Hey Survivors!

Welcome to the twenty-nineth issue of the ARK Digest! We hope you all enjoyed our April Fools shenanigans. We had a lot of fun with it and seeing your reactions over our social media definitely made our day.

Let's start off with an important announcement!

International Modding Contest Voting!

Earlier this year we were thrilled to announce the first challenge for modders with our very first ARK International Mod Contest! Putting content creators, new and old, to the test through making their own ARK Mod. We had over 100 entries between the three total categories, which was amazing! Looking through all of the different entries and seeing the level of skill and creativity blew us away.

Studio Wildcard is excited to announce the top candidates which will now be entering public voting. Community voting on the mod contest entries is now open!

Click the links below to be brought to the voting pages and see the finalists!

The contest is divided into the following three categories:

Mods: Extensions of current gameplay functionality

Extensions of current gameplay functionality Maps: These are new ARK's to play on.

These are new ARK's to play on. Total Conversions: These are complete 'overhauls' of the game which change core functionality.

Make sure to vote for your favourite submission in each category!

PRIZES:

Fifteen (15) prizes will be awarded. 1st thru 5th, places for each category:

1st Place: $10,000 in each category

in each category 2nd Place: $5,000 in each category

in each category 3rd Place: $3,000 in each category

in each category 4th Place: $2,000 in each category

in each category 5th Place: $1,000 in each category

in each category $63, 000 TOTAL PRIZE POOL!

VOTING/JUDGING:

Studio Wildcard has selected 5-10 submissions they consider high quality in each category to be voted on by the community. The submissions were awarded scores (1-100) based on three categories:

Originality/creativity

Overall graphical or functional quality/polish

Entertainment value (how fun is it to play/use?)

60% of the judging score will done by the ARK: Survival Evolved development team. 40% of the judging score will be calculated by the community through a public vote. You must be a member of survivetheark.com with a minimum of 30 posts in order to place your vote.

The winners will be announced on May 15th, 2016, after finalist voting, spotlight and judging rounds.

Best of luck to all of the participants!

ARK Digest Q+A

Survivor, Ghost334 asks, "How will the new tek armor work, will it only give you extra protection or will it also work as an exoskeleton and make it so that you can carry more or maybe give you protection from fall damage?"

Quote The Tek Armor has properties beyond simply extra armor protection. It alters how much and how long you’re affected by debuffs, reduces fall damage, and other special properties! These capabilities do, however, require periodic recharging...

Survivor, Dinopants asks, "I noticed that although the sloped roof is able to be placed both upward and downward, the sloped walls cannot be flipped to match any roof pointing downwards. Will the sloped walls eventually be given the ability to flip directions like the sloped roof?"

Quote We’ll fix that soon! Looking forward to seeing how builders will utilize this change.

Survivor, Neizan, asks, “Will we have workshop (mods and maps) for ARK SotF ?”

Quote Yep, we plan to release the Survival of the Fittest Dev Kit shortly!

Survivor, Katigura, asks, “Is there anything you guys can give/show/tell us about the older-dino pass?”

Quote Sure! Here's a couple examples: Trikes will be given a skewer attack, Rex’s will be given a debuff flee-instilling roar, there will be Fish Meat, Dodo’s will be given the capability to be carried around by hand, and more!

Survivor, Akeema, asks, “I've seen a lot of focus on bringing more oceanic creatures into the game, lately. While I'm pumped for this, it leaves me wondering if you also plan to bring more air creatures into the game?”

Quote Yes, just look at the Dossiers, many air creatures to come -- and more yet not yet revealed...

Survivor, FaneBlackwing, asks, “Would you guys think about adding special perk bonuses to the Artifacts? For example, we may equip one Artifact on our character giving them a unique bonus. (Artifact of the Immune making you more resistant to natural effects like freezing and overheating and possibly immune to the toxic damage in the swamp cave?)”

Quote That’s a really neat idea, I can dig it. Will further consider it!

Survivor, DiloFodder, asks, “Will the tek tier bring new base defenses such as electric fencing (touching the fence would incur an electric shock that deals knock-back and torpor) or laser fencing? (touching the laser fencing would deal heavy damage and strong knock-back)”

Quote The Tek Tier will add a form of powered force-field along those lines!

