ARK Survival Evolved makes good on its pledge to bring in fan-made content
Not long ago, we told you how Studio Wildcard pledged to make fan-made mods part of the official game. Now, they’ve made good on their promise, announcing today that the new player-created fantasy map The Center is now an official part of ARK Survival Evolved and is available today as a free download on Steam PC and Xbox One via the ID@Xbox program.
The Center was apparently created by modder Ben Burkhart as part of Studio Wildcard’s Official Mods Program, which has and will continue to generate a steady stream of player-created content for ARK: Survival Evolved. The Center’s massive map doubles the in-game playable geography of the already enormous ARK landscape making it about 70 sq. kilometers.
The Center complements the current biomes with a rich, hand-drawn Tolkien-esque aesthetic. Filled with stunning lighting effects, lava rivers, giant picturesque mountains, misty floating islands, ancient underground ice caves, and more, The Center is free for anyone who already owns ARK Survival Evolved.
For those who don’t already own it, you’re in luck. ARK Survival Evolved is now on sale for Steam players for 33% off (retail $29.99) and on Xbox One via the ID@Xbox program for 25% off for Gold members and 15% off for Silver members (retail $34.99). Looks like now is as good a time as any to ride the Dino.
“With ‘The Center,’ players are presented with a gorgeous fantasy geography that provides a distinctly different feel and perspective from the traditional ARK Island, and it is simply stunning in size and imagination,” said Jeremy Stieglitz, co-founder, lead designer, Studio Wildcard. “The ARK modders are developing a ton of fun, creative content that, up until now, only the PC community has been able to enjoy. By selecting the most innovative high-quality mods and adding them into the main game, we’re able to make this amazing content available to console players as well.”
Drawn completely by hand without any auto-generated content, The Center uses its own save data, with separate options to reset the save data for each individual map. Including The Center with new Official 100-player Servers, today’s Xbox update also includes the following additions & fixes:
- Added all content up thru PC patch v240 (includes such things as Broodmother Arena, Megapithecus Arena, Direbear, Manta, Chem Table, Prim Cannon, Lystrosaurus, Arthropluera, Sabertooth Salmon, Primitive Bola, Tribe Rank Management, and more!)
- Fixed memory/crash issues, massively reduced game memory overhead
Improved rendering performance by approximately 10%
Fixed the huge stall/lock/crash when you “Transfer” a bunch of items at once - Spawn-In First Person Animations are now playing properly once again
- ADDED The Center Official Mod Map! Doubles the playable game area of ARK, with all new adventures – added Official The Center servers supporting up to 100 simultaneous players.
ARK Survival Evolved is in development for full launch on Xbox One via the ID@Xbox program, PS4, and Steam PC. We at COGconnected have been your ARK Headquarters since day one – check our full coverage here.
SOURCE: Press Release