ARK Ascended??

[Eldrum]

I don't post on these forums often, but this is important. I have followed this game since 2016, and played many times on and off since then. ARK Ascended is a *blatant* cash cow that WC is trying to push out there into the fields. They want money for ARK 2, yes, but if we all buy this, this remaster that is a UE5 port with extra graphics and convenience features, then WC will continue to punk us for fools in ARK 2.

Taking down the official server networks is a blatantly awful move and forcing people who have played there to rent their own servers just to play on a server they were told would last? Why rely on officials in the first place? Would any of you of built on officials if you knew this would happen? You'll get your saves, but it won't be the same. It will just be you and your friends.

And what is this with the expansions? Sure, for 1 year we will be able to buy ARK Ascended and ARK 2 in one bundle, but you have to buy the expansions separately? Expansions by which we see in their news post, we have already played through? What's new? Art overhauls? Do you really trust that UE5 will change the gameplay experience that you've already played (very likely) hundreds of hours on? I have 3k hours clocked in ARK over the years, and I can say that the game will not really change if it just looks a little different, or performs 10% better. It's fundamentally the same damn game, and they'll want us to buy it again.

An ARK Ascended *exclusive* expansion, available Q4 2023 that is only available if you buy the game? Come on guys, they're either in a lot of debt, or getting greedy. THIS is the line, and we define where it stands, because we're their resources. It's cheap frankly, it is dirt cheap and it is not why we bought this game; hell a good portion of us have even bought the expansions, because they offer enough cool stuff to be worth the money. But expansions are just that, they *expand* on the content of a game. This remaster is... a remaster, but they think that because they have overcome so many technical hurdles to build it, that they deserve to sell it even though it's mechanically the same product?

Could that time of not gone into ARK 2? They're "waiting for the technology to develop," so they say. And maybe that's true, but is this remaster not built on the same technology? Do they think the remaster will be garbage? Why not release this as a free update, and launch their new expansion later this year? And they know we will buy it? Will we?

Maybe it's good old Snail Games pushing the envelope for this one, regardless of our sympathies for the poor folks forced to make these decisions, we have to be clear that they need to raise their standards if they're going to really sell us an ARK 1.5. That is what this is, and the way they are doing it is incredibly cheap and dull, and frankly, it sounds like a scam, it looks like a scam, maybe it is a scam.

Don't buy it, raise your standards, raise their standards, make them add actual new gameplay features, dinosaurs, mechanics, whatever to their remaster. There's plenty of other games, let's not let WC punk us, and it will be a miracle if they return to their former semblance of policy standards if we go through boycotting this. The more I look into this, the more it seems like they're trying to swindle their loyal players, so I'm not going to. This is the line I mentioned, so let's draw it in the sand.

[YR.MK]

Yo me sumo a este tema, es realmente descarado que te vende un producto igual con una lavada de cara, ya pague tanto por el juego y por todo sus DLC así que no pienso dar una moneda más por el mismo juego, y a mí no me obligan a pagar por ark 2 un juego del cual no sé nada, ni se si quiera si mi pc lo pueda correr de forma fluida cuando salga, tampoco sé si es más de lo mismo a ark 1 y si llega a hacer así que chiste tendría que me compre un nuevo ark que sería igual al anterior, me parece un descaro que anuncien en primera Remake gratuito y días después digan que estas obligado a comprar todo de nuevo si quieres seguir jugando, eso de aquí a donde lo vean es un ESTAFA, súmate a no comprar el juego de nuevo si eres de Consola o de PC no lo compres, exijamos que nos den el nuevo contenido gratis para todos los que tenemos comprado el juego y sus DLC. WC véndeme un Nuevo DLC si quieres, pero no me vengas a ver la cara queriendo meterme de nuevo algo que ya te compre.

[Esteban Ernesto Tercic]

Publicado originalmente por YR.MK:

Yo me sumo a este tema, es realmente descarado que te vende un producto igual con una lavada de cara, ya pague tanto por el juego y por todo sus DLC así que no pienso dar una moneda más por el mismo juego, y a mí no me obligan a pagar por ark 2 un juego del cual no sé nada, ni se si quiera si mi pc lo pueda correr de forma fluida cuando salga, tampoco sé si es más de lo mismo a ark 1 y si llega a hacer así que chiste tendría que me compre un nuevo ark que sería igual al anterior, me parece un descaro que anuncien en primera Remake gratuito y días después digan que estas obligado a comprar todo de nuevo si quieres seguir jugando, eso de aquí a donde lo vean es un ESTAFA, súmate a no comprar el juego de nuevo si eres de Consola o de PC no lo compres, exijamos que nos den el nuevo contenido gratis para todos los que tenemos comprado el juego y sus DLC. WC véndeme un Nuevo DLC si quieres, pero no me vengas a ver la cara queriendo meterme de nuevo algo que ya te compre.

