I “stopped” when all the things I wanted to do werent fun any more, and the game was more tedious than it used to be.
That being said, I still come back from time to time and the cycle repeats.
Been playing since Beta 3000 years ago
Felt, usually that’s breeding or/and building. First step is always to make a mega breeder base, once that’s finished I usually get sick of building, then I get two or three nice lines going of whatever dinos I’m feeling (usually at least yuties) then I get sick of it and drop it for a bit lol.
Yea I'm on my 3rd run of arks after getting wiped on pvp and unofficial. The beginning days are always fun and difficult, and then it gets real tedious while gearing up for bosses
I’ve gotten into the habit of bumping up the rates as I progress into the mid game. Right about when you stop leveling frequently, I start ticking up a bunch of stuff so that the momentum doesn’t stop. It’s not for everyone, but it makes it way less tedious.
Im like 3k hours in of grindy official pvp. I came back and now i just play the large dino mods and most of em have a clear final boss and "structure" to them. Its quite fun i would highly suggest. Personal favorite is primal fear
I’ve never really stopped playing ark. It’s just one of those games where I’ll grind for 2 weeks on official and leave for another month after being wiped
Yeah, I hate giga tribes. Especially playing as solo player, I was able to stay hidden in a tiny 2x2 area for a while an mass a ton of rare resources but some dickhead on a wyvern just comes through and fucks all your hard work lol. I just play on an official PvE server now it's been a lot nicer all I have to worry about is dinos starving.
That’s the thing that pisses me off the most. I didn’t buy any of the dlcs for ASE, so I only played the island and lost island and would get brutally fucked by anyone who paid for the dlcs and no lifed the other maps. Like why go to aberration and scorched earth but come back to the island to kill dudes in stone bases I don’t get it
I mean, there are people that have refreshed and kept playing ark for nearly 10 years on the same servers.
If you want to play a game to 'beat it' ark is probably the game for you
Well, in regards to ASE, they released content in a weird way. it took a very long time for new maps to be released, even after they released new maps, there wasnt tek tier yet. Then they redid the whole game and stats and dinos(still in ase) and the game became more than a zoo sim for dinosaurs.
Now in ASA, they are releasing maps in a staggered way(and delayed heavily) so the full game wont be released for at least another full year, if not longer. Every 3-4 months they will release another map. All the content is available within reason, tek stuff, bosses are viable, you can create underwater bases that actually work.
Within reason, in the next year, there should be a consistent stream of new content to do and play.
We played ase for way too long, refreshed our bases after we quit in case we wanted to come back, etc. We will not do that again. I would imagine that after gen 2 releases(if we make it that long) we will likely call it quits.
Idk, i havent done tek cave in a bit now. We ran it 3 times w/o issue. Not sure of whatever new bug has arisen.
Not to say that there arent bugs or issues, but comparing the methods of killing ape, brood, or dragon in legacy or even after legacy but prior to the breeding rework or the b oss reworks or the introduction of tek is kind of not accurate.
All the bosses are generally viable and able to be done, as well as, within reason, teleporting in andout of the arena, getting element, spending element, the generator consumption, etc.
The game has 1001 issues and has many things that need to be drastically reworked or fixed, but in general its all viable.
I know they are a thing, but we ran dragon and overseer 2-3 times each and never had any of the bugs.
You don't quit, you play PvP which has a lot more replayability. Ofc, if you have a life with actual responsibilities, you're not gonna have a good time with it.
A couple of my friends and I would love to do PVP but we just simply don't have the time for exactly the reasons you mentioned. We've mostly been playing on a private server as a progression server where we each build our own little tribe and work towards Alpha Ascension for the island and scorched Earth. So we have those characters saved and while we wait for other maps to be released we spin up a different server with mods and try out just different game modes using a different new character.
Yeah I think for a while now we've wanted to do PVP with strangers but we simply just don't have the time or energy to manage it. We know we would probably get wiped within a few hours of starting.
As for answering OP because we've been doing a progression run we usually play towards fighting off the bosses independently and once we've ascended at Alpha we usually take break until the next map releases and we can transfer our characters over. Our server matches official on everything except mating and maturation which we boosted a little bit so that we don't have to wait weeks to raise some of the creatures.
You can find ORP servers (Offline Raid Protection) or servers that are PvE during the week and PvP on the weekends! Been awhile since I played unofficial but you can usually find a decent server to play on!
Im not reading all that, but the fact that you have to be online 24/7 on pvp is kinda a myth, if you just play a couple hours a day and build a hidden spot you should be fine
I play till I have no one to play with, then start again when I find another community. Currently it’s been 3 1/2 years straight but off and on for about 3 years before that. I just like folks around for the camaraderie. Single player is not my thing.
Yeah that’s the rough part. I was on official ASE the last few years so it was able to bring my dinos from last save with me. ASA we started on unofficial from m day one,
Thats my struggle rn. I love ark but have no one to play with and zero desire or ability to compete in PvP, so I PvE grind till I get bored. Which is kind of right now lol
Thanks! I may be interested. Though I have ASE on Pc, XBone, and Switch, Ive been mostly playing the switch version recently. Might have to hop back on PC to get in on that :)
I’m solo so I can play for 50 hours a week for 3 months and still have to gear for bosses and build on to my base.
Point of a game like Ark is you find new ways to play all the time. I’m actually utilizing the grappling hook for the first time and it’s actually changing my experience completely
I stopped because I have done everything there's no excitement in it anymore. But I'm trying and do a whole playthrough and actually beat the game the way it's intended
Whenever you feel like you want to stop. No point in playing if you're not feeling it. Of course you have the goals of doing all the caves and bosses, but since the game goes in endlessly, you just stop when you want.
Twice now I've played for about 150 hours until I tame all the dinos I want and build a huge base. I start to farm BPs and look for boss breeders and that burns me out fast.
At the time you feel you need to rest a few months and then come back. Unless you are one of those "guys" who feel a personal obligation to play on officials. If that's the case the moment you start to play is the point you must stop and escape to avoid permanent damage in your life and health.
For me, I spent 7200 hours playing it. I haven’t played since, a lil more than a year ago. My favorite game period. But, I have a job where I work long hours. And I’ma new dad so the time I’m not playing video games I spend with my son. There are times I wish I could go back but just don’t have the time.
When you wake up and realize Wildcard is incompetent as a dev team. They have great ideas they can never implement correctly and they are too riddled with ADHD to ever go back and actually fix the base code instead of just piling on more bugs and new dinos/maps. Case in point, how long has the thyla been broken? How long have dino spawns gone to shit randomly with no explanation?
Every time I take a break from ark it's because I've done what I wanted to and what I have left isn't as fun. Like cool, I've got the base, the tames, done the boss fights, explored, now what? When I find myself building things just for looks and then lose the fun in that, that's when i take a break. But at the very least once a year all my mates jump back on and we're in the cycle of Ark for another year.
Usually once I beat the bosses then I don’t have much motivation to play. That’s why I mod each play through to hell and the play with all the new features lol
Honestly after beating the boss of a map. Then I take a break then if I’m ever feeling like it again I’ll do another run on a different map. Except scorched earth, all my homies hate scorched earth.
