn’t heard of ARK or known of our plans to push to console.

If you’d like to check out the twitch interview you can do so here;

http://www.twitch.tv/twitch/v/6216496?t=2h31m15s

TheRightHand was also at E3 and spent his time alongside Nvidia, and did an interview speaking about our work with GameWorks!

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/articles/ark-survival-evolved-developer-discusses-nvidia-gameworks-future-game-features

Since the launch of the game we’ve sold over 700,000 copies and hopefully it will continue to grow. You guys have shown us tremendous support and the team is working very hard to ensure that the game meets all of your expectations and much more.

PvP Wipe

As for more details inside the game, recently we became aware of a duping exploit that existed within our game. This resulted in a full PvP map-wipe and an engram point reset. This was an unfortunate situation and it was due to miscommunication and Father's day on our end that we did not act quicker. We apologise for the inconvenience and heartache caused, you have our word that we're going to do everything we can to make sure that something like this doesn't happen again.

Linux and Mac

Just an update on the situation! I know you guys have been patiently waiting for the release of the Mac and Linux version of the game, they’re still being worked on and tested internally so we won’t be able to meet our anticipated release of the 25th of June. We’re going to keep at it and have it available as soon as possible, some unforeseen issues in other areas has led to the delay on this and for that we apologise.

Hack Bounty

Something we’ve announced this week is that we will be offering bounties to any survivor who can find a multiplayer hack or severe exploit in the game! We’ve asked anyone interested in reaching out to get in touch at [e-mail] -- we want our game to be the best it can be and as secure as possible! If you have something you want to share that you think will seriously impact gameplay, or is a genuine hack please get in touch!

For more information, please check out this thread http://steamcommunity.com/app/346110/discussions/0/523890046867273520/ - it’ll add a lot of clarification to bounties and what we pay them out for.

Your Questions our Answers

Survivor, Arsenic_Touch asks, “When will we start to see the story and lore you spoke of in regards to the game? how will that story and lore play out? a main quest line, side quests?”

Answer:

Good questions! As we’ve expressed before the ARK has a story behind it, you guys aren’t just here for no reason - if you want to figure it out, it will be possible whilst playing the game. Throughout the summer we’ll begin working on introducing the lore and explaining what it is via ingame content. This is a primary focus for the content team and something they’ve been working on for a while, the first part will consist of randomly generated ruins with Explorer Notes, these notes will contain the lore, so they provide a backstory to the game, and they will grant experience to survivors who discover them. Expect that to roll out this summer!

Survivor, Arsenic_Touch also asks, “Any plans for super dinos that roam the lands? (larger dinos that require groups to take down but aren't summoned like bosses) or rare dinos (perhaps with unique skins) with loot tables to get players incentive to hunt these rare dinos down?”

Answer:

This is something that gets asked a bit and we haven’t provided too many details on it yet as we’re still working out the plan, however the jist of it is that yes, we do have plans for powerful and more rare dino variants to be available soon. These will be a lot stronger and difficult to take down, you may see unique loot tabled involved and they’ll look great! So it is definitely something for you to keep your eyes open for :)

Survivor, Arsenic_Touch also asks, “When will the sci-fi tech tier be added? and what will that entail? ”

Answer:

Afraid you’ll need to wait a little while for this guys! We’re aiming to have these starting to come out around September, all the way throughout October. However for now in terms of technology tier, our primary focus is on expanding both the primitive and modern tier. Once we tackle these, we’ll be able to begin introducing and releasing the sci-fi tier.

Survivor, Yeti asks “What further dynamics do you plan to implement with wild creatures? The herding, predator/prey, and egg guarding is already amazing, just curious what might be in the tube in the future? Migrations?”

Answer:

Right now Dinosaur AI is fairly basic, we have them eating, movement, proximity based AI. This was something we just wanted to get in the game right away, to help with it’s playability. In the mid-term we plan to improve on this drastically and add a lot of elements to the AI so it truly becomes the great ecosystem you guys all want.

