Community Crunch 432: Fear Ascended, Extra Life, UE 5.4 News, and More!

We’re diving into the spooky details of Fear Ascended, providing a live operations update on Aberration transfers, and sharing an update on Unreal Engine 5.4. Plus, we have an exciting announcement about a special guest host joining this year’s Extra Life event!

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The shadows draw closer… Fear Ascended is creeping into ClubARK, and all the eerie goodies—skins, emotes, chibis, and tameable creatures—will haunt ClubARK as rewards! If you’re brave enough to earn a tameable creature through ClubARK events, it will come sealed in a cryopod, ready to be unleashed on your server. Wild event dino colors will bleed through to official servers, adding a ghostly touch to the wilderness.

And for our Unofficial server friends, you can summon Fear Ascended creatures through commands or spawners—if you dare!

10/30/2024 to 11/13/2024

PVP/PVE: 2x Harvesting, Taming, and Experience, and Breeding

Small Tribes: 4.5x Harvesting, Taming, and Experience + 4x Breeding

ARKpocalypse: 5x Harvesting, Taming and Experience, and Breeding

Zombie Fire Wyvern

Zombie Lightning Wyvern

Zombie Poison Wyvern

Zomdodo

Skeletal Giga Costume

Skeletal Raptor Costume

Skeletal Rex Costume

Skeletal Stego Costume

Skeletal Trike Costume

Skeletal Wyvern Costume

Ghost Basilisk Costume

Ghost Bulbdog Costume

Ghost Direwolf Costume

Ghost Mantis Costume

Ghost Reaper Costume

Ghost Rex Costume

Dino Witch Hat

Scary Dino Pumpkin Helmet Skin

Weapon

Cleaver (Sword) *new*

Crowbar (Pick) *new*

Armor

Werewolf Costume *new*

Arrow-Head Hat *new*

Axe-Head Hat *new*

Sword-Head Hat *new*

Araneo Swim Bottom Skin

Araneo Swim Top Skin

Basilisk Ghost Costume

Bulbdog Ghost Costume

Clown Mask Skin

Dino Witch Hat Skin

Direwolf Ghost Costume

DodoRex Mask Skin

DodoWyvern Mask Skin

Headless Costume Skin

Hockey Mask Skin

Jack-O-Lantern Swim Bottom Skin

Jack-O-Lantern Swim Top Skin

Jack-O-Lantern-Print Shirt Skin

Mantis Ghost Costume

Onyc Swim Bottom Skin

Onyc Swim Top Skin

Reaper Ghost Costume

Reaper Swim Bottom Skin

Reaper Swim Top Skin

Reaper-Print Shirt Skin

Rex Ghost Costume

Rex Bone Helmet Skin

Scary Pumpkin Helmet Skin

Skeleton Costume

Skele-Print Shirt Skin

Strawman Costume

Snow Owl Ghost Costume

Tentacle-Print Shirt Skin

Trike Bone Helmet Skin

Vampire Dodo Swim Bottom Skin

Vampire Dodo Swim Top Skin

Vampire Eyes Skin

Werewolf Mask Skin

Witch Hat Skin

ZombDodo-Print Shirt Skin

Zombie Wyvern-Print Shirt Skin

Horror Species X *new*

Festive Dino Candy (Dino Candy Corn)

