Neue Rezensionen von HansWasser

Watch the video on the development history by ShadowZone and you'll know what kind of product you are spending your money on and what company your money will go to...

Please don't...

Ark is dead! The official servers will be shut down in only a few months when the unreal 5 remaster supposedly releases. However, I cannot find a mention of that anywhere on the steam page. Not to mention that so far there is no footage or screenshots of the remaster, only some asset comparissons that show nothing more than wildcard/snail games ability to retexture some assets and drag them into UE5.

On the other hand the store page mentions features like DX12 rendering, something that was promised years ago but abandoned in 2019. Or the dynamic tesselation, which is a feature that was abandoned even before the game left early access, yet the devs seem unable to remove the unfunctional checkbox from the settings menu. And that while useful and working features like vsync can not be toggled via the menu and need to be enabled by editing the settings file. Not to mention the load of bugs that have been in the game for years.

That isn't the reason I'm writing this review though. I'm writing it because I'm sick of the devs creating new preorder bundles for the Ark remaster and Ark 2, of which we have only seen render trailers and concept art at best, in the case of Ark 2, or straight up nothing but updated assets in case of the remaster. I'm also sick of Wildcard/Snail not acknowledging the Island Boys false mass ban. These people paid money for this game and invested thousands of hours into it, as did I, just for them to get false banned by someone clearly abusing their admin privileges!

Enough is enough! I have tolerated way too much over the years because at it's core, Ark is a very fun game. But for me it stops here. I have uninstalled the game and will not play it again or buy anything from wildcard/snail until these problems are adressed. I can only advise everyone reading this to do the same!

See below for review update.

Original review:
This was a promising early access game and I had great fun playing it. However, with the recent events I am highly disappointed and can only recommend everyone to stay away from it.

The progress on the game is currently almost inexistent with the spline update being far behind schedule with originally promised features not being included (dynamic switches). If the spline update even fixes what it's supposed to fix is highly questionable.

Now that staff members were bullied out of the team and the discord server was locked down to announcements only it has gotten clear that Keume, the sole developer and only paid person on staff, is unable to manage a project of this scale.
It's now two days after the discord server was locked down and Keume finally made a public statement about whats going on. This is his first time directly talking to the community in months (other than posting changelogs) and he has not adressed any specific problems or potential sollutions in his statement.

The future of this game is highly uncertain and while it is fun, it is also far from finished. If Keume manages to get things under control I will update this review. Until that is the case I am sorry but I can't recommend this game.

Update 18/09/22:
Keume seems to be making progress on the game again. The new building tools have been added to the old physics based splines and we even got a new engine and waycar. This is very welcome progress that's been long overdue in the last couple months. However I would still advise anyone to be careful.
The game was supposed to go out of early access a year after initial release, which will be next month. However, the game is far from ready for that and I hope that Keume will not just call the game finished and move on. While the latest progress has given me hope and proves that Keume is willing to work on the game, it is not enough to prove that he has the skill and resources to pull it off on his own. We will see what the future brings.

Update 22/11/22:
The updates in the past month have been sort of regular, bugs are getting adressed eventually. So I guess the game is not a complete disaster after all but it is still uncertain if the original ambitions can be fully realized. But at least the train is on it's way again...

All screenshots are from angles that hide the missing distant scenery. The distant mountains are lacking any form of scenery, all blank without any detail. The houses in Arosa and Chur look like they've been built yesterday with no weathering at all. Low quality textures on some objects. Train throttle position isn't displayed in HUD. Pantographs glitch through the overhead wire.
Seriously, I've seen TS1 routes that look better than this

Trains look good and sound is nice but without good scenery this route just isn't worth that much money to me. I'm getting a refund and can't recommend this at all for full price. Look at these screenshots https://imgur.com/a/hseQfYG and decide for yourself if it's worth your money, I'd recommend you to rather get the TS1 version of this route if you really want it.

Die Steuerung ist total schwammig und der Bus lässt sich nur schwer kontrollieren. Außerdem fährt sich der Bus im realistischen Modus wie mit angezogener Handbremse, so dass er, wenn man vom Gas geht bereits nach ca. 100m zum Stehen kommt. Eine optische einschätzung der aktuellen Geschwindigkeit ist ebenfalls nur schwer möglich.

Die Karte ist relativ detailarm, das Straßennetz wirkt künstlich. Eine glaubwürdige Stadt sieht anders aus.
Auch haben alle Haltestellen eine eigene Haltebucht, was in der Realität nicht so ist.

Vielleicht ist das Management der eigen Firma ja ganz interessant und bestimmt kann man im Multiplayer gut drüber lachen, wie man mit der Steuerung kämpft, aber als realistische Simuation empfinde ich dieses Spiel nicht.

Leider nur gut gemeint, aber nicht gut gemacht...

Ich persönlich lasse mir mein Geld zurückerstatten.

I've noticed a few bugs but nothing game-breaking. I didn't have problems playing the tutorials at all. Everything worked fine.
As for the bugs, I'm sure they're gonna get fixed and as I said, nothing game-breaking.

If you should buy this is hard to say. I'd recommend it but if the bugs bother you and you aren't able to wait for the fixes I can't help you. Maybe then wait for a sale.

Ich habe den Key zu diesem Spiel bei einem Streamer bekommen und es nach dem installieren erstmal nicht weiter beachtet. Heute habe ich mich dann 5 Minuten mit diesem Spiel beschäftigt. Ich habe noch nie etwas schlimmeres gesehen! 1. Mann kann die Steuerung nicht einsehen oder auf andere Tasten legen.
2. Das Menü ist so unfassbar Hässlich... das kann man nicht in Worte fassen.
3. Die Grafik ist... naja grade so akzeptabel...

Kauft es euch auf gar keinen Fall! Ich würde es nichtmal spielen, wenn ich Geld dafür bekommen würde.