+1

[Biber]

Publicado originalmente por YR.MK:

Yo me sumo a este tema, es realmente descarado que te vende un producto igual con una lavada de cara, ya pague tanto por el juego y por todo sus DLC así que no pienso dar una moneda más por el mismo juego, y a mí no me obligan a pagar por ark 2 un juego del cual no sé nada, ni se si quiera si mi pc lo pueda correr de forma fluida cuando salga, tampoco sé si es más de lo mismo a ark 1 y si llega a hacer así que chiste tendría que me compre un nuevo ark que sería igual al anterior, me parece un descaro que anuncien en primera Remake gratuito y días después digan que estas obligado a comprar todo de nuevo si quieres seguir jugando, eso de aquí a donde lo vean es un ESTAFA, súmate a no comprar el juego de nuevo si eres de Consola o de PC no lo compres, exijamos que nos den el nuevo contenido gratis para todos los que tenemos comprado el juego y sus DLC. WC véndeme un Nuevo DLC si quieres, pero no me vengas a ver la cara queriendo meterme de nuevo algo que ya te compre.

pierden a todos con consolas "viejas", incluso aquellos que están enojados por su codicia y también aquellos que no quieren ark 2, se avecina un gran futuro ^^

[USURPER]

First of all the Wildcard Dev's themselves DON'T get paid enough imo, in the end they are DEV's not the "Key Masters" so hold no true power.

Secondly be it greed or other (by those in charge) it will be a brand new game from the ground up, with way more optomization and hopefully a smaller file size to boot. Add to that the plethora of new intergrations for the likes of meshing (which on XBOX is a welcome move) if it does indeed work how it was explained to me.

Also as somone who also owns a PC and will most likely buy the game for both platforms again, I genuinely hope they have a better Anticheat with harsher penalties to stop those who abuse it and (I could be wrong but i hear this will be a thing).

That being said the previous iNi changes that you could do client side will now NOT be able to as it will be server side so no cheesing the game to get an advantage over others, if this pans out which it absolutely should are more than good enough reasons to rebuy unless ofcourse your a cheater who likes to exploit.

On top of that with recent changes to the price plan its now 60 GBP ALL inclusive (meaning all DLC) will come at the due release dates, you can disagree if you like but this IS a fair price plan for what you are getting. On top of that everyone for years has been moaning about fixing the game, and I am sure by now that if you hadn't heard the ASE cannot be fixed (it was a fire hazard) of a wiring loom to start with.

This should resolve the problem / problems stop complaining and accept it and either play or don't this is the way forward, as we all know ASE is a TURD.

So to end with a quote: You can polish a turd, but it is still a turd.

[Alucard †]

Publicado originalmente por Ward:

Easy to say this is one of the greediest things ever done in gaming.

I am not so sure about that.
I bet some companies did worse than that.

[Almost Sir Gilman]

Publicado originalmente por Ward:

Easy to say this is one of the greediest things ever done in gaming.

Hello Games and No man's sky would like a word.

It's a redemption story now and the games is great. But that's NOW. At release it was a disaster.

[123]

Publicado originalmente por Digibluez:

There is no way this company that made the big mess that Ark is, will be able to make TWO UE5 games totally from the ground up out of nowhere

my theory is, all this time they been working on ark 2 is just the art assets, and remastering ark into ue5 is the next step of ark 2 development, and then ark 2 will be made from ark remaster.

ark remaster is a milestone of ark 2 dev that is being used as a cash grab.

very early on in development ark 1 showed it needed to be rebuilt from the ground up, their solution? continue with it for years, use it as a base for a second game, and now remaster to sell again. kinda dont see them putting in the effort to built ark 2 form the ground up when they can just reuse ark 1 again.

[Haqqon]

after all this drama that WC did im giving ASA and ark 2 a hard pass

no need to justify my decision to anyone here, i find it pointless to argue with zealots so yeah let those who wanna support WC blindly do what they want. you can't stop them

on the other hand i'll just spit on snail games and find other games to play

[Eldrum]

They essentially said, in their original post that ARK ASA is an experiment (and it will be unstable inherently). Then they up the price for the base game because they removed the DLC cost and THEN they remove the ARK 2 deal, so at the end of the day, you pay even more if you were still planning to buy ARK 2.

Needless to say, even with these alterations, I'm still not buying it and I think the product should be boycotted until they prove that it will be more than just a graphics upgrade... Some actual new features and content, perhaps even new takes on existing systems like building. They have the chance with this remaster, and given they literally acknowledged its an experiment, they might as well change things up.

[g0rml3ss]

We can't fix the code in ARK.

HOWEVER !!! for another £60 we can fix the code in ARK and pretend to do a bunch of other fixes that will come as part of moving over to UE5 naturally, we can also install one of the worlds WORST data mining software that nobody wants for no other reason than we can start asking for money for mods too across all platforms TRUST US !! WE are doing YOU !! a massive favour.. by doing very little if anything at all.

Not an actual quote but a very basic break down of what's being touted for anyone capable of the very basics of English.