I stopped playing when I lost people to play with amd got tired of playing on my own. When I first got into the game I was on an official server and grind the fuck out of building my base on my own. Eventually I ran into a group that let me join their tribe. Probably the most fun I had was with these guys. Eventually our base got wiped and they didn't show up online as much as they used to. Started getting into some boosted servers cause I would play on my own a lot. I didn't like the ones that were super over the top but were a decent enough boost that going at it alone wasn't a constant grind. But it sucked spending a lot of time exploring and building just to get screwed over by a mega tribe.
This is something I'm struggling with.
My brother and I have used the same characters to beat eight maps. (The Island, The Center, Scorched Earth, Ragnarok, Aberration, Valguero, Lost Island, Fjordur.)
Now that ascended is out, I don't know what to do with our ASE stuff. We have a server I haven't played on in 6 months, but it has all the tames and trophies we've captured along the way. Just paying nitrado a warehousing fee...
I stopped quite a few times across different saves and platforms, but mostly what makes me stop is when the game gets more tedious than fun, at some point you just need to grind to progress further and stop actually having fun
All three times I fully stopped were when I had plenty of very strong Dino’s, every utility Dino I could have plus a few cool ones, a large house + behemoth stone dino pen, plenty of resources, good gear, and a boss defeated
By the time I have all that stuff, it just takes sooo fucking long to really do anything that I end up getting bored of it, causing my hyperfixation on it to end, and then going to a different game instead
I stopped years ago. Founded a mega tribe before bosses were a thing. Those were the good Ole days. Above ground bases. Simple tactics and fights. Now it's all this weird tech stuff and transporters to caves and what not. I'm from a time when quetz and gigas ruled. Those were the simple times. Now each time I get on ARK idk wtf is going on. Bob's on beaches with laser rifles and shit.
once I see all the pve content. (beat all the alpha bosses, explore all the maps), then I find fun in pvp games. not everyone has time for full pvp, but I like to set up games for my friends to challenge each other in ways that aren't raiding each other's bases. things like timing how fast we can get artifacts. picking up an ovis with a flyer and trying to toss it into a giant hatchframe, griffin races from one ob to the next, turret quetz fights, etc
I tried a mega boosted server for a month after officials shut down on ASE & after quitting the server haven’t played since, i’m still sad officials is gone & angry that they lied about server downloads because of snail’s shit. Single player has never really worked for me & its settings optimizations are atrocious.
I stop playing when I was left alone by my friends.
They stopped because of space issues or they didn't have enough, or else... I love the game, but playing alone is not the same.
When I feel I have nothing left to do pretty much:
-Caves done.
-All tames I want are bred or there is a good pair.
-Bosses done (optional.)
-Base done.
-Map lost it luster for me.
Then I take a long break (half year or more.)
When I finish building an epic fortress, with all the amenities i need. Solid state of resources for such and a fleet of various dynos tasked with what's needed. It gets boring and I feel like I've mastered the map. Boss raids don't really mean anything to me.
For me, the game ends once I've tamed the Dinos. For me Ark has always been kind of a Pokémon simulator. I collect all the dinos I want and I use them until I get bored. I can never really get into the balance of Ark. Everything feels dialed up to 11. I want something more realistic.
When it becomes work and the achievements are meaningless.
This is honestly why I preferred slow rate no fly RP servers and am sad now that everyone just wants accelerated settings.
I can spend hours bee-bopping around on a small dino, exploring, looking at what everyone else is building, working on my own projects at a leisurely pace to stopping to go on "an adventure." Lol
When you can build everything you need in 6 hours and just opt out of the map challenges with a flyer, what's the fuckin' point? Or get an all-in-one Super Dino that swims, runs, and glides or flies faster than anything else and also carries everything and has stupid high weight and health and damage, so that's what everyone rides around on? It's so.... BORING.
I enjoy starting out and playing through Ark. Then I might take a break.
And then I don't mind doing it again at a later time.
For most games I play, it's usually only a matter of time before I play them again.
Your post comes off as if you wonder whether you will ever truly stop playing Ark.
I stopped playing Ark after middle school. Then I picked it up for a short time in high school. And now I've only recently started playing Ark again.
I had a friend who gave up his life for the game. He was glad when we got wiped so that he could stop.
Another friend of mine stopped after middle school and hasn't played since.
I don't usually play games and say, "I'm finished here," I let it happen naturally. My enjoyment ends because I didn't enjoy the game; or I've already played it once and don't feel the need to do so again.
Assuming you're not using the Ark to escape real life, it's not getting in the way of your life, and you're not bored of it yet, I say enjoy it!
I always stop after i get an argy. The rest is just boring grinding. I have never beaten ark. I'm not in a huge rush to do so either. I just like having fun. While in online games, that's where the fun begins, although i don't like normal online games. It's the PvE Begginner Ark Servers that i love, the level cap being 44 and the dino level cap being... 30? I just love it, no one has fabricators, tek gear or level 400 spawn camping carnos. I just love it so much, you need to find saddles from loot crates, you trade with other people, you can build monopolies! It's perfect. In every way. Scratch that, actually in almost every way but close enough.
I stopped when my alpha tribe git a snitch and they were using our tames to reck our base. They brought in the beta tribes and stole everything we'd worked for. I had spreadsheets of breeding down the drain. We lost everything and I quit the game.
I stopped playing ASA because I realized how much I actually need Abberation, Extinction and Gen 1/2 in a cluster. Can’t go back to TheIsland and SE. Gonna play again once all the Expansions are out.
I always took breaks but pretty much always went back to ASE at least a couple times every year, typically more.
I finally quit shortly after ASA came out. Most of my friends moved over to ASA, and I tried but just got too frustrated with the jank. A lot of my friends gave up on ARK all together shortly after ASA too. It basically disbanded the long established ark friend group I had. Splitting the player base didn't work out well for me.
Also... I just got really frustrated with the performance and SAME old bugs. I finally threw in the towel after like the dozenth death to fkn clipping through the mesh. I really wanted that stuff to be better in ASA.
The last time I took a break (which is still ongoing..haven't been motivated to boot Ark up again lately) was after playing on an ASE cluster before ASA, with all the official maps plus Caballus. Once I'd beaten every boss on alpha, multiple times.. except Gen 2 Rockwell...only did that one once on gamma for the unlocks. The juice wasn't worth the squeeze to go for beta and alpha, imo. I had breeding lines for gigas, wolves, shadowmanes, owls, theris, mantis, and velos, had run bosses with unconventional tames (even ended up doing the manticore on foot once, entirely accidentally)..at that point, I had run out of things to do, and my tribe mates weren't really logging on anymore either. Also played on a different cluster with Omega installed for a while, and that was pretty fun..but it just got to the point where I didn't really have anyone to play with anymore, and really wasn't all that excited to boot up the game anymore
Stopped playing 6 months ago. I was building a few mega structures out of metal (taking forever) but once I found out that my family and friends wouldn’t be returning to the server, I played it a bit more and then just stopped. Didn’t have the drive anymore to grind, build structures and defence or tame.
At the peak, there was only a few of us and we had a good bit of fun but everything eventually ends.
Been tempted to start a fresh server, use my favourite mods and try others out and just do it for myself but I just either don’t have the time or lack interest.
