Ark: Survival Evolved has been around for so long and sold so many copies that it's pretty easy to forget that it never actually "came out". After a long period of beta and early access, Studio Wildcard announced that the survival game (with dinosaurs) will have its official release the 8th of August on PC, PS4, Xbox One, Linux, and Mac. To go with this news, the developer also released a free DLC map named Ragnarok, the first result of Ark's Sponsored Mods Program.
ARK will be released in three versions. One version will contain the core game only and will cost $59.99. A second edition, named "Explorer's Edition" will contain the season pass for the game and it will cost $99.99. Finally, the Limited Collector's Edition will include the season pass and comes with a nice wooden box containing:
- A handcrafted leatherbound Explorer's Notebook, featuring the dossiers of every ingame creature
- An official ARK necklace
- A cloth map of the ARK island
- A poster of the Studio Wildcard development team
- The official ARK: Survival Evolved soundtrack, recorded live by the
- Philharmonia Orchestra
This collector's edition can be pre-ordered only at Gamestop (affiliate link) and EB Games Canada for the price of $159.99 USD/$219.99 CAN.
The other news surrounding Ark is that the Ark Sponsored Mods Program birthed its first child. The aim of the program is to help the modding community thrive by selecting, every month, some talented modders that will be given some monetary compensation from Studio Wildcard to help them cover development costs. Ragnarok is the first mod made DLC to become available. It's a free map inspired by Norse mythology that adds to the game a number of mythical creatures and interesting landscapes and biomes.
The free DLC is already available to download for PC players and will be released on PS4 and Xbox One in early July.
