“It’s got dinosaurs in it.”
That’s about the only pitch I needed when I was wondering if I should play Ark: Survival Evolved. Certainly, nothing else about the currently very popular Early Access game jumps out as noticeably different from the deluge of survival sandboxes that have flooded Steam.
It’s another one of those survival games where, yes, you craft a lot of stuff and, of course, you build some buildings. There are other people doing similar things in the same world, and maybe you’ll join up with them? Maybe you’ll kill them?
But this one’s got dinosaurs in it! And if anything can spice up a genre that’s become a bit stale in a very short space of time, it’s the wonderful beasties that used to dominate this silly world.
Ark: Survival Evolved wastes no time at all in introducing its hook. The moment you wake up on the beach in whatever section of the world – an alien world, at that – you decided to plonk down your custom survivor man or lady, you’re faced with giant, stomping dinosaurs. And gosh, it’s the best way to start a game.