Who doesn't love a good magic trick.

[Degout]

Tell me one activity that has lasted you over 3,000 hours for that cheap of a price? I'd say you got your money's worth. Plus you don't have to buy the new game lol.

[retsam1]

Publicado originalmente por Degout:

Tell me one activity that has lasted you over 3,000 hours for that cheap of a price? I'd say you got your money's worth. Plus you don't have to buy the new game lol.

As an analogy, giving one's business for years to a restaurant and where conditions have changed doesn't invalidate complaints or frustrations such a person presents. If anything, it actually is more detrimental; because you take a long term patron and convert them into a more motivated word of mouth dissenter.

However of course there are those who do not agree, like yourself;and Wildcard of course is quite literally banking on their 8 years of seeing such dissent at different controversial times of the game and how it doesnt correlate to impactful loss of revenue. A good portion of their GDC talk in 2017 was about that actually regarding the review bombing of 2016 when SE's dlc was released and sales there after. They just simply recognize that gamers are some of the most unprincipled consumers of any market and are willing to buy a product when it satisfies their enjoyment and escapism needs. Would it be then a fair assessment to say you fall within that category of consideration?

But some do see this as being that Wildcard 1. created Ark 1 and the problem 1. has groomed the complaints and frustations of it nowm, and 3. then markets a new product as the "solution" to the issues they created with the first one. For those people then, their principles outweigh their considerations for Ascended. For you, that's seemingly not the case though and that's your choice, but others choices different from yours have no less validation than your own in these regards.

[Degout]

[/quote]As an analogy, giving one's business for years to a restaurant and where conditions have changed doesn't invalidate complaints or frustrations such a person presents. If anything, it actually is more detrimental; because you take a long term patron and convert them into a more motivated word of mouth dissenter. [/quote]


This is using a business model. Let me ask you this then. Have you never bought a remaster game in your life?

Also, using a restaurant as a business model. You pay at a restaurant and even those restaurants have changed and charged more over the years. Which back to my point, non of these offered anyone those hours for the price they payed for ark.

[Eldrum]

Publicado originalmente por Degout:

Tell me one activity that has lasted you over 3,000 hours for that cheap of a price? I'd say you got your money's worth. Plus you don't have to buy the new game lol.

Sure a lot of us, definitely me, got my money's worth out of this product, but it's not about the product, ARK 1, it's about the company behind it. I'm not planning on buying ARK ASA, that's a core point I made in light of the topics of this post. I don't personally believe anyone else should, too. Why? The marketing strategy of the developer has changed in a complete 180 degree turn from what they have been doing for years: actually offering something original for us to buy.

But I also saw your other point, asking about buying remasters. Sure, remasters are fine... usually as presented with a bonus for loyal, long-time players of a game, but now we have support ending for ARK 1, official servers for it being closed down, and new features and new DLC are never going to appear on it again, and the solution they give us? ARK Ascended, a new (experimental) product that has only minor visual differences, for a speculative return of value in future updates and DLC... Without truly offering anything original that differentiates it from ARK 1, of course other than that shiny UE5 branding that everyone loves. ARK 1's viability is being put on the line for the sake of ARK Ascended, you are losing value in ARK 1 due to the very existence of ARK Ascended.

We were all holding out for ARK 2, and a smooth transition to ARK 2, but instead they decide to taint the name of ARK 1 by offering a "reskin" to it, at full price. The value is better on paper, sure, for a full game and all of the DLCs (after much community outrage), but if you already own ARK 1, and have played ARK 1 to its fullest, it is just a reskin as it stands, which is why we should at the very least ask for more before buying it, if you are a long-time player of WC's games.

So yes, WC has delivered many hours of gameplay before, and in the form of DLC (love it or hate it) has continued to provide new content, and I have had a lot of fun through this, and have happily supported their continuation of the game's development this way. But now they want the same product, shinier, ultimately really hinging its value on future development if you really look into it, WHILE they're also creating ARK 2 which with ARK ASA they are "letting ourselves explore and get used to the new technology," and expecting us to buy it up. This trend will surely continue into and after ARK 2, in the form of low value DLCs, and maybe ARK 2 will have its own remaster in say 2030 that pulls the same scheme (if this is successful).

I don't even need to bring up the whole way this "cool reveal" came about, and how shady and underhanded it is, and what that says about the developers now, or Snail Games.

Perhaps if it was not just a copy, I would not care, and if it wasn't at the expense of part of ARK 1. But I have followed WC's line of products for years, and this is not like the other ones. It is not original, for the full price of a game.

[Lydium]

Publicado originalmente por Almost Sir Gilman:

Hello Games and No man's sky would like a word.

It's a redemption story now and the games is great. But that's NOW. At release it was a disaster.

This is quite literally the worst comparison to Ark in fact, Hello Games shows exactly what you SHOULD do when making mistakes.

To this day, No Man's Sky has released a TON of updates (the latest being April very recently), all free of charge.