Scorched Earth is the first expansion pack for Ark: Survival Evolved and its out today
Ark: Scorched Earth is a bit different than what players may be used to.
Instead of landing on an island with lovely terrain, they are instead dropped naked, hungry and afraid on a "fiery" drought-ridden desert world.
Players will need to immediately seek water, hunt for food, harvest new flora, craft new items, and build shelter from the extreme heat.
Scorched Earth comes with a new map featuring seven desert-themed biomes: dunes, high desert, mountains, canyons, badlands, oasis and the dragon trench.
New creatures live in the area, and many can be tamed, such as the camel-like Morellatops. Players can also tame a Wyvern, which can "rain fire down" on enemies.
And then, there's the Death Worm which resides in the desert sands. So, watch out for those. It doesn't sound like you can tame them and take a ride on one à la Dune. They don't really compare to one massive beast: the Manticore. Players will use the power of the Obelisks to call forth and fight the fourth boss creature.
Unlike The Island, water isn't one of the easiest resources to find, so players will need to ration it if they wish to survive. To help matters, though, there are over 50 new items to craft such as clothing, portable structures such as tents, and there are new tools as well.
Other items which will help with survival include are water wells, wind turbines to generate power, and oil refineries which can be built to harvest resources. Weapons include whips, boomerangs and flamethrowers, and new mechanics are also included.
The weather can be harsh what with the electrical storms, blinding sand storms, and the possibility of a heat stroke can be rather high.
Finally, Scorched Earth also makes use of a new feature called The Gateway, which is a cross-server ARK transfer. Those who manage to survive the desert lands can travel back and forth from the Scorched Earth map to the ARK: Survival Evolved main game. They can take with them all of the newly collected tools, weapons, and tamed creatures.
The expansion is out today on both Steam for PC and Xbox One, with the latter also getting the Primitive+ Official Total Conversion. The update adds the HD resolution upgrade to fully support 720p gameplay with 1080p UI’s on the console.
Ark: Survival Evolved and the Scorched Earth Expansion Pack both now include support for Nvidia Ansel and the expansion pack will run you $19.99.