Pumpkin

Scarecrow

Stolen Headstone

Chibi-Skeletal Brontosaurus

Chibi-Skeletal Carno

Chibi-Skeletal Giganotosaurus

Chibi-Skeletal Jerboa

Chibi-Skeletal Quetzal

Chibi-Skeletal Raptor

Chibi-Skeletal Rex

Chibi-Skeletal Stego

Chibi-Skeletal Trike

Chibi-Skeletal Wyvern

Chibi-Ghost Basilisk

Chibi-Ghost Direwolf

Chibi-Ghost Mantis

Chibi-Ghost Rex

Chibi-Spooky Bulbdog

Howl *new*

Sniff *new*

Evil

Panic

Scare

DarkLavender

MediumLavender

WyvernPurple0

DragonFire

Orange

Peach

Green

MediumTurquoise

DarkTeal

DarkBlue

Dino Dark Blue

Blue

ActualBlack

BlackSands

Dark Grey

MediumAutumn

Yellow

DeepPink

A very special guest has joined our lineup—content creator Raasclark will be going live with us from our Seattle office Saturday November 2nd at 10AM Pacific for this year’s 24-hour Extra Life event! Join us for an unforgettable stream as Raasclark helps us make a difference for a great cause!

If you are interested in donating, click on the button below! All donations go to the Extra Life organization and contribute to raising the Official Network rates for 24 hours!

DONATE

We will announce all the final details in a future Crunch, but here’s a sneak peak of what you can expect:

Reveals of upcoming game content, such as ARK Extinction and Bob’s Tall Tales Part 3

Preview of ‘ARK Ultimate Mobile Edition’ from Grove Street Games

First Looks at ARK The Animated Series Part 2

Stop by on November 2nd and hang out out in our Twitch stream or Discord for an opportunity to win a cool giveaway!

Alternatively, you can join the Studio Wildcard Extra Life Team and help raise money for children in need! By teaming up with us on Extra Life Gameday, not only will you be part of 24 hours of epic reveals, giveaways, and entertainment, but you’ll also be giving back to those who need it most!

Transfers on Aberration Official servers will open at 10am PST/1pm EST November 8th allowing players to move items, creatures, and characters onto the map without restriction! Pack your cogs and get your Cosmos ready to explore!

Unreal Engine 5.4 is being pushed back a little bit, but is still well underway. Before we determine a new launch timeframe, let’s give you a little background on this process in the form of an analogy.

Let’s say you have a factory that bakes cakes with many specialized techniques that you designed. Now, this cake factory is a little dated. Fortunately for you, cake making techniques continue to improve, and new methodologies are available to enhance your cake. Seems pretty straightforward, right? But not exactly.

You’re working with a live cake factory; you need to continue making cakes to feed your customers, so you cannot disrupt that process to integrate these improvements. However, you can dedicate a small team to make a new cake factory, based on the original, and incorporate the upgrades.

After some time, the new cake factory has finished with the upgrades. Still, you notice that your specialized techniques that made your cake taste a certain way no longer work, so now you’ve got to spend time fixing all of that while still operating your old cake factory..

This is the stage we’re at. We’ve branched the codebase, completed the upgrade, and are now going through the time-consuming process of ensuring that everything works as expected; this doesn’t just include the old things that are essential to developing ARK and were custom-built but also making sure that the new improvements are functioning as expected within our custom codebase. This impacts how you experience the game (i.e., when we cook out the files, is the gameplay as we expect, are we noticing the performance improvements, has anything new broken?) and also how we experience the editor (are our tools functioning the way we expect them too, can level designers still create volumes, are blueprints cooking, etc.).

So yeah, while we do want to move into the new cake factory, we’re still testing that all components of our cake can be made with the new factory tools and that the cake is still a cake, but better.

It’s pretty lengthy and carries some risk. We could get through it quicker if we put more people onto it, but that adds more risk to the cake we’re giving people now (ASA) and we’ve got a lot of orders lined up for the rest of the year.

So, what’s our new timeline? We believe the safest approach would be to release the engine upgrade to 5.4 (or maybe higher at that point) in Q1 next year. This allows our team to focus on the significant content milestones this year (Extinction, Events, and Wasteland War) and then gently move on to wrapping up the upgrade after the break.

We’re really excited about the upgrade, not only because of the performance improvements but also because it gives us access to better and sharper tools to continue improving the quality of the game. It’s still coming, so hang in there!

TLDR: Cake is on the way, coming to a bakery near you in Q1 2025.