Survivor, Hope, asks, “Will we be getting any more instruments next to the drums? A Didgeridoo, conch shell horn, or ruman tuba, as well as other instruments would be really neat to have.”

Quote Our next planned instrument is a xylophone, couple weeks out!

Survivor, FaneBlackwing, asks, “With the new Dunkleosteus taking Titanoboa Kibble as it's preferred kibble, Titanoboa eggs are starting to become a need. Could we see the Titanoboas become tameable in the very near future and receive genders so we can collect eggs from them easier? It's a real pain, especially on SP, where I can barely find any of them.”

Quote Yes, we plan to add tameable Titanoboas quite soon!

Survivor, Weapon14, asks, “Will we eventually be able to transfer dinos from official servers to personal provided servers?”

Quote Yeah, we’ll add that capability back in, specifically for Dino export from Officials.

Survivor, UpFromTheDepths, asks, “What animals (specifically dinosaurs) did you want in the game but didn't make the cut?”

Quote There are many, many theropods and sauropods that didn’t have enough to visually/functionally distinguish them from some of the ones we’re already doing. We want the ARK to be as diverse as possible, as much as we and others love their theropods/sauropods.

Survivor, PhantomGamer, asks, “Can we have a server option to disable fog? It's a very limiting weather effect that makes it so you have to sit and wait for it to be over, which is a bit stupid.”

Quote We’ll add in configurable server options for each of the current and upcoming weather systems.

Survivor, Mr.Grey, asks, “Will you guys add Mic input option so we can use voice changer software, It would help the RP community alot!! Thanks :)”

Quote Haha we’ll look into it. We love our RP community!

Survivor, MrXQuikSilver, asks, “Will we ever get another weapon for underwater ( harpoon) or maybe another melee weapon such as a mace, Molotov, make hatchets throwable, or a boomerang.”

Quote Boomerang is incoming! See what I did there ;-P

Survivor, TR-8R, asks, “Will the antidote be an universal one or we will have to make specific antidote for certain diseases?

Quote Each of the diseases will each have their own specific antidotes.

Survivor, JuicedMachine, asks, “Would it be possible to expose a list of dinos tamed by the tribe?”

Quote Yes, that’s a very good idea! We'll do that.

Survivor, viewsfromla6, asks, “What are the plans to make people explore the ocean more? Rarer resources forcing people to go deep down, more sea dungeons?”

Quote Sea Dungeons are already in the works.

Survivor, nafroberts, “Are there any plans for dino-mounted weaponry? Like a mounted battering ram, catapult or canon that could take the place of or be added to a saddle? This would make dinos like parasaurs more useful in a battle or siege.”

Quote Cannons at the more primitive level. Tek Tier will introduce Dino-mounted plasma weapons that can be fired while actually riding the creature.

Survivor, Mullahadin, asks, “Could we get a peek at the breeding mechanics phase 2? Rumors are being created left and right.”

Quote It involves genetics, random mutations, and family trees!

Survivor, Wulfsige85, asks, “Can we have items appear on players characters when they have them equipped in the quick bar? you know a little visual aid e.g. pistol with holster, rocket launcher on there back, bow on shoulder etc. that way other players can tell if someone's packing heat.”

Quote The main issue with this is that it becomes problematic when the weapons aren’t grouped into “types”, and also would tend to look pretty strange given the variance of ARK humans’ size and shapes. However, we will further consider what can be done to provide more visual recognition of someone who’s got weapons in their quick bar...

Survivor, Huntzilla, asks, “Could there be a creature that FAKES getting knocked out and you have us a scope to make sure? Or a creature that is able to attack a little when knocked out so you have to be careful?”

Quote We will be looking into real creatures which may have ‘played dead’. But as for dangerous when unconscious, wait ‘till ya see a torpored Titanosaur!

That’s it for this week’s ARK Digest! Thanks for tuning in and hopefully you’ve walked away learning something new! Thanks for all the support, engagement, and feedback so far!

Much love,

Wildcard Jen & The ARK Survival Evolved Team!