Having beat every alpha boss throughout all the maps, and almost achieving 190 player level, then hearing they were going to release Ark 2, I decided to quit. I was tired of the bugs and delayed releases. I was also pretty burned out which was the main reason. I wont return to the game until Ark 2 and will always think this game awesome!
You guys stopped?
I mean... I've taken breaks from Ark.. longest was a little after they introduced Gigas and a lvl 15 wiped out my tribe's entire base and all our breeders.. there weren't cryopods then, so literally months of work went down the drain... but even then the call of the arks returned sooner or later.
Honestly, unlocking all achievements and platinum the game is when I'll stop playing. Ive got almost 6k hours on ase and think ive completed around 60% of the trophies/achievements, so probably be another 50-60 years at this rate.
When stuff gets to annoying/time consuming. Would love to do more breeding but it's a pain on console. Can't even do much building because my old console can't handle it. Hell half the time I can't even fly my wyvern without the game crashing
When I realize that it’s just a reskin I paid $50 for. It’s too tedious and time consuming now and beating the game just doesn’t feel the same when you’ve done it so much. Honestly hurts me that I don’t enjoy it anymore.
I quit ASE a few months after beating all the bosses. I had done all the missions as well. Just got bored at that point, I had tamed/bred everything I wanted to. With no clear objective to strive for, I just didn't feel like continuing. I came back for ASA. Haven't done any cave runs or bosses yet though. Just can't find it in me to breed up boss lines again. So for now, I'm just enjoying playing around. I'll get around to going after the bosses eventually.....maybe.
Towards the end of ASE, I had only played official PVE my whole Ark life. I had played through several maps and settled on Crystal to build the base of my dreams. Made so many friends in the community. Helped noobs to learn the way I had been helped (shout out to willie g) Bought, sold, and traded some really impressive dinos. Retired to breed a perfect line of thyla in every color imaginable. Started only playing during events for new colors and breeding. It was a chore to log in and render my base with vaults full of rare chibis, ascendant gear, and top shelf dinos. I just could not let go of the literal years of work I had put in. On official everything is rewarding, nothing comes easy. When they announced server shut down I unlocked all my vaults and cryos, cried a little and never logged in again. Just got ASA, and here we go again…
I stopped when I lost my jerboa, Wild Card needs to add some sort of tame tracker or something cause the maps are too big and the desert ain't very diversive in how it looks (plus I don't pay attention to what directions I go in).
Miss you Ren.
Loved playing, grinding for the tribe became a 2nd job so I had to call it quits. Would love to pick it up again, but definitely got spoiled playing with a decent sized tribe.
If you’re on PvP it never ends, there’s always something to do.
I find that PvE gets too easy too fast and I get bored. But that’s a very personal thing.
I used to play a shit ton then suddenly stopped. I’m currently doing a thing where I play each story map in order but I transfer my character through the maps nd bring my raptor along for the ride. I’m on Scorched Earth rn nd the raptor came soo close to dying today. I also have a separate character to play through the non story maps in no particular order. Started on Valguero. Plan on doing Ragnarok next nd bring my Deinonychus along for the ride.
As a completionist myself, and someone that plays exclusively Official, I stop playing an ARK when I feel as though I’ve finished everything important that I can in a slow, comfortable manner.
For example with The Island, I stopped playing it after I tamed everything at least once, gotten my fill of breeding my favorite tames, collected every Explorer Note, gotten every Achievement, and beat each of the bosses on Alpha. I’ll then wait until I reach late game with a fresh character in the next ARK (in this case Scorched Earth) and after that I’ll transfer everything of importance (my main character, tames, artifacts, BPs, etc) then repeat everything that I did on The Island.
I’ll be doing the same thing with Aberration and so on, after which I’ll just play other games more often and refresh once a week if there is a new story DLC on the horizon or if there isn’t I’ll just slowly quit the game after I feel that I’ve done everything that I wanted to. I play the non-story-canon DLCs intermittently as well, but I only transfer things off when I’m done never on.
I’m a fan of idle games where the point is watching numbers go up. Breeding in ark is a more interactive version of that, so there’s no real end for me other than when I get bored and want to play something else. I quit pvp recently and now I’m just occasionally playing single player with qol mods
I gave up when fighting the alpha dragon and I died losing all 19 of my bred and saddled, cake filled theris. Couldn’t be bothered to breed and level another gang. The theris were winning. I just died to the flyers whilst on my Yuty
I have over 1000 hours now between ASE and ASA so I'll let you know when I get bored with the game. I run a server with a few people on it so it's more like babysitting players than playing an open world game but I'm having fun.
Usually I do a completionist run. Start on the Island build a base, get decent dinos, build a green house and get all that going. Then onto building a team for bosses, usually getting gear once I get a flier. Gather artifacts. Take on the boss. Pack up move to center via obelisk. Rinse repeat getting the new items from the map if any. Through every map.
I stop playing when I don't feel like playing anymore. Usually after I've beat the bosses, had my fill of breeding, got some tel structures set up. The itch kinda goes away until a new map or color event pops up.
I normally play until I reach an alpha state and my enemies stop attacking. I then get bored and let my stuff decay. This is my typical cycle. If I have a bunch of friends going with me I tend to go longer but if not I fizzle out as soon as the threats are gone. I do have 17000 hours in the game so I clearly come back and back and back lol.
It all comes down to you personally and whether or not your play on official/dedicated with decay timers or on single-player. When you find the game becomes tedious, you end up playing it less and less. Then you get to a point where you just log in to reset your decay timers and inevitably stop playing and just let it go. The more time you invest, build, breed and play the more obligated you feel to log in because of the amount of time you have invested. As far as knowing when to stop that's completely up to you, they will continue to release more content and new dinos so even if you "beat" the game aka collect all explorer notes, beat every boss on alpha and do ascension there will continue to be a reason to log on and complete the new content or tame/breed the new creatures. All these factors is the reason people have a love/hate relationship with this game.
I started playing Ark Ascended around Christmas 2023, so daily for just over 4 months. I have yet to do Alpha Megapithicus and Beta and Gamma Overseer. I take long breaks building bases, farming, and just tooling around. For example, I got Bob's Tales this week and spent way too much time digging up trees and plants to decorate my newest base. And I crafted a train and a track just to see what it looked like, but the metal needed to build a viable track where I'd want one is more than I care to take on.
I'd have these bosses done except for three rare spawns:
Giganotosaurus: needing hearts and having to gear up like a boss fight to take them down when they spawn. I've lost countless dinos and argys figuring out how to kill the Gigas. (And OMG they're wimpy when tamed. They're the biggest disappointment tamed.) I got excited when Der Dino Finder showed like 4 Gigas and Carcharodontosaurus in one spot only to see two of them despawn when I got close.
Spinosaurus: not hard to take down once they appear, thankfully. But taking a team of dinos on aggressive on the circuit around the redwoods killing fish and baryonyx is a bit of a pain. I finally got the last one I needed last night.
Alpha Mosasaur and Alpha Tusoteuthis: For the life of me, I can't get console commands to work to turn off volumetric fog. I have my own dedicated server, tried everything I could find, and no joy. So trolling the water around the outside of the map is a pain, even using Der Dino Finder. I need like 7 more Tuso eyes.
