Ark: Survival Evolved Reviews
To say that personal frustration isn't involved would be a lie. To say that said personal frustration seems to come around because a game wasn't properly balanced between the multiplayer and single-player aspects, with it being tilted a bit too heavily towards the top dogs, would be true. As a single-player title, ARK: Survival Evolved can get quite tedious and annoying having to handle tasks meant for multiple people solo. As a multiplayer game, having to submit to survive and not have everything ruined is annoying, as well. Hopefully, a better balance can be found, but, for now, the game just feels wrong for what it's supposed to be.
Is this the worst game on the Switch? It is very close. Ark: Survival Evolved is easily the most poorly converted game on the system, which makes it feel like it could be the worst. If things worked and it didn't look like computer generated vomit, it might have been an average survival game at best. Nothing would distinguish itself. It is unfortunate that the one aspect it has that makes it stand out is just how much of a porting disaster it has proven to be.
ARK: Survival Evolved is a mixed-bag experience that only truly caters to those well aware of, or heavily interested in, the survival genre.
ARK: Survival Evolved is still a good game, but it's not a one friendly with newcomers. Getting to the enjoyable part of the game will take hours, so gamers need to be willing to put the time into it. The game looks even better now than it did before, making you fear for your life when you see the hulking beasts out to get you, not to mention the gorgeous environments you'll explore.
To enjoy ARK: Survival Evolved you're going to have to earn it, and that's a tough sell in this day and age. For those who are willing to sweat over their controller to make even the smallest amount of headway, this is a title you should definitely give a chance. However, if the idea of suffering for a while to gain any real traction sounds horrible, steer clear. Those who survive this are going to prove they deserve to - and that's the ARK experience.
Like a lot of of titles in this genre, Ark: Survival Evolved has a steep learning curve and requires quite the time - and possibly financial - investment. But once you get into the rhythm of it, the endless need to survive, set against the simple satisfaction of slowly building up your capacity to do so, makes this a game that could well turn into a hobby for you, all in itself.
I want to love this game so bad, but I just can't.
Ark Survival Evolved is a unique open world survivor game pitting players to overcome a harsh ecosystem. They may choose to do so solo or with friends; in addition to playing against other gamers in a showmanship of the most advance hunters. Level opposing villages or work with them in an exchange of services. Ark gives you the opportunity to grow a garden, tame mystical and ancient beasts, and much more; the power of this lies in your forearm and your ambitions.
Ark: Survival Evolved has more bugs than the grill of a Mack truck and your first introduction to the game can feel akin to the sensation of being hit by aforementioned truck, but peel away the layers of abstruse game mechanics and you'll find a strangely compelling game that'll make you feel like the Pope of Dino-Town at times and want to open a vein in a hot bath at others.
Surprisingly, the online play works well, and it is cool to have a portable version of ARK for playing on the go. But would I recommend it on Nintendo Switch? $49.99 is…pricey for the quality. It's worth it if you have no other way to play ARK, but only if it goes on sale. ARK: Ultimate Survivor Edition itself is a very good, if not great, game, but this port is more mediocre than the best it can be. While I like playing it on Switch as an existing fan, I'm not sure I would if I was new to the game.
Ark: Survival Evolved, in its current state, is not the best port to grace Nintendo Switch. It is, however, a proper MMORPG survival game with a deep and rewarding crafting system and the potential for some brilliant online cooperation with your fellow survivors. There's a palpable thrill to moving from simple stone tools to more advanced weaponry as you begin to master the crafting cycle, an experience no other game on Switch can offer right now. But its myriad technical problems – ranging from texture pop-in to substantial performance slowdown – mean you really are better off playing Ark on a different platform for the time being. Patches could solve some of these problems over time, but we can't help but feel this ambitious title will never run at an acceptable level on Nintendo's hybrid platform.
ARK: Survival Evolved could have brought another interesting and fun game to the Nintendo Switch catalogue. Instead it's a severely distorted experience which due to its poor graphical performance, ends up not fulfilling any of its ideas correctly. As a consequence of its terrible lack of fluidity, pop ups and mistakes on the graphics department, ARK: Survival Evolved turns out to be an extremely frustrating effort that leaves no one satisfied.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
In the end, Ark's ambition pulls it in the right direction with more force than its clunkiness tugs it the other way. It's always more enjoyable to spend time with a game that tries something new and exciting, stumbling along the way, than a game that tries to tick focus group-inspired boxes. If that game also happens to simulate an entire prehistoric ecosystem, and produces bewildering emergent scenarios like clockwork, all the better.
When you finally get over the initially steep learning curve and find fellow like-minded players that you can group up with, ARK: Survival Evolved becomes a truly enjoyable sandbox game where anything goes. But not even the impressive dinosaurs and cool tech can cover up just how repetitive the game really is, and how you're forced to sink in hours and hours of grinding before you can finally start to get to the ‘good' stuff.
Ark Survival Evolved is a good survival game with awesome mechanics, but it's also a technical disaster (lag, freezes, connection issues...). Such a shame!
Review in French | Read full review
Ark: Survival Evolved has a bunch of interesting ideas. But by attempting to be a jack-of-all-trades, it doesn't really feel like it has mastered any particular element. This doesn't mean there isn't fun to be had in the ARK; if you enjoy the brutal survival mechanics on offer here, then you will likely spend many dozens, if not hundreds, of hours in the quite lengthy grind as you conquer the primitive world. For many people, however, the time required to really enjoy what's shown on the cover art may prove too insurmountable.
Ark: Survival Evolved is far from being complete, what with its many bugs and a feature bloat that doesn't always hit the nail on the head. And yet, it's still an addictive grind that proves that life can find a way.
In its best moments, Ark is the dream of every Dino fan. But bugs and the grindy game principle often spoil the fun.
Review in German | Read full review
Amazing things are possible in the ARK — the gun-wielding soldier set high atop the most badass predator of all time comes to mind — but the experience is clouded by the best ones being locked behind excessive grinding, boring farming and the need for a large group.
A clumsy control scheme aside, the console version of Ark: Survival Evolved is a recommendation, especially if you going to play together with your friends.
Review in Swedish | Read full review