➡️ The Shortcut Skinny: Ark Survival Evolved

• 🦖 Ark Survival Evolved on Switch has been completely remade

• 😱 The game was described as one of the worst Switch ports by Digital Foundry

• 🧐 The same developer of the GTA Trilogy - Definitive Edition handled the port

• 🤩 The game now looks unrecognizable from its previous version

Ark: Survival Evolved was widely regarded as one of the worst Nintendo Switch ports when it was released in 2018, but that’s no longer the case.

Under the new title ‘Ark: Ultimate Survivor Edition’ – which is thankfully a free upgrade for anyone who blew their money on Ark: Survival Evolved on Switch – the game has been completely reworked from the ground up.

The experts at Digital Foundry have revisited the title to analyze the game’s technical improvements, and it’s a remarkable upgrade. It still won’t get close to making it onto our best Nintendo Switch games list, but Digital Foundry admitted that Ark: Ultimate Survivor Edition is “actually a gosh darn nice-looking video game now.”

The game previously held the unwanted title of having the “lowest resolution Switch game, or any recent console game” – worse than GameCube and PS2 games, according to Digital Foundry – but image quality has greatly improved due to modern anti-aliasing and upscaling techniques. The level of detail, load times, and the game’s janky frame rate have also been fixed, making for a much more enjoyable experience.

The game now actually looks like Ark, runs reasonably well (not that Ark performs brilliantly on any console), and isn’t just an ugly, blurry mess. Kudos to Studio Wildcard for putting in the time and resources to right the wrongs of the 2018 version, which was – to put it lightly – an abysmal port.

This new version of Ark also includes hundreds of hours of new content, all the expansion packs, new cinematic content, custom server support, and a “young explorers mode” – a new educational mode that lets players discover and learn all about the prehistoric creatures that you’ll encounter in the game.

You can watch Digital Foundry’s scathing yet hilarious review of the original Ark: Survival Evolved for Nintendo Switch below and witness the pitiful port in action yourself.

Ark: Ultimate Survivor Edition is available now and is well worth revisiting if you already own the game. If taming dinosaurs isn’t your thing and you’re in the market for Black Friday Nintendo Switch deals, I’ve rounded up all of the best bargains you can find right now.