What are Ark II and Ark: The Animated Series?

Ark: Survival Evolved became a successful take on the persistent world genre, popularized by games like the DayZ mods and Rust.

It is now getting both a sequel and an animated series, appropriately titled Ark II and Ark: The Animated Series respectively.

The trailer for Ark II featured Vin Diesel prominently, as his character fought off attacks from both an unnamed group and dinosaurs alike.

Similarly, the credits for Ark: The Animated Series advertise Vin Diesel alongside a number of other well known names such as David Tennant, Elliot Page, Russell Crowe, Jeffrey Wright, Karl Urban, Michelle Yeoh, and more.

Ark II, the sequel to Ark: Survival Evolved

The Ark II trailer shown at The Game Awards 2020 revealed very little information about what exactly the game could be about. The trailer itself seems to alternate between looking somewhat okay to having very problematic animations and models.

The Ark 2 trailer looked jank to me, but it was a lot of moments that I couldn't describe other than "it hit the eye weird", so I slowed down the cuts and animations to see exactly what was going on.Did the editor have 5 minutes to cobble this together? pic.twitter.com/8k7j3gRGgy

— Foxcade 🦊🇨🇦 (@SuperFoxcade) December 11, 2020

While this cinematic will hopefully have little bearing on the actual gameplay, it’s never a good sign when the even trailers meant to portray the game in the best possible light look rushed and poorly made. Unnatural movement aside, the trailer shows two core features to the Ark series, prehistoric combat and dinosaurs.

To round all of this out, however, the trailer ends by revealing the high tech undercurrent present in the world of Ark. Although this high tech seems to be more a way for the game to feature more elements as needed, it’s a part of the identity of the Ark games and fits in quite well here.

New Chronicles of Riddick lookin crazy #ark2 #VinDiesel pic.twitter.com/AWRFwfPJW9

— The Michael Cycle (@MikeTres22) December 11, 2020

Ark: The Animated Series trailer

The Ark: The Animated Series plays up the underlying story of the Ark games far more than the Vin Diesel trailer. The trailer for Ark: The Animated Series muses on the relationship between past and present before shifting gears to show two unnamed characters riding dinosaurs fighting one another.

The first character appears to be riding a Parasaur while wielding a bow attempting to fend off an attack from an armored figure wielding a sword and riding a raptor. Through the course of the fight, the unnamed bow-wielder manages to land a shot on the raptor and impale the armored figure on a handheld arrow.

Overall this trailer also reveals very little about the story of either the game or series, although Vin Diesel’s appearance in both implies at least some connection.

(Image Credit: Studio Wildcard)

Final takeaway?

Fans of Ark: Survival Evolved will probably be happy to see one or both of these. However, given the overall lack of information in either trailer, and animation problems in the trailer for Ark II, fans and curious buyers alike should keep an eye out for more information before committing to trying either.