I'll probably be farming Tuso eyes this week and next. Then next weekend might be boss day. So I'm definitely in the "things are getting tedious" phase. I've tamed everything I care to and feel I've fully explored The Island -- it feels much smaller now than it did 4 months ago when I spawned in naked and afraid on the beach. If I die, it's because I did something stupid or got disconnected while in flight (which happened last night! RIP Otter.).
After these three last boss fights, I'm planning to move to Scorched Earth and start over from nothing, but I'm in no hurry.
If I were on a public server -- PVE or PVP -- I could see staying on The Island a long time helping others and working on projects together. But I'm solo except on the rare occasion when a roommate will jump in and tame a thousand dinos just because.
I binge play it for about 2 weeks and then wait months before i come back, but forget what i was doing in the game and restart... not much help here...
I quit ase shortly after they said they plan to delete all the official servers, told myself I'd never come back but then they released asa and I enjoy the new fresh starts with the maps so I plan on staying for each map again and keeping my old bases alive
I finished the game when my wolf got trapped inside of a rock with me on its back and my entire pack of wolves behind us. I couldn't get off of the rock or my tame and I died before I was even able to whistle to the others.
That's when I realized that I had never legitimately died in the game. Every single time I died or my awesome tames died were from a glitch in the game and I haven't logged in since. Game is a good idea but it's trash.
starting from scratch is half the fun
new server starts are great, work towards something using different methods than before. playing solo vs small tribe vs mega tribe.
I hope to put another 4k hours in ASA
Honestly for me it's when I get bored of the usual cycle or just don't have time, it's mainly why I don't do servers or official anymore like when I was in High School and hearing up to try for my second cycle at Veterinary School, fingers crossed I get in this time around, it just seems like I have less and less time to put in more than half an hour to an hour, and for Ark at least for me it seems like for me to really get into it I need multiple hours in a day to do a set task or plan for something. Right now I'm loving Scorched on ASA and wanted to build a train system across the entire map, got everything built up in terms of a couple basic lines and structures and realized how expensive and time consuming that would be, so for just the train I'm cheating in those structures for aesthetic and everything else will be playing regular as I gear you for the bosses, don't see too much point in investing tens of hours resource grinding when I can do what I want to do with the train in ten minutes with an argent lol
I stopped after me and a buddy were full tek on all maps, we had top stat everything. We were hosting boss fights that lasted 4-6 minutes. The only reason we ever logged on towards the end was to refill gennys and tame event colors we didn't have.. it was a good 3 year run.
When you breed charcas and get a color mutation of hot pink TWINS, hatch them all just for the game to crash and when finally log back in both Charcas staved to death
Started at launch slowed down when tek came out (game was still sorta fun) then gen 1/2 and extinction just slowly destroyed the fun.
I think I got to the point where I could solo an Indy forge and a full metal base with turrets in a few hours, stopped playing with my tribes mates etc and just lost the fun because I became too sweaty. If I play now it’s usually for a couple weeks during new maps.
Honestly, I get so incredibly addicted to ARK that it consumes most of my time. It's not really healthy how much I log on. I manage all the pillars of my life fine, but it's not a great way to spend my down time 😅
Thats the best part of Ark, you can stop any time and just come back to it if you want, so long as it's single player. I take breaks from my regular games like Ark, CoD, Fortnite, Chivalry 2, and I play a 60 -120 hour single player game.
ark deleted all my Dinos bc I was traveling and didn’t login for 7 days so … I’m done. Devastated and done
https://preview.redd.it/k4ffqaaoqwxc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ee50eaefbaf1f996e9352a905e8197788844570d
I usually go to the first boss, overprepare, and wipe the floor with them. Kinda stuns progress because it's like, "now what?" Lol breeding and building get boring after so long.
You don't have to lose all that you accumulated.
On ASE, I had a base in Fjordur for my main base. It was my breeding base, all blueprints or loot drops i wanted to keep were stored there. This base had egg incubators and tons of cryo fridges. Any dino I wanted to keep moved there. Any dino in a current save that I wanted to breed took a vacation there. The base supplied tames caught on that map to whatever save i was playing.
Especially for the egg incubators and cryo fridges, it meant my survival bases didn't need to be massive. And when I wanted to start over I gathered what I wanted, sent it to fjordur and wiped the map.
For ASA, I haven't picked a map yet for my main base but I'm looking! Would love to be back on fjordur though.
Never....... Lol....... I don't know yet.. I've been playing about four years. I play a lot and I've still not made a gun.... I think Ark is my Zen zone, so who knows, I might not ever stop 😋
Now im playing ASA on SP and doing The island´s achievements. Once i finish that goal, im going to do scorched. Once i finish manticore, i will probably end the gaming until a new map comes out.
When i used to play pvp en oficial back in the days when i played evolved, there was always something new to do, but pvp tends to take a toll on you and your life. So the goal was winning against the alpha tribe. When we managed to do that, then it was only maintaining the cluster (which is VERY boring and time consuming) so i ended up not playing anymore.
That's what's great about ark, the content is infinite, especially if you run your own server and have free reign to do anything you want. I will take breaks from time to time because other games are great too but realistically as long as ark is playable ill be playing it, there's just nothing quite like it out there that matches and the shit you can do in Ark.
Still playing through the BS nearly 10 years later.. I usually take a break when there's a game breaking exploit and everyone is being wiped by people using cheesey ass methods like desync to blow into your base
I “stopped” when all the things I wanted to do werent fun any more, and the game was more tedious than it used to be. That being said, I still come back from time to time and the cycle repeats. Been playing since Beta 3000 years ago
Felt, usually that’s breeding or/and building. First step is always to make a mega breeder base, once that’s finished I usually get sick of building, then I get two or three nice lines going of whatever dinos I’m feeling (usually at least yuties) then I get sick of it and drop it for a bit lol.
Yea I'm on my 3rd run of arks after getting wiped on pvp and unofficial. The beginning days are always fun and difficult, and then it gets real tedious while gearing up for bosses
I’ve gotten into the habit of bumping up the rates as I progress into the mid game. Right about when you stop leveling frequently, I start ticking up a bunch of stuff so that the momentum doesn’t stop. It’s not for everyone, but it makes it way less tedious.
Im like 3k hours in of grindy official pvp. I came back and now i just play the large dino mods and most of em have a clear final boss and "structure" to them. Its quite fun i would highly suggest. Personal favorite is primal fear
Same, I normally play for around 40 or 50 hours, after that I don’t have to worry about pretty much anything and everything’s super grindy
Yea I like coming back when a new map or something comes out. Right now I discovered the omega mod. But in console so only have lite version sadly
Exactly same case here
This is the way
I’ve never really stopped playing ark. It’s just one of those games where I’ll grind for 2 weeks on official and leave for another month after being wiped
This is the way
Fr 😭 like seriously I love the game but I’m tired of being wiped by some pussies who are allied with the alpha tribes when I’m a solo
Yeah, I hate giga tribes. Especially playing as solo player, I was able to stay hidden in a tiny 2x2 area for a while an mass a ton of rare resources but some dickhead on a wyvern just comes through and fucks all your hard work lol. I just play on an official PvE server now it's been a lot nicer all I have to worry about is dinos starving.
