ARK is a hard game to pin down. On the one hand, it is very much a pastiche of existing game genres: Play one wipe and you will see how it very clearly draws survival , Shooter, and strategy games. But while it borrows from all those genres, its unique flow ensures that its chaotic Survival , Taming and open storyline feel decidedly new. A shifting, but not jarring pace, an unpredictable narrative, tough-as-nails gameplay, and a constant sense of ambient terror--ARK's many moving parts coalesce into a rare survival that grabs you with its mechanics and its story and never lets go, seducing you with its challenges and a foreboding sense of dread every step of the way.