We’re working closely with our partners at Nitrado to make the official server saves from our sunsetted servers available soon. We know how much these worlds mean to you, and we’re committed to helping preserve your hard-earned progress. Stay tuned for more updates!

On April 8th, we deployed a new type of server across the network (for the various game types) that we refer to as “Expire” (which is what you can search for in the session filter).

These servers will be online until 10 am PST / 1 pm EST on November 15th. We’re preemptively using our allocation for Extinction to host some additional sessions that players can travel onto to farm, tame, and experience Aberration Gameplay. The same transfer restrictions apply in that you are only able to download your character, but you can freely take anything off. This is to help reduce load off some of the other servers, or provide players an option for those who just want to jump onto Aberration temporarily.

Please note that these servers will no longer exist after 10 am PST / 1 pm EST on November 15th, so if you intend to use them, remember to transfer your items/creatures/characters off before that date, as nothing will be saved beyond that time period.

Happy 1-year Anniversary to ARK: Survival Ascended!

From dino-mite adventures to reaching new heights as ascended Survivors, it’s been an epic journey, and we’re grateful to have you all along for the ride. As we celebrate this milestone, we’re excited to look toward an even bigger year ahead—one filled with surprises and new discoveries. Here’s to another year of adventure together!

From all of us at Studio Wildcard—thank you, Survivors!

Download & play new custom content created by players, including new maps, creatures, items, and game modes, through a dedicated new Mod-browser directly within the game. Enjoy an endless stream of new ARK content as the creativity and talent of the community is fully unleashed for the first time across gaming platforms and stay tuned as we spotlight more Cross-Platform Mods each week!

This video features:

MSVV Halloween by Deckard

H&N Wicked Wardrobe by TheNokosa

Randis Halloween Mod by Randi_Beers

Skin Cosmetics Klinger Reinforced Concrete by klingerMartins

This weekend, the Official Network will be receiving bonus rates! It will be active until Monday, October 28.

PVP/PVE: 2x Harvesting, Taming, and Experience, and Breeding

Small Tribes: 4.5x Harvesting, Taming, and Experience + 4x Breeding

ARKpocalypse: 5x Harvesting, Taming and Experience, and Breeding

Fan Art Gallery | Screenshot Gallery | Artist Feedback Form

Player’s creativity, passion, and, love for this lil’ dinosaur game inspire us daily. It’s awesome to see what ARK sparks in you—be it art, mods, or stories that capture the spirit of our shared world. The talent of this community is next level, and witnessing your creations and passion reminds us why we push the boundaries of ARK’s universe.

Creator: Raasclark feat. Haitch

Raasclark and Haitch attempt to tame their very first dragon on ARKpocalypse without a HUD!

Creator: Kittykatlapurr

Kittykatlapurr is taking us on an adventure to find Basilisks on Aberration in Ark Survival Ascended. They are a rare sight to see but can be found in all zones.

ARK goodies by gman2006

Tried drawing a Megalo from memory by ikrannn

Been playing ARK lately; I like the critters. by ackusia

Aberration Ascended by @MystikQuill

Poglin by sirdrip

Gems by @falco_luna

Go go go!! by @alkonavi

Photo Mode by grungke2

Cowboy Cosmo by nesvog

Me and my Ceratosaur getting nice and cozy. by flamekeeper2224

Memorial built in honour of our dear friend and moderator, Lego by @vadams10

New build on Aberration by haroww

Enjoy your weekend! Studio Wildcard

Twitter: twitter.com/survivetheark Discord: discord.com/invite/playark Reddit: reddit.com/r/playark Instagram: instagram.com/survivetheark Twitch: twitch.tv/survivetheark Steam: steamcommunity.com/app/346110 Youtube: youtube.com/survivetheark Facebook: facebook.com/survivetheark Threads: threads.net/@survivetheark Official Wiki: ark.wiki.gg