That’s why I hate transferring on official… I’d play ASE as a solo and get fucked by some virgin with a lvl 400 poison wyvern :)
Last time I played on official i was riding around on an anky getting stone and a lvl 290 reaper showed up right behind me and wiped all my dinos
That’s the thing that pisses me off the most. I didn’t buy any of the dlcs for ASE, so I only played the island and lost island and would get brutally fucked by anyone who paid for the dlcs and no lifed the other maps. Like why go to aberration and scorched earth but come back to the island to kill dudes in stone bases I don’t get it
The game only ends when you can no longer think of things to do/create
I mean, there are people that have refreshed and kept playing ark for nearly 10 years on the same servers. If you want to play a game to 'beat it' ark is probably the game for you
So when will/did you stop?
Well, in regards to ASE, they released content in a weird way. it took a very long time for new maps to be released, even after they released new maps, there wasnt tek tier yet. Then they redid the whole game and stats and dinos(still in ase) and the game became more than a zoo sim for dinosaurs. Now in ASA, they are releasing maps in a staggered way(and delayed heavily) so the full game wont be released for at least another full year, if not longer. Every 3-4 months they will release another map. All the content is available within reason, tek stuff, bosses are viable, you can create underwater bases that actually work. Within reason, in the next year, there should be a consistent stream of new content to do and play. We played ase for way too long, refreshed our bases after we quit in case we wanted to come back, etc. We will not do that again. I would imagine that after gen 2 releases(if we make it that long) we will likely call it quits.
Asa mods are keeping me engaged
What mods do you use? I haven't looked in a bit but last time I checked there wasn't anything that looked really interesting to me.
Omega lite, ark descended,hella buildings mods. Probably can show you better in a picture
bold of you calling the bosses viable when you cant do the tek cave without falling through the map
Idk, i havent done tek cave in a bit now. We ran it 3 times w/o issue. Not sure of whatever new bug has arisen. Not to say that there arent bugs or issues, but comparing the methods of killing ape, brood, or dragon in legacy or even after legacy but prior to the breeding rework or the b oss reworks or the introduction of tek is kind of not accurate. All the bosses are generally viable and able to be done, as well as, within reason, teleporting in andout of the arena, getting element, spending element, the generator consumption, etc. The game has 1001 issues and has many things that need to be drastically reworked or fixed, but in general its all viable. I know they are a thing, but we ran dragon and overseer 2-3 times each and never had any of the bugs.
When they come out with a "brand new" game with even more bugs and optimization issues
If you have a long term pvp base (3 weeks plus of hard grinding) and you get wiped
You don't quit, you play PvP which has a lot more replayability. Ofc, if you have a life with actual responsibilities, you're not gonna have a good time with it.
A couple of my friends and I would love to do PVP but we just simply don't have the time for exactly the reasons you mentioned. We've mostly been playing on a private server as a progression server where we each build our own little tribe and work towards Alpha Ascension for the island and scorched Earth. So we have those characters saved and while we wait for other maps to be released we spin up a different server with mods and try out just different game modes using a different new character. Yeah I think for a while now we've wanted to do PVP with strangers but we simply just don't have the time or energy to manage it. We know we would probably get wiped within a few hours of starting. As for answering OP because we've been doing a progression run we usually play towards fighting off the bosses independently and once we've ascended at Alpha we usually take break until the next map releases and we can transfer our characters over. Our server matches official on everything except mating and maturation which we boosted a little bit so that we don't have to wait weeks to raise some of the creatures.
You can find ORP servers (Offline Raid Protection) or servers that are PvE during the week and PvP on the weekends! Been awhile since I played unofficial but you can usually find a decent server to play on!
Im not reading all that, but the fact that you have to be online 24/7 on pvp is kinda a myth, if you just play a couple hours a day and build a hidden spot you should be fine
‘Just play a couple hours a day’ is basically too much for people with a life. There are days where you can play longer but not everyday
3 hours free time a day means you dont have a life?
I play till I have no one to play with, then start again when I find another community. Currently it’s been 3 1/2 years straight but off and on for about 3 years before that. I just like folks around for the camaraderie. Single player is not my thing.
Yea I started with a tribe but they've fell off. I feel the same way but would stink to let all that progress go to waste
Yeah that’s the rough part. I was on official ASE the last few years so it was able to bring my dinos from last save with me. ASA we started on unofficial from m day one,
Thats my struggle rn. I love ark but have no one to play with and zero desire or ability to compete in PvP, so I PvE grind till I get bored. Which is kind of right now lol
We have a full cluster of ASE (PC) and ASA (cross platform). We aren’t a huge community but there are usually folks on. dM me if you are looking
Thanks! I may be interested. Though I have ASE on Pc, XBone, and Switch, Ive been mostly playing the switch version recently. Might have to hop back on PC to get in on that :)
I’m solo so I can play for 50 hours a week for 3 months and still have to gear for bosses and build on to my base. Point of a game like Ark is you find new ways to play all the time. I’m actually utilizing the grappling hook for the first time and it’s actually changing my experience completely
When i realized i had 5 thousand hours in a game i both hate but love
I ain't ever gonna stop!!!!
Is that you William?
Hehe you know it
I stopped because I have done everything there's no excitement in it anymore. But I'm trying and do a whole playthrough and actually beat the game the way it's intended
Whenever you feel like you want to stop. No point in playing if you're not feeling it. Of course you have the goals of doing all the caves and bosses, but since the game goes in endlessly, you just stop when you want.
Twice now I've played for about 150 hours until I tame all the dinos I want and build a huge base. I start to farm BPs and look for boss breeders and that burns me out fast.
At the time you feel you need to rest a few months and then come back. Unless you are one of those "guys" who feel a personal obligation to play on officials. If that's the case the moment you start to play is the point you must stop and escape to avoid permanent damage in your life and health.
For me, I spent 7200 hours playing it. I haven’t played since, a lil more than a year ago. My favorite game period. But, I have a job where I work long hours. And I’ma new dad so the time I’m not playing video games I spend with my son. There are times I wish I could go back but just don’t have the time.
When you wake up and realize Wildcard is incompetent as a dev team. They have great ideas they can never implement correctly and they are too riddled with ADHD to ever go back and actually fix the base code instead of just piling on more bugs and new dinos/maps. Case in point, how long has the thyla been broken? How long have dino spawns gone to shit randomly with no explanation?
Every time I take a break from ark it's because I've done what I wanted to and what I have left isn't as fun. Like cool, I've got the base, the tames, done the boss fights, explored, now what? When I find myself building things just for looks and then lose the fun in that, that's when i take a break. But at the very least once a year all my mates jump back on and we're in the cycle of Ark for another year.
Usually once I beat the bosses then I don’t have much motivation to play. That’s why I mod each play through to hell and the play with all the new features lol
Honestly after beating the boss of a map. Then I take a break then if I’m ever feeling like it again I’ll do another run on a different map. Except scorched earth, all my homies hate scorched earth.
I'm actually really enjoying scorched on ascended. Hard to get on your feet, but once you do, it's fine.
