Community mods, can you help us?

[Kenny026]

Hi,

The news today has been disappointing for PS5 users and there are just a lot of things unclear. Can we use this topic to get some answers from the devs maybe?

Roughly 65% of the next gen consoles are PS5 players based on sold consoles. So I think it is fair to say that 65% of console players are still waiting for some clarity surrounding a possible release date. I don’t want to turn this into a console war topic so to all readers, please refrain from this. I’ve seen comments about having to buy an xbox etc, but when all your friends play on the other platform, it’s just not possible or shouldn’t be a discussion even.

Having said that, there are a lot of rumors rising in the community. Some say it has to do with mods on the PS network, others say it’s because of PSN governance and processes, others say issues on the PlayStation version aren’t resolved yet. Nothing is stated in the update of today other than WC is discussing with Sony for a end of November release. 

I hope we can get some clarity about these rumors. Right now there is a huge backlash pointed towards WC and i think some answers and clarity can turn that around.

Thank you

[jpinmo]

ROFL thats rich

[Joebl0w13]

4 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

So I think it is fair to say that 65% of console players are still waiting for some clarity surrounding a possible release date.

So the assumption is if 65% of consoles are PS, then of course by logical extension, every single one of those people with a PS are playing Ark? 

Um, no.

[Kenny026]

1 hour ago, Joebl0w13 said:

So the assumption is if 65% of consoles are PS, then of course by logical extension, every single one of those people with a PS are playing Ark? 

Um, no.

……

 

never mind….

[Kenny026]

Let me dumb it down… 

if there are 100 Ark console players, and roughly 65 are from PS and 35 from Xbox, do you understand where the 65% comes from?

[Joebl0w13]

1 hour ago, Kenny026 said:

Let me dumb it down… 

if there are 100 Ark console players, and roughly 65 are from PS and 35 from Xbox, do you understand where the 65% comes from?

I hope you don't use statistics or math for a living. 

[Pipinghot]

5 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

Let me dumb it down… 

if there are 100 Ark console players, and roughly 65 are from PS and 35 from Xbox, do you understand where the 65% comes from?

You're making an assumption with no evidence.

Even if it's true that "Roughly 65% of the next gen consoles are PS5 players based on sold consoles" that does not automatically mean that 65% of the console owners who play are are using a PS to play it. For all you know ARK is much more popular with XBox owners than with PS owners, it might be the case that the majority of ARK console players are using XBox to play the game.

Unlike you, WildCard actually knows how many of their console players are using PS to play and how many are using XBox to play, so maybe they chose XBox first because they know that historically they have more XBox players than PS players. Or maybe not, I don't know, and neither do you. The difference is you're making an assumption about ARK's console players even though you don't have evidence to support your assumption.

This is the point Joe was making that went over your head.

[Kenny026]

4 hours ago, Pipinghot said:

You're making an assumption with no evidence.

Even if it's true that "Roughly 65% of the next gen consoles are PS5 players based on sold consoles" that does not automatically mean that 65% of the console owners who play are are using a PS to play it. For all you know ARK is much more popular with XBox owners than with PS owners, it might be the case that the majority of ARK console players are using XBox to play the game.

Unlike you, WildCard actually knows how many of their console players are using PS to play and how many are using XBox to play, so maybe they chose XBox first because they know that historically they have more XBox players than PS players. Or maybe not, I don't know, and neither do you. The difference is you're making an assumption about ARK's console players even though you don't have evidence to support your assumption.

This is the point Joe was making that went over your head.

You are right, i have no clue how many players actually play on xbox and PlayStation. The only source we have is Steam with actual player counts. But there is a misinterpretation from the start of my post and a strange spin in taken into this this discussion. With a mod telling me um no and i hope you don’t do this for a living, whilst taking a very strange interpretation by him or herself, it’s difficult to stay respectful.

