A player with over 35,000 hours in ARK requests a refund and leaves a negative review on Steam

Accuses developers of having ruined the original game after focusing on remastering.

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The usual scenario is that, after thousands of hours in a game, the experience is marked as positive. But not always. A Steam user with over 35,000 hours logged in ARK: Survival Evolved has left a negative review and requested a refund, claiming that recent changes have destroyed what was once their favorite game for years.

The player claims to have enjoyed ARK for years with friends and family, even managing custom servers with mods. But this has changed, following Studio Wildcard’s focus on ARK: Survival Ascended and the controversial DLC ARK Aquatica, their experience has been marred by severe compatibility, server, and broken content issues.

The ARK community erupts over the state of the original game after the release of Ascended

In their comment, the user explains that “nothing works anymore“, that mods are no longer compatible, and that all this seems to be part of a strategy to push players towards ARK: Survival Ascended, a game they also own, but directly calls “trash”.

“They had something great and ruined it out of greed,” they sentence in their review. They also accuse Studio Wildcard of breaking the original version after focusing their efforts on the remaster, and claim that the current state of the game is unacceptable for those who have supported it from the beginning.

Meanwhile, publisher Snail Games has publicly acknowledged the issues and indicated that they are working to resolve them. However, they have also admitted that it’s a more complex situation than expected, so an immediate solution is not expected. In the meantime, the community continues to express its discontent and demand answers.