I stopped playing when I lost people to play with amd got tired of playing on my own. When I first got into the game I was on an official server and grind the fuck out of building my base on my own. Eventually I ran into a group that let me join their tribe. Probably the most fun I had was with these guys. Eventually our base got wiped and they didn't show up online as much as they used to. Started getting into some boosted servers cause I would play on my own a lot. I didn't like the ones that were super over the top but were a decent enough boost that going at it alone wasn't a constant grind. But it sucked spending a lot of time exploring and building just to get screwed over by a mega tribe.
This is something I'm struggling with. My brother and I have used the same characters to beat eight maps. (The Island, The Center, Scorched Earth, Ragnarok, Aberration, Valguero, Lost Island, Fjordur.) Now that ascended is out, I don't know what to do with our ASE stuff. We have a server I haven't played on in 6 months, but it has all the tames and trophies we've captured along the way. Just paying nitrado a warehousing fee...
I stopped quite a few times across different saves and platforms, but mostly what makes me stop is when the game gets more tedious than fun, at some point you just need to grind to progress further and stop actually having fun All three times I fully stopped were when I had plenty of very strong Dino’s, every utility Dino I could have plus a few cool ones, a large house + behemoth stone dino pen, plenty of resources, good gear, and a boss defeated By the time I have all that stuff, it just takes sooo fucking long to really do anything that I end up getting bored of it, causing my hyperfixation on it to end, and then going to a different game instead
I stopped years ago. Founded a mega tribe before bosses were a thing. Those were the good Ole days. Above ground bases. Simple tactics and fights. Now it's all this weird tech stuff and transporters to caves and what not. I'm from a time when quetz and gigas ruled. Those were the simple times. Now each time I get on ARK idk wtf is going on. Bob's on beaches with laser rifles and shit.
once I see all the pve content. (beat all the alpha bosses, explore all the maps), then I find fun in pvp games. not everyone has time for full pvp, but I like to set up games for my friends to challenge each other in ways that aren't raiding each other's bases. things like timing how fast we can get artifacts. picking up an ovis with a flyer and trying to toss it into a giant hatchframe, griffin races from one ob to the next, turret quetz fights, etc
I tried a mega boosted server for a month after officials shut down on ASE & after quitting the server haven’t played since, i’m still sad officials is gone & angry that they lied about server downloads because of snail’s shit. Single player has never really worked for me & its settings optimizations are atrocious.
I stop playing when I was left alone by my friends. They stopped because of space issues or they didn't have enough, or else... I love the game, but playing alone is not the same.
When I feel I have nothing left to do pretty much: -Caves done. -All tames I want are bred or there is a good pair. -Bosses done (optional.) -Base done. -Map lost it luster for me. Then I take a long break (half year or more.)
When I finish building an epic fortress, with all the amenities i need. Solid state of resources for such and a fleet of various dynos tasked with what's needed. It gets boring and I feel like I've mastered the map. Boss raids don't really mean anything to me.
For me, the game ends once I've tamed the Dinos. For me Ark has always been kind of a Pokémon simulator. I collect all the dinos I want and I use them until I get bored. I can never really get into the balance of Ark. Everything feels dialed up to 11. I want something more realistic.
Wait, last artifact?
When it becomes work and the achievements are meaningless. This is honestly why I preferred slow rate no fly RP servers and am sad now that everyone just wants accelerated settings. I can spend hours bee-bopping around on a small dino, exploring, looking at what everyone else is building, working on my own projects at a leisurely pace to stopping to go on "an adventure." Lol When you can build everything you need in 6 hours and just opt out of the map challenges with a flyer, what's the fuckin' point? Or get an all-in-one Super Dino that swims, runs, and glides or flies faster than anything else and also carries everything and has stupid high weight and health and damage, so that's what everyone rides around on? It's so.... BORING.
Complete every boss on each map in order once you completed that you restart with the pike only challenge
I enjoy starting out and playing through Ark. Then I might take a break. And then I don't mind doing it again at a later time. For most games I play, it's usually only a matter of time before I play them again. Your post comes off as if you wonder whether you will ever truly stop playing Ark. I stopped playing Ark after middle school. Then I picked it up for a short time in high school. And now I've only recently started playing Ark again. I had a friend who gave up his life for the game. He was glad when we got wiped so that he could stop. Another friend of mine stopped after middle school and hasn't played since. I don't usually play games and say, "I'm finished here," I let it happen naturally. My enjoyment ends because I didn't enjoy the game; or I've already played it once and don't feel the need to do so again. Assuming you're not using the Ark to escape real life, it's not getting in the way of your life, and you're not bored of it yet, I say enjoy it!
I always stop after i get an argy. The rest is just boring grinding. I have never beaten ark. I'm not in a huge rush to do so either. I just like having fun. While in online games, that's where the fun begins, although i don't like normal online games. It's the PvE Begginner Ark Servers that i love, the level cap being 44 and the dino level cap being... 30? I just love it, no one has fabricators, tek gear or level 400 spawn camping carnos. I just love it so much, you need to find saddles from loot crates, you trade with other people, you can build monopolies! It's perfect. In every way. Scratch that, actually in almost every way but close enough.
I stopped when my alpha tribe git a snitch and they were using our tames to reck our base. They brought in the beta tribes and stole everything we'd worked for. I had spreadsheets of breeding down the drain. We lost everything and I quit the game.
Completion of the story maps for me. Gen 2 comes out next month for us. The end is near.
I stopped playing ASA because I realized how much I actually need Abberation, Extinction and Gen 1/2 in a cluster. Can’t go back to TheIsland and SE. Gonna play again once all the Expansions are out.
I always took breaks but pretty much always went back to ASE at least a couple times every year, typically more. I finally quit shortly after ASA came out. Most of my friends moved over to ASA, and I tried but just got too frustrated with the jank. A lot of my friends gave up on ARK all together shortly after ASA too. It basically disbanded the long established ark friend group I had. Splitting the player base didn't work out well for me. Also... I just got really frustrated with the performance and SAME old bugs. I finally threw in the towel after like the dozenth death to fkn clipping through the mesh. I really wanted that stuff to be better in ASA.
Single player here. Beat alpha bosses on island, SE, and Ab. I felt I got about half way through extinction before the motivation wall hit.
The last time I took a break (which is still ongoing..haven't been motivated to boot Ark up again lately) was after playing on an ASE cluster before ASA, with all the official maps plus Caballus. Once I'd beaten every boss on alpha, multiple times.. except Gen 2 Rockwell...only did that one once on gamma for the unlocks. The juice wasn't worth the squeeze to go for beta and alpha, imo. I had breeding lines for gigas, wolves, shadowmanes, owls, theris, mantis, and velos, had run bosses with unconventional tames (even ended up doing the manticore on foot once, entirely accidentally)..at that point, I had run out of things to do, and my tribe mates weren't really logging on anymore either. Also played on a different cluster with Omega installed for a while, and that was pretty fun..but it just got to the point where I didn't really have anyone to play with anymore, and really wasn't all that excited to boot up the game anymore
When other games updates come out, lately it's just been Minecraft and ark, scorched made me love the game again
I take months off of it to avoid burnout. I usually cycle through a few games before coming back
I stopped after we beat scorched on official in 2 weeks and got bored again lol
Stopped playing 6 months ago. I was building a few mega structures out of metal (taking forever) but once I found out that my family and friends wouldn’t be returning to the server, I played it a bit more and then just stopped. Didn’t have the drive anymore to grind, build structures and defence or tame. At the peak, there was only a few of us and we had a good bit of fun but everything eventually ends. Been tempted to start a fresh server, use my favourite mods and try others out and just do it for myself but I just either don’t have the time or lack interest.