Sales for PlayStation and Xbox for ASE have been roughly 50/50 based on published numbers by snail. The number of sales of sold next gen consoles are 65/35 in favor of PlayStation. Since Xbox doesn’t have the headstart like with ASE, i think it is fair to say that there is a reasonable chance ASA will sell more on PS. Then there is Gamepass and PS Plus but that has to be seen in the future. Since there are no sale numbers for Ark Ascended (it can only be wishlisted on PSN), i think the target audience is 65% towards PlayStation for console players.

But if we skip this part, i think i asked some very normal questions. It’s a shame a mod is turning this into a strange discussion.

[Yggdrassil]

I dont think the intention is to penalize PS players or make them wait for no reason, from my limited knowledge on the matter, it seem sony have certain requirements, it may be resource usage, file size etc. that must be stricter than microsoft. My guess would be, wildcard are struggling to meet such requirements and/or certification takes longer. We know ASA is currently plagued with issues, they may have allowed more time to resolve some performance problems before setting a release date.

I doubt it has anything to do with market share and trying to gain more money from one console than the other. Nothing above is from fact, so take it with a pinch of salt.

[Pipinghot]

17 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

 

That's a pretty good answer, thanks.

17 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

But there is a misinterpretation from the start of my post and a strange spin in taken into this this discussion. With a mod telling me um no and i hope you don’t do this for a living, whilst taking a very strange interpretation by him or herself, it’s difficult to stay respectful.

I'll address this at the end.

17 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

Sales for PlayStation and Xbox for ASE have been roughly 50/50 based on published numbers by snail. The number of sales of sold next gen consoles are 65/35 in favor of PlayStation. Since Xbox doesn’t have the headstart like with ASE, i think it is fair to say that there is a reasonable chance ASA will sell more on PS. Then there is Gamepass and PS Plus but that has to be seen in the future. Since there are no sale numbers for Ark Ascended (it can only be wishlisted on PSN), i think the target audience is 65% towards PlayStation for console players.

Now that you've described it, that's some reasonably solid reasoning. I mean, we still have to assume that WC has a reason for the order they chose the platforms for release, but your logic behind the idea that PS will be a majority audience is easy to understand. Mind you, that doesn't mean it will be the majority audience at the the time of release, but it is a pretty good explanation for why, over time, the audience for ARK will be larger on PS than in XBox.

So in case you think your reasoning is falling on deaf ears, it's not, I get it. In return I'd ask you to consider that your reasoning for the long term audience may or may not have any applicability to the size of the audience at the time of release.

Beyond this, there might be reasons beyond the question of audience size that would lead WC to chose XBox first. My suspicion (and it's only a suspicion because I don't have personal experience with releasing a game on any of these platforms) is that it's because XBox is a platform that's closer to Steam than PS is on the back end or there is some issue between WC and Sony/PS that needs to be resolved and WC doesn't want to stop their rollout while they wait for that issue to be resolved. Even if the PS would have a larger audience on the day of release it's an over simplification to think that this simple numerical comparison is enough to prioritize one platform over the other.

And, by the way, none of this is intended to tell you that you shouldn't be frustrated or impatient. I get that part, we're all human and you want the game to come to your chosen platform sooner than later. No one can argue with that feeling.

17 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

But if we skip this part, i think i asked some very normal questions.

Agreed. If you had removed the second paragraph from your OP, "Roughly 65% of the...", then you probably would not have gotten any push back on your posts. The actual questions were all pretty normal and I'm sure tons of PS players have the same questions.

17 hours ago, Kenny026 said:

It’s a shame a mod is turning this into a strange discussion.

Agreed, but unfortunately that's what happens when people use unsupported statistics as one of the premises of their argument. It's perfectly legit to question someone's argument if they base that argument on bad ideas or bad numbers. It's obvious you weren't trying to be disingenuous, but you have to remember that 83.8429% of statistics are just made up by people because they think it makes their argument look better.

