Developer Studios Wildcard said it was a mistake to bundle the ARK remaster with its sequel, but now ARK: Survival Ascended will actually cost $10 more for gamers to purchase, with future expansions.
In late March, Studio Wildcard announced that ARK II, the sequel to its popular survival game ARK: Survival Evolved, would be delayed from a 2023 release date to late 2024. However, it also announced a new Unreal Engine 5 remaster of the original game, ARK: Survival Ascended. Originally, the plan was to offer the remaster of the game and ARK II in a bundle for PC and Xbox players for $49.99, with PlayStation 5 players getting the remaster for $39.99 as a standalone purchase. It would also cost more if you want to get the Survival Evolved expansions.
However, ARK players made complaints in the last week that getting a remastered version of a game they already own as a bundle with an unreleased game was not the best idea. Late on Friday, Studio Wildcard made another post scrapping the Ark: Survival Ascended-ARK II bundle. It stated:
Our bad; we recognize how combining ARK Survival Ascended with ARK 2 and requiring further DLC upgrades wasn’t optimal, especially since you wouldn’t be able to judge ARK 2 as no gameplay or content would be available yet.
