Monday, November 13, 2023

Game Review: Ark Survival Ascended

 
By Nydia Tungsten 

Let me start this off by saying this game was gifted to me. While I am always grateful to the one that offer me games and all the good intentions that go with it, I would like to offer a heartfelt “Thank you!”

BUT, That would be the only way I would have got this game, due to Snail games and Nitrado servers backroom deals to screw over the Ark community by making a quick cash grab before anyone knew what was happening. If you want to know more about their attempts, look to YouTube.


I started a game and the first thing I noticed is the character creation was very well-detailed. The flora and fauna is more detailed, some more than other. I have noticed one major flaw with this new version, if you kill one of the smaller dinos, it is very hard to get at it to butcher it, I had to walk away from multiple kills just because I couldn’t interact with them … at all. 

But I do have to admit it has been optimized a heck of a lot more than “Survival Evolved” 21 minutes and some change for that to load up while ASA loads up in 2 minutes 30! If you have played Ark before you know how frustrating that can be, so this change is a welcome one.

Another very interesting change is the Dino behavior they track a lot better … which is a good AND bad thing. Good in the fact that it is harder for you to lose one of your dinos as you run through the forest, they path much better to get to you, on the BAD side, the Hungry wild dinos can now track better to get to you as well. So a lot of mixed blessings I guess you could say.

I have heard that the Island map has changed, which I have to agree, the topography, I have tried to visit the areas where my angels and I have had bases when we all first started playing Ark, and they are jungles and forests, so think it would be impossible to put bases there. I found the small cove area where we built our ship bases before they nerfed it. And the spot where we took over a giant cliff area that was so open and easy to defend. NOW it is a forest so think you can’t even think to build there without a larger group for support.


As you can see from these pictures, the graphics are incredible, I believe you can fly a bit higher in ASA, if you fly too high you can enter the clouds and actually be unable to see anything, just a greyish-white blurry blob.you can see the “Steaming Jungle” behind me in this shot


The bay you are looking at here is the changed cove where we built our Raft Bases, WHICH you can do again with the right mods.


The mod makers are filling up the mod pages quickly. I am still tinkering with ASA as you are reading this, and I will do a part two eventually.


Do I recommend you buy this game? In good conscious, No I can’t. All because of Snail games and they’re money-grabbing greed. BUT! If you DO get it, I am confident you too will be impressed with the changes.

Remember, if your gaming company is doing things YOU don’t agree with let them know by NOT buying anything from them.

Until next time GOOD GAMING TO YOU!

Nydia Tungsten

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