Some of the features that we are planning include, but of course never limited to ;), Nests, Migration, and something we’re really excited to let you know about is sensory based awareness! This means that in the future Dinosaurs will be able to hear you, see you and smell you! It’ll add another element to the game and hopefully add tons more enjoyment for you guys.

Survivor, QuantumLegacy asks “Can we expect more interesting twist to taming?”

Answer:

Certainly! Initially the taming process we released was fairly basic, however effective and somewhat true to real life. However we wanted to expand on it and introduce other methods for taming creatures, as well as helping players improve their taming affinity. Some of the things we’ve got planned and are currently working on are options for non-violent taming which we plan to introduce this summer!

This includes feeding conscious herbivores by hand or providing carcasses for carnivores which will have much greater affinity than knocking out creatures with a weapon, along with the introduction and specialization of new food, and ingredients to allow players to hit higher numbers in regards to taming effectiveness for each creature.

Survivor, ROisAWESOME asks “What big feature will come next?”

Answer:

There’s a lot of things we’re working on.. but the biggest that is coming up on the horizon is something that has been heavily requested since we announced the game back in May, Breeding!

Survivor, Dravion asks “Are you going to give us more challenges to strive for on this island that requires a group effort to complete?”

Answer:

Certainly! We’re going to be drastically re-working our current boss fights so that they take place in dedicated boss arenas and it’ll mean that survivors will need to put in a serious shift if they want to be victorious. We’re also going to be looking at introducing more caves, as well as making changes to the current ones, plus with the Dinosaur A.I improvements that are upcoming the game will definitely see some more challenges ;).

Survivor, Lucky asks “Can we build ON the plesiosaur? It says so in the dossier but were you guys actually able to bring that feature into the game?”

Answer:

Yes! You will be able to build on the Plesiosaurus! CONFIRMED. In fact, you’ll be able to build on certain new saddles on many of the larger dinosaurs, as well as put sleeping bags on them for mobile spawn points!

Survivor, Sunfang asks “Any plans to weaponize fire, or at least make Dinosaurs scared of it?”

Answer:

Yup, that’s planned ;)

Survivor, Sunfang also asks “Also, Why do we have to fully immerse our characters in water just to have a drink?”

Answer:

Haha, yeah we’ll actually be fixing this relatively soon! Survivors will be able to quench their thirst without having to submerge in water sources.

Survivor, AmmerBo asks “Will you one day be giving us an electronic dino collars so wayward pets can be located? I wouldn't mind this being a craftable collar that goes in a slot next to the saddle. Of course you'd need a crafted locator device.”

Answer:

Yup! This has been planned for a while now and should be completed within the next few weeks! :) so won’t be long til you can keep track of all your dinosaurs… as well as your enemies ;)

Survivor, Kimsie asks “Will we be able to move furniture so that we don't have to break it down and rebuild it, losing half the resources?”

Answer:

We’ve heard the requests! And yes, this is something we are planning on doing. How it’ll work is similar to how it does with Turrets, Sleeping Bags and Flags - where you’ll be able to pick up most non-core structure items and move them!

Survivor, Jormanxer asks “Fiber is an issue for many, and we currently have no dino's able to gather it?”

Answer:

This has been requested a whole lot! Especially recently now that players have invested more hours into the game and are spending more times on their Dinosaurs. We’re considering adding a scythe-like weapon to the game, and as for Dinosaurs, well we’ll have today’s newly announced creature to help with that ;)

Survivor, smcmillion100 asks “Ever think of allowing us to paint our dinosaurs? A war-painted Triceratops is all I've ever wanted out of life. Continuing that thought, will there be a method to remove paint from objects like walls etc?”

Answer:

Yes to both questions! Once our team has finished working on the paintable signs, they’ll begin working on the war-paint system for Dinosaurs! and we’re also going to be introducing a soap-like item to help wash off all the paint on your walls!