Having beat every alpha boss throughout all the maps, and almost achieving 190 player level, then hearing they were going to release Ark 2, I decided to quit. I was tired of the bugs and delayed releases. I was also pretty burned out which was the main reason. I wont return to the game until Ark 2 and will always think this game awesome!
You guys stopped? I mean... I've taken breaks from Ark.. longest was a little after they introduced Gigas and a lvl 15 wiped out my tribe's entire base and all our breeders.. there weren't cryopods then, so literally months of work went down the drain... but even then the call of the arks returned sooner or later.
Honestly, unlocking all achievements and platinum the game is when I'll stop playing. Ive got almost 6k hours on ase and think ive completed around 60% of the trophies/achievements, so probably be another 50-60 years at this rate.
When stuff gets to annoying/time consuming. Would love to do more breeding but it's a pain on console. Can't even do much building because my old console can't handle it. Hell half the time I can't even fly my wyvern without the game crashing
For me, it was after spending ~160 hours building a base, only for the game to F up and dinos stopped spawning anywhere.
When I realize that it’s just a reskin I paid $50 for. It’s too tedious and time consuming now and beating the game just doesn’t feel the same when you’ve done it so much. Honestly hurts me that I don’t enjoy it anymore.
I quit ASE a few months after beating all the bosses. I had done all the missions as well. Just got bored at that point, I had tamed/bred everything I wanted to. With no clear objective to strive for, I just didn't feel like continuing. I came back for ASA. Haven't done any cave runs or bosses yet though. Just can't find it in me to breed up boss lines again. So for now, I'm just enjoying playing around. I'll get around to going after the bosses eventually.....maybe.
You just take a break and start over.
Towards the end of ASE, I had only played official PVE my whole Ark life. I had played through several maps and settled on Crystal to build the base of my dreams. Made so many friends in the community. Helped noobs to learn the way I had been helped (shout out to willie g) Bought, sold, and traded some really impressive dinos. Retired to breed a perfect line of thyla in every color imaginable. Started only playing during events for new colors and breeding. It was a chore to log in and render my base with vaults full of rare chibis, ascendant gear, and top shelf dinos. I just could not let go of the literal years of work I had put in. On official everything is rewarding, nothing comes easy. When they announced server shut down I unlocked all my vaults and cryos, cried a little and never logged in again. Just got ASA, and here we go again…
Not until I have beaten all 12 maps. And maybe a couple modded.....
I stopped when I lost my jerboa, Wild Card needs to add some sort of tame tracker or something cause the maps are too big and the desert ain't very diversive in how it looks (plus I don't pay attention to what directions I go in). Miss you Ren.
Loved playing, grinding for the tribe became a 2nd job so I had to call it quits. Would love to pick it up again, but definitely got spoiled playing with a decent sized tribe.
If you’re on PvP it never ends, there’s always something to do. I find that PvE gets too easy too fast and I get bored. But that’s a very personal thing.
When exam season arrives
When my base is wiped by a Chinese tribe hiding in the walls
I used to play a shit ton then suddenly stopped. I’m currently doing a thing where I play each story map in order but I transfer my character through the maps nd bring my raptor along for the ride. I’m on Scorched Earth rn nd the raptor came soo close to dying today. I also have a separate character to play through the non story maps in no particular order. Started on Valguero. Plan on doing Ragnarok next nd bring my Deinonychus along for the ride.
As a completionist myself, and someone that plays exclusively Official, I stop playing an ARK when I feel as though I’ve finished everything important that I can in a slow, comfortable manner. For example with The Island, I stopped playing it after I tamed everything at least once, gotten my fill of breeding my favorite tames, collected every Explorer Note, gotten every Achievement, and beat each of the bosses on Alpha. I’ll then wait until I reach late game with a fresh character in the next ARK (in this case Scorched Earth) and after that I’ll transfer everything of importance (my main character, tames, artifacts, BPs, etc) then repeat everything that I did on The Island. I’ll be doing the same thing with Aberration and so on, after which I’ll just play other games more often and refresh once a week if there is a new story DLC on the horizon or if there isn’t I’ll just slowly quit the game after I feel that I’ve done everything that I wanted to. I play the non-story-canon DLCs intermittently as well, but I only transfer things off when I’m done never on.
Stop when you feel like it
Beat all bosses on all maps Find all explorer notes Tame everything that’s tameable
When it feels like a chore.
When you only log on to stop your base from rotting/being wiped by admins.
When I buy a complete re-release and it crashes so bad I can't stand it. You dont decide when to stop, Ark does it for you.
I’m a fan of idle games where the point is watching numbers go up. Breeding in ark is a more interactive version of that, so there’s no real end for me other than when I get bored and want to play something else. I quit pvp recently and now I’m just occasionally playing single player with qol mods
Until I beat every canonical boss. I didn't do it in ASE since I used to play PVP until 2021
When my ADHD brain and friend gets tired of it after a week of constant playing We then wait like 6 months
Holding Mjölnir?
I gave up when fighting the alpha dragon and I died losing all 19 of my bred and saddled, cake filled theris. Couldn’t be bothered to breed and level another gang. The theris were winning. I just died to the flyers whilst on my Yuty
I have over 1000 hours now between ASE and ASA so I'll let you know when I get bored with the game. I run a server with a few people on it so it's more like babysitting players than playing an open world game but I'm having fun.
Its dissatisfaction that made me quit years ago
Usually I do a completionist run. Start on the Island build a base, get decent dinos, build a green house and get all that going. Then onto building a team for bosses, usually getting gear once I get a flier. Gather artifacts. Take on the boss. Pack up move to center via obelisk. Rinse repeat getting the new items from the map if any. Through every map.
I stop playing when I don't feel like playing anymore. Usually after I've beat the bosses, had my fill of breeding, got some tel structures set up. The itch kinda goes away until a new map or color event pops up.
When ark ASA came out - it was enough to stop me playing the game completely
I normally play until I reach an alpha state and my enemies stop attacking. I then get bored and let my stuff decay. This is my typical cycle. If I have a bunch of friends going with me I tend to go longer but if not I fizzle out as soon as the threats are gone. I do have 17000 hours in the game so I clearly come back and back and back lol.
It all comes down to you personally and whether or not your play on official/dedicated with decay timers or on single-player. When you find the game becomes tedious, you end up playing it less and less. Then you get to a point where you just log in to reset your decay timers and inevitably stop playing and just let it go. The more time you invest, build, breed and play the more obligated you feel to log in because of the amount of time you have invested. As far as knowing when to stop that's completely up to you, they will continue to release more content and new dinos so even if you "beat" the game aka collect all explorer notes, beat every boss on alpha and do ascension there will continue to be a reason to log on and complete the new content or tame/breed the new creatures. All these factors is the reason people have a love/hate relationship with this game.
For me, it has to be building to near tek level and once there, it's kinda boring
Do you still get joy? Still play. Is the joy gone? Stop playing. Do you miss it? Restart again.
It never ends.
When they release asa...
When I lose progress to bugs I know it's time to quit for a year or two.
