Mod: Thieves Island Paid mods was one of 2015's most contentious issues, with Valve and Bethesda abruptly introducing, and just as quickly dissolving, a system in which modders could sell their Skyrim mods to players through the Steam Workshop. While this paid mods system was a failure for a number of reasons, Valve recently stated that it may reintroduce a paid mods system in the future, with Valve's Gabe Newell saying of modders, "...absolutely they need to be compensated." Studio Wildcard, developer of Early Access dino-survival game Ark: Survival Evolved, is in agreement with Newell's sentiment about modders being paid, and are launching their own program that will allow Ark modders to earn some money. Not by allowing the sale of mods to players, but instead by paying modders directly on a monthly basis to work on and complete their mods. In a call with Ark's lead designer, lead programmer, and co-creative director Jeremy Stieglitz last Friday, he

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When I woke up naked on a beach on one of Ark: Survival Evolved's largest roleplaying servers, I had no idea what to expect. Being drugged and forced to sing karaoke, however, was at the bottom of my list. But that's just life on TwitchRP, an island of oddball characters where one minute you are doing cannonballs into a pool and the next you're charging forward on a sheep in a jousting tournament. Roleplaying in Ark is bizarre, hilarious, and unexpectedly liberating. It's also the most fun I've had in a multiplayer game in ages. Last night, I streamed my journey into Ark roleplaying. I became Lazarus Astros, a man stranded on the island with only the hazy memory of a woman's face. My first 20 minutes were spent trying to survive in the darkness as raptors nipped at my heels, but then I ran into another player who whisked me away to safety. Moments later, I was drinking mojitos in a beachfront bar talking to some of the strangest characters I've ever met in an online game. If you want to watch the full stream, you can find the three parts here. (A note about the Twitch videos: other characters can only hear me when the microphone icon is displayed in the top-right corner. Otherwise

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Dinosaurs aren't the only thing that's big about Ark: Survival Evolved, there's a massive community of roleplayers trying to survive on The Island too. This afternoon I'll be diving into one of Ark's largest roleplaying servers to explore exactly why a game with a dedicated poop button has become a haven for roleplaying, and I want you to join me. At 3 pm PST on Twitch , I'll stop being Steven and become Lazarus, a weary traveller from an alternate dimension, who finds himself trapped on one of the largest Ark roleplaying servers, TwitchRP . With thousands of players, TwitchRP is a hardcore community that has built a reputation as one of the most dedicated roleplaying communities around. Seriously, even breaking character once can result in a ban. For several hours, I'll attempt to survive and interact with the locals completely in-character, a stranger in a strange land, to see what's so appealing about roleplaying in a survival sandbox. To be honest, I'm not sure what to expect. Will the locals accept me with open arms? Or will Lazarus have to revisit his tortured and bloody past in order to live among those surviving in this jurassic jungle? TwitchRP allows PvP, so I'm expecting I'll have at

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Breeding dinosaurs in Ark: Survival Evolved can be a long and arduous process, but for Valentine's Day you might have an easier time of it. During this lovey-dovey event, which is now live, your dino mating and breeding will get a bit of a boost. All servers using a '-vday' command line paramater, including official ones, can expect cupid's arrow to deliver the following romantic bonuses: * Mate Boosted range increased by 2x; * Mating Speed and Mating Recovery increased by 3x; * Creature Maturing and Egg Incubation speed has been increased by 3x; * Baby Food Consumption has been decreased by 1/3; There's also a 5% chance of dinos dropping a box of chocolates after they mate, which can be consumed either for a full heal or used to advance a dino's taming bar halfway. Plus, players can obtain a new emote and hairstyle, though I don't know if that will increase your chances of mating with another player. I suppose it couldn't hurt. Note: even after downloading the update, make sure to restart your Steam client. Some players have reported picking up chocolates but not seeing them in their inventory. A Steam restart should fix this. 

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Is Ark: Survival Evolved a good survival game? Is it a good enough survival game to get by without its key feature: the ability to tame, breed, and ride dinosaurs? Studio Wildcard is curious to see if players will still enjoy Ark without being able to saddle up the scaly terrors of the island, so they've launched some new experimental servers to find out. To be clear, this isn't some new game-wide policy. It's a limited test to see how people like playing Ark without their pets. Dinos will still be lumbering, flying, and swimming around, but you won't be able to make nice with them—by which I mean drug them into unconsciousness and cram food into them until they submit to your will—on these new experimental servers, which will have the capacity for 120 players, with tribes limited to only 10 people. On the Ark community forums, Admin Jat (Jatheish Karunakaran) posted the following: "These are a bit different to our standard servers as they do not allow players to tame, ride, or breed creatures. ARK has a lot of core survival elements to it, and we wanted to see how players would find playing the game without the help of their trusty tames. Of course, this doesn't mean

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Sure, the Tek Tier update for Ark: Survival Evolved contains goodies like jetpacks, sci-fi weapons and structures, new dinosaurs, and laser cannons you can strap to your T-Rex's head. That all sounds great—provided you like excitement, adventure, and insane laser-dino battles. Personally, I'm more interested in how the patch will change players' faces, since the update is also adding beards that grow in real time and can be cut with craftable scissors. As a real-life beard-haver, I realized I had a number of questions (eight) about Ark's beards, and so I went to the source for answers. Jesse Rapczak is Co-founder and Co-Creative Director of Studio Wildcard, the developer of Ark. More importantly, Jesse has a beard, and most importantly, he was willing to answer my beard-related queries. The men AND women of ARK are both veritable beard-growing machines. PC Gamer: You say beards will grow in real time, but my real beard grows extremely quickly. Meanwhile, I have a friend only has to shave once a month. What type of person are you basing the beard-growth rate on: someone like me who grows hair like a werewolf or someone who barely grows hair on his face at all? Jesse Rapczak: Hah! Good point. We mean it grows dynamically

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