Survivor, PostalPatriot asks “Hey Jat, I was wondering if there will be some sort of option for server host to disable higher end tech. I really like the idea of having a server that players can’t progress into namely firearms and flak armor, generators etc. A kind of primal stone age rp server. Any chance we could get that option?”

Answer:

This is actually already possible! Just check out the Extended Game Options topic in General Discussion (it’s stickied!), it involves editing some INI files and you’ll be able to have the primitive RP server you’ve dreamed of. Later on we’ll be making this a lot easier by having a launcher application to help deal with all the ini editing!

Survivor, thelastchocobo asks “Do you think that we can get a way to flag for PVP against other tribes on PVE?”

Answer:

Yes! This is something we’re definitely interested in having and something that is currently being worked on. It’ll be a system where Tribes are able to declare war on each other, it’ll specifically be used on PvE servers!

Dino Dossier

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=468627077

A new Dino Dossier has been revealed, this one is everyone’s favorite short-tempered beast, the Gigantopithecus!

Closing thoughts..

That’s it for this week guys! We’ve got some major announcements and fun-stuff planned, definitely something to keep your eyes open for. It’ll be coming fairly soon! I wish I could share more, just for now we’ll say that it’s going to be pretty epic!! We’ll be releasing Patch 180 later tonight so be sure to check out the patch notes for the changes involved!

Thanks for reading guys, hopefully you’ve learnt something new about the game!

All the best,

Your Community Manager Jat and the ARK Survival Evolved Team

[Haakon]

Awesome, thanks!

[Baboonbuttpocalypse]

:/ didnt see my questions answered. Oh well!

[PCAwesomeness]

Very nice plans. Looking forward to them.

[|PHD| lelze]

Originally posted by PCAwesomeness:

Very nice plans.

On the other hand, I hate this Gigantopithecus; gorilla aggression proves to be overblown and stupid once again.

*Pounds chest as hate flows through my comment*

[Harothir]

Great work guys. You've clearly thought out many of the things we've been thinking thinking about! Can't wait to see where it goes.

[WeaselTown]

For the saddle on the gigantopithecus, I want to see a front-mounted baby-carrier style harness that lets your arms and legs dangle free while the ape carries you around.

[Lightning]

haipu

[Lurk]

YES, can't wait for breeding. Soon, my herd of parasaurs will be a proper domestic herd!

Also looking forward to nonviolent taming, getting a bit sick of the knock them out and shove ♥♥♥♥ in their mouth. Time consuming and dull, taming a conscious predator will be much more risky and rewarding!

[Alex Darigan]

Originally posted by Lurk:

YES, can't wait for breeding. Soon, my herd of parasaurs will be a proper domestic herd!

Also looking forward to nonviolent taming, getting a bit sick of the knock them out and shove ♥♥♥♥ in their mouth. Time consuming and dull, taming a conscious predator will be much more risky and rewarding!

Yeah and also adversely make your typical *starter* Trike tame a lot less dangerous.

And maybe we won't have to chase after ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ Parasaurs.

[Cranky Coyote]

All very good responses. Wish more questions were answered but still looking forward to things for singleplayer!

[Eve of the West]

Heh. I'm grinning ear to ear here thinking of a group of raiders pulling off a dawn raid by springboarding over the walls of some sleepy little tribe's fort. Standing on the shoulders of giants indeed!

[Zian]

Great, keep up the good work.

[Phantomrose]

I am also looking forward to breeding, and nonviolent taming. That system of offering food to herbivores/carnivores sounds pretty interesting! I also like that there is a collar or similar thing being worked on to keep better track of dinosaurs. I'm going to need some for my raptors and other pets, when I occasionally disconnect. xD

[Wulfeh]

Lots of great info here, i am even more excited for the game to be finished:D

[polaris.ursa]

omg omg omg omg lol

Great news all-around! =D