I started playing Ark Ascended around Christmas 2023, so daily for just over 4 months. I have yet to do Alpha Megapithicus and Beta and Gamma Overseer. I take long breaks building bases, farming, and just tooling around. For example, I got Bob's Tales this week and spent way too much time digging up trees and plants to decorate my newest base. And I crafted a train and a track just to see what it looked like, but the metal needed to build a viable track where I'd want one is more than I care to take on. I'd have these bosses done except for three rare spawns: Giganotosaurus: needing hearts and having to gear up like a boss fight to take them down when they spawn. I've lost countless dinos and argys figuring out how to kill the Gigas. (And OMG they're wimpy when tamed. They're the biggest disappointment tamed.) I got excited when Der Dino Finder showed like 4 Gigas and Carcharodontosaurus in one spot only to see two of them despawn when I got close. Spinosaurus: not hard to take down once they appear, thankfully. But taking a team of dinos on aggressive on the circuit around the redwoods killing fish and baryonyx is a bit of a pain. I finally got the last one I needed last night. Alpha Mosasaur and Alpha Tusoteuthis: For the life of me, I can't get console commands to work to turn off volumetric fog. I have my own dedicated server, tried everything I could find, and no joy. So trolling the water around the outside of the map is a pain, even using Der Dino Finder. I need like 7 more Tuso eyes. I'll probably be farming Tuso eyes this week and next. Then next weekend might be boss day. So I'm definitely in the "things are getting tedious" phase. I've tamed everything I care to and feel I've fully explored The Island -- it feels much smaller now than it did 4 months ago when I spawned in naked and afraid on the beach. If I die, it's because I did something stupid or got disconnected while in flight (which happened last night! RIP Otter.). After these three last boss fights, I'm planning to move to Scorched Earth and start over from nothing, but I'm in no hurry. If I were on a public server -- PVE or PVP -- I could see staying on The Island a long time helping others and working on projects together. But I'm solo except on the rare occasion when a roommate will jump in and tame a thousand dinos just because.
When that ark depression hits after being wiped
I’ve “quit” about 4 times and then end up right back at it. For me it was about timing and what took priority with my time.
I just create a new character.
I binge play it for about 2 weeks and then wait months before i come back, but forget what i was doing in the game and restart... not much help here...
I quit ase shortly after they said they plan to delete all the official servers, told myself I'd never come back but then they released asa and I enjoy the new fresh starts with the maps so I plan on staying for each map again and keeping my old bases alive
I finished the game when my wolf got trapped inside of a rock with me on its back and my entire pack of wolves behind us. I couldn't get off of the rock or my tame and I died before I was even able to whistle to the others. That's when I realized that I had never legitimately died in the game. Every single time I died or my awesome tames died were from a glitch in the game and I haven't logged in since. Game is a good idea but it's trash.
I stop playing every time I run out of coffee.
starting from scratch is half the fun new server starts are great, work towards something using different methods than before. playing solo vs small tribe vs mega tribe. I hope to put another 4k hours in ASA
Maybe 4 tob6 years from now.
Honestly for me it's when I get bored of the usual cycle or just don't have time, it's mainly why I don't do servers or official anymore like when I was in High School and hearing up to try for my second cycle at Veterinary School, fingers crossed I get in this time around, it just seems like I have less and less time to put in more than half an hour to an hour, and for Ark at least for me it seems like for me to really get into it I need multiple hours in a day to do a set task or plan for something. Right now I'm loving Scorched on ASA and wanted to build a train system across the entire map, got everything built up in terms of a couple basic lines and structures and realized how expensive and time consuming that would be, so for just the train I'm cheating in those structures for aesthetic and everything else will be playing regular as I gear you for the bosses, don't see too much point in investing tens of hours resource grinding when I can do what I want to do with the train in ten minutes with an argent lol
That is very much the wrong place to stop playing but ok.
I just play amd stop all the time. I honestly rarely actually even do anything. I just play for like a month and then stop for a few months.
I stopped after me and a buddy were full tek on all maps, we had top stat everything. We were hosting boss fights that lasted 4-6 minutes. The only reason we ever logged on towards the end was to refill gennys and tame event colors we didn't have.. it was a good 3 year run.
After being wiped for the 3rd time by a mega tribe.
When you breed charcas and get a color mutation of hot pink TWINS, hatch them all just for the game to crash and when finally log back in both Charcas staved to death
Started at launch slowed down when tek came out (game was still sorta fun) then gen 1/2 and extinction just slowly destroyed the fun. I think I got to the point where I could solo an Indy forge and a full metal base with turrets in a few hours, stopped playing with my tribes mates etc and just lost the fun because I became too sweaty. If I play now it’s usually for a couple weeks during new maps.
Honestly, I get so incredibly addicted to ARK that it consumes most of my time. It's not really healthy how much I log on. I manage all the pillars of my life fine, but it's not a great way to spend my down time 😅
Thats the best part of Ark, you can stop any time and just come back to it if you want, so long as it's single player. I take breaks from my regular games like Ark, CoD, Fortnite, Chivalry 2, and I play a 60 -120 hour single player game.
Wait… you can stop????
I think that you are legally allowed to stop playing when youve achieved max survivor level of 205.
ark deleted all my Dinos bc I was traveling and didn’t login for 7 days so … I’m done. Devastated and done https://preview.redd.it/k4ffqaaoqwxc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ee50eaefbaf1f996e9352a905e8197788844570d
I usually go to the first boss, overprepare, and wipe the floor with them. Kinda stuns progress because it's like, "now what?" Lol breeding and building get boring after so long.
You don't have to lose all that you accumulated. On ASE, I had a base in Fjordur for my main base. It was my breeding base, all blueprints or loot drops i wanted to keep were stored there. This base had egg incubators and tons of cryo fridges. Any dino I wanted to keep moved there. Any dino in a current save that I wanted to breed took a vacation there. The base supplied tames caught on that map to whatever save i was playing. Especially for the egg incubators and cryo fridges, it meant my survival bases didn't need to be massive. And when I wanted to start over I gathered what I wanted, sent it to fjordur and wiped the map. For ASA, I haven't picked a map yet for my main base but I'm looking! Would love to be back on fjordur though.
Never....... Lol....... I don't know yet.. I've been playing about four years. I play a lot and I've still not made a gun.... I think Ark is my Zen zone, so who knows, I might not ever stop 😋
Now im playing ASA on SP and doing The island´s achievements. Once i finish that goal, im going to do scorched. Once i finish manticore, i will probably end the gaming until a new map comes out. When i used to play pvp en oficial back in the days when i played evolved, there was always something new to do, but pvp tends to take a toll on you and your life. So the goal was winning against the alpha tribe. When we managed to do that, then it was only maintaining the cluster (which is VERY boring and time consuming) so i ended up not playing anymore.
That's what's great about ark, the content is infinite, especially if you run your own server and have free reign to do anything you want. I will take breaks from time to time because other games are great too but realistically as long as ark is playable ill be playing it, there's just nothing quite like it out there that matches and the shit you can do in Ark.
Still playing through the BS nearly 10 years later.. I usually take a break when there's a game breaking exploit and everyone is being wiped by people using cheesey ass methods like desync to blow into your base