Ark: Survival Ascended is finally available on PC but a significant change to dedicated servers has led to fury among players.
Nitrado has secured Ark: Survival Ascended server hosting exclusivity for the new release, which significantly limits the options for players to host their own servers—and locks it behind a monstrous paywall.
A three-day server subscription with 26 player slots, the cheapest option with Nitrado, costs $8.09, with a 30-day subscription priced at $32.29. If you want to secure that service for a year, the price increases to a whopping $322.19.
Prices also increase for the number of players, with a maximum size of 200, and just three days runtime for that size costs $51.99, while a 30-day runtime is priced at $207.79. At the top end of the spectrum, a year-long server with 200 player slots clocks in at over $2,000.
The terms of the exclusivity and the pricing have understandably led to a furious reaction from the player base—particularly as the single-server available through Steam can only be used for one map.
Players have described the decision regarding Steam servers as “absolutely mind-boggling,” while others have said they “have no intention” of moving to Ark: Survival Ascended from its predecessor, Ark: Survival Evolved, especially due to the server hosting limitations.
Frustration regarding dedicated servers on Ark: Survival Ascended has come alongside problems with the official servers since launch, though a new server-side build will eliminate “over 95% of server crashes.”
Server stability at launch has long been a problem with Ark, which was acknowledged by the developer, which will be concerning as the game is still yet to be released on console. However, more official servers will be launched.
There are, however, some ways to erase both of those problems, though they do come with limitations. A non-dedicated server can host up to eight players, while the game can also be played in a single-player world.
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