While Joe's first response to you was perhaps overly blunt, he made a very valid point that you were using an unsupported statistic, and that there are good reasons why that unsupported statistic might be wrong.

You responded to that by saying, "Let me dumb it down..." which had two flaws: 1) it didn't improve the tone of the conversation and 2) it demonstrated that you missed the point of Joe's response. It's an old, old truth of debate that if you're going to be snarky you'd better be sure that you're right before you do it. In this case you escalated the snark and missed the point.

 

So, in the interest of trying to improve the tone of the conversation - your complaints and questions were perfectly legitimate, regardless of any discussions about statistics. Hopefully WC will provide the answers that you and other PS owners are looking for. Fingers crossed for you.

Edited November 6, 2023 by Pipinghot

[banggugyangu]

On 11/4/2023 at 6:48 PM, Kenny026 said:

Let me dumb it down… 

if there are 100 Ark console players, and roughly 65 are from PS and 35 from Xbox, do you understand where the 65% comes from?

99% of households own computers, so clearly 99% of all ARK players are on PC, right ..... RIGHT.....?

[banggugyangu]

On 11/5/2023 at 3:48 AM, Kenny026 said:

Sales for PlayStation and Xbox for ASE have been roughly 50/50 based on published numbers by snail. The number of sales of sold next gen consoles are 65/35 in favor of PlayStation.

I believe you're demonstrating a fundamental misunderstanding of what you're trying to represent.  The sales figures between xbox and playstation being "roughly 50/50" takes no regard into the number of consoles in homes for either platform.  This is simply the breakdown of console-platform sales of ASE.  That means that, of the console players for ASE, approximately one half were on playstation and approximately one half were on xbox.  That said, if PS5 has 65% of the market share, that implies that fewer Playstation owners play ARK than xbox owners.  Essentially, this implies that approximately 66% of all xbox owners also own ARK, while approximately 33% of all playstation owners also own ARK.  Except that's still not the whole story.  ASE was also a game pass title.  Because of this, we can assume that there is also an audience of ASE players on xbox and UWP which don't own the game outright, but rather play it through game pass.  What we cannot assume, however, is the number of players that fit in this final category.  By your own anecdotes, though, it's pretty evident that the higher density of console players lies on the xbox platform.

 

*edit* Yes,  I'm aware of my own error in this.  It doesn't detract from my point, though, it merely deflates the numbers.

Edited November 6, 2023 by banggugyangu

[Kenny026]

@Joebl0w13

 

all we have are the published sale numbers giled to the SEC bij Snail. Those show roughly a 50/50 for console. Are there numbers for actual PlayStation players vs Xbox players on Ark? 
 

just curious…

[Kenny026]

@Pipinghot thanks for your answer. I know i was sarcastic with the dumbing down remark. At that point i felt like being made a fool of. 

Inwas approaching this from a marketing point of view and since it cannot be pre-ordered or bought on consoles i was purely looking at that. 
 

again, thanks for the constructive response 👍

[Joebl0w13]

32 minutes ago, Kenny026 said:

Are there numbers for actual PlayStation players vs Xbox players on Ark?

Sure there are. And only WildCard knows them. Everything else is conjecture. 

It’s been a while since I read the SEC reports but I think they include the Switch as a console as well. In any case, Nintendo considers it one:    

“Nintendo classifies it as "a home console that you can take with you on the go".
So it may be in the mix too. 

Edited November 7, 2023 by Joebl0w13

[Novarae]

On 11/4/2023 at 8:22 PM, Kenny026 said:

Hi,

The news today has been disappointing for PS5 users and there are just a lot of things unclear. Can we use this topic to get some answers from the devs maybe?

Roughly 65% of the next gen consoles are PS5 players based on sold consoles. So I think it is fair to say that 65% of console players are still waiting for some clarity surrounding a possible release date. I don’t want to turn this into a console war topic so to all readers, please refrain from this. I’ve seen comments about having to buy an xbox etc, but when all your friends play on the other platform, it’s just not possible or shouldn’t be a discussion even.

