Ark: Survival Ascended Will Now Launch In 'Early Access' On Xbox This October

It's been announced that the upcoming remaster of Ark: Survival Evolved will be launching a little bit later than planned, with the release window now set as October 2023. It'll be available in "Early Access" until late 2024.

The remaster, which will be called Ark: Survival Ascended, is intended to bring the Survival Evolved experience into the next generation with an Unreal Engine 5 overhaul, but the team says that working with Unreal Engine 5.2 has proved "challenging" - hence the reason for the delay from August to October.

"We’ve found it challenging working with Unreal Engine 5.2, but at the same time, it is incredibly exciting. We’re discovering new ways each day to push the technology to the next level; combined with the work needed to support a fully cross-platform-moddable game ecosystem on consoles and PC, it’s clear that we’ll need a bit more time."

The plan with Early Access is to launch (with an initial discount) at $39.99 later this year, followed by a rollout of various maps such as The Island, Scorched Earth, Ragnarok and Aberration in late 2023 and throughout 2024.

As a result, it's been decided that the dedicated servers for the original Ark: Survival Evolved will now be closing on September 30th rather than August 30th.

Here's a bit more information on Ark: Survival Ascended's delay courtesy of developer Studio Wildcard:

"We had initially planned to ship with more content on Day One, but that won’t be happening, so we’re adjusting the launch price accordingly. We know you really want to get your hands on ASA, and we appreciate that support and enthusiasm. We’re going to do our best to work hard to make sure that we can deliver a tremendous next-gen ARK experience that meets both your expectations and our own."

"Our plan is to show gameplay close to the launch of ASA, as that’ll be when it’s completely ready and best represent the final product, so you’ll have to stay tuned until then."

Interested in buying this Ark remaster later this year? Tell us down in the comments section below.