ARK: Survival Evolved PS4 Release Date
By Jasmine Henry 29 November 2016
Studio Wildcard announces the ARK: Survival Evolved PS4 release date, after claiming Sony would not allow the in-development game to be released on the console.
For PS4 players looking forward to playing Studio Wildcard’s dinosaur survival series, it has been a tumultuous six months. Studio Wildcard announced that arena-based spin-off ARK: Survival of the Fittest was ‘on hold’ on PS4 in order to work on the PS4 version of (main game) ARK: Survival Evolved, but the PS4 release of this game then looked in jeopardy. The developer claimed that Sony wouldn’t let the developer release it on the console before it was finished, leaving fans incredibly disappointed.
Thankfully, it seems that the drama surrounding the game will soon be resolved and that Sony has changed its mind. It has now been announced that ARK: Survival Evolved will be released on PS4 on December 6, available as the ARK: Survival Pack which will cost $55. Studio Wildcard explains that the Survival Pack includes both the base game Survival Evolved, as well its first expansion pack, Scorched Earth. The base game and the expansion will be sold separately in Europe, says the developer, but they won’t be available separately in North America until spring 2017.
Moreover, the PS4 release, which features all of “the previously released content” for the game, will also include some PS4-exclusive goodies. These extras are the Bionic Giganotosaurus skin and the Manticore armor set (for both male and female characters). PS4 players can also expect “a constant stream of major updates packed with new dinosaurs, weapons, armour, mechanics, and lifestyle improvement” to be released “in approximate tempo with the other platforms” before the game’s full launch in spring.
With the PS4 release of ARK: Survival Evolved now set in stone (albeit an in development version), Studio Wildcard can now put more work into bringing the full version of Survival Evolved to PC. The game’s full PC release was delayed from summer until the 2016 holiday season and still does not have an official release date. It’s unclear whether this PC release date has been pushed back again to spring 2017, so that all platforms can play the full version of the game at the same time, though such a decision is likely to cause frustration amongst PC players who have been playing the game since before the PS4 and Xbox One versions were even announced.
What’s also unclear is whether Survival Evolved‘s PS4 release signals a move towards an official PS4 early access program from Sony. The Studio Wildcard game isn’t the first in-development title to hit the console, with Epic Games’ MOBA Paragon also having been available as a ‘beta’ version from earlier this year. However, despite Sony considering a PS4 early access program previously, the company has never set anything up akin to the Xbox One Preview Program. Perhaps the continued interest in early access titles from gamers and the success of ARK: Survival Evolved on PS4 will mean that something more concrete is put in place.
Source: Studio Wildcard