Having said that, there are a lot of rumors rising in the community. Some say it has to do with mods on the PS network, others say it’s because of PSN governance and processes, others say issues on the PlayStation version aren’t resolved yet. Nothing is stated in the update of today other than WC is discussing with Sony for a end of November release. 

I hope we can get some clarity about these rumors. Right now there is a huge backlash pointed towards WC and i think some answers and clarity can turn that around.

Thank you

 

 

All the conjectures and rumors you claim, mainly being you trying to inflate the importance of your asks, and other silly things aside throughout this thread, let's just cut to the chase:

Volunteer moderators are not going to be able nor willing to impart any info, clarity etc  to you regarding of the things you're specifically asking for that amount to you wanting just really a release date. Its not their purview.  All you've managed to do double down on your rant thus far by going off on a tangent debating minutia on console numbers with them and others.

Devs will use official channels to promote info concerning release etc.  Otherwise, you can go to the discord and rant there until Dollie or similar drops you some little grain of ambiguity to have the discord go into a 2 hour slow-mode pixel crack fiending frenzy. 

 

 

But what this all boils down to is you're having a clash of what you're begging for and that of what's the reality going on. Sorry.  

 

I get that you're impatient and perhaps finding it difficult will yourself to do so. But you're just going to have to wait to see.

 

[Joebl0w13]

6 hours ago, Novarae said:

Volunteer moderators are not going to be able nor willing to impart any info

We can't share information WildCard hasn't made public. We have an open line of communication with them to the degree that we can help the community out where we can but we aren't staff and are not privy to most of the hot topic questions players have.

Edited November 9, 2023 by Joebl0w13

[Kenny026]

5 hours ago, Novarae said:

 

 

All the conjectures and rumors you claim, mainly being you trying to inflate the importance of your asks, and other silly things aside throughout this thread, let's just cut to the chase:

Volunteer moderators are not going to be able nor willing to impart any info, clarity etc  to you regarding of the things you're specifically asking for that amount to you wanting just really a release date. Its not their purview.  All you've managed to do double down on your rant thus far by going off on a tangent debating minutia on console numbers with them and others.

Devs will use official channels to promote info concerning release etc.  Otherwise, you can go to the discord and rant there until Dollie or similar drops you some little grain of ambiguity to have the discord go into a 2 hour slow-mode pixel crack fiending frenzy. 

 

 

But what this all boils down to is you're having a clash of what you're begging for and that of what's the reality going on. Sorry.  

 

I get that you're impatient and perhaps finding it difficult will yourself to do so. But you're just going to have to wait to see.

 

Just a bit of background, i’m 43 years old and have seen my share of delays in the world of gaming. Me and my friends purchased a ASE server at G-Portal the same evening more info was released about ASA end of October. That was the moment we learned about ASA and we were surprised, happy and decided to wait for the console release of ASA. We were not disappointed since we only learned that evening about ASA.
 

We do not care about PvP issues, shared servers, XP boosts etc. We don’t even care if we have to wait till the end of this month or hell even next month since we just learned about ASA. We will have our own private bubble with a PvE server, 6-7 friends, without anybody else than our own little group. That is how we played ASE, Conan, Farming Sim etc. 
 

i saw a huge blowback on WC with the community crunch update which I didn’t think was fair. I work for a big software company so i understand last minute delays, bugfixes, following process etc. What i learned so far spread out over different channels is that they mananged to solve the issue of why they had to postpone in the first place (one of my initial questions), and they are waiting now to finalize with Sony so it is out of their hands basically (also one of my initial questions). I think the community crunch update could have prevented a lot of the negativity we see now (of a huge 65% target audience).
 

Believe it or not, i’m with team WC on this whole “issue”.
 

Edited November 9, 2023 by Kenny026