E3 2015: Ark: Survival Evolved

Upon it's early access launch on Steam, Ark: Survival Evolved jumped to the top of the bestselling list and still holds that spot as this news is posted. Not to mention that the game has been wildly popular on Twitch with thousands of viewers tuning into streams of the game being played by top broadcasters.

I had a chance to talk with Senior Technical and Gameplay Designer Kayd Hendricks to learn about Studio Wildcard's collaboration with Nvidia in producing jaw-dropping game visuals. The game's graphical effects plan to further utilize Nvidia GameWorks technology to render game world elements ranging from the surrounding oceans to dense forests with effects such as waterworks and global illumination.

While the game's oceans already look fantastic, the developers are looking them to make them feel far more dynamic and alive with the addition of waves and other visual improvements. The game's forests benefit from dynamic lighting in which the more dense one is with trees and such, the less light that is able to enter between the foliage. Kayd noted that the developers are continually working to optimize the game to make it better perform on systems with not the most modern hardware.

When asked about the game's launch, Kayd said that the studio was overwhelmed by the response and its at the time lofty sale goal of 10,000 sales was exceeded in the first hour of release. Stay tuned as I plan to spend some hands-on time with the game and provide my thoughts on the experience.

Ark: Survival Evolved is available now through Steam Early Access for PC.