Ark: Survival Evolved hit the top live streaming charts at the beginning of the month when its official servers reset in preparation for the release of the remake later this month, Ark: Survival Ascended.
Ark was the 3rd most-watched game (4th including Just Chatting) from October 2nd to October 13th, jumping 104 spots from the weeks prior. It generated 34.4 million hours watched in that time period. On October 4th, the game actually overtook GTA V as the most-watched game with almost 3.9 million hours watched (GTA V had 3.8M).
The game’s live-streaming success was driven primarily by the Japanese streaming community, who participated in a private role-playing server for the first few weeks of the month. Vaultroom, a gaming room and event site partnered up with the esports/content creator team Crazy Raccoon.
Similarly to the extremely popular role-playing servers in GTA V, the Japanese RP server brought together a group of live-streaming creators across to play Ark: Survival Evolved together. Popular creators across Twitch and YouTube, including a bunch of Vtubers, got creative by roleplaying as their individual characters in the game. Fps_shaka was the most-watched creator during the first couple of weeks of the month, generating just under 8 million hours watched of Ark alone.
Private live-streaming servers are a game-changer for brand awareness and boosting creators. Instead of just sponsoring streamers, brands can take it up a notch by sponsoring whole servers, integrating their presence seamlessly into the gaming experience.
Games like Ark are perfect for this because of how customizable they are. These games support customized mods and skins, making it a branding playground. GTA V is already doing this, and games like Rust and Ark can follow suit.
These private servers can handle 50+ players, making them ideal for hosting multiple streamers. This means small creators can share the screen with big shots, exposing them to a larger audience for more chances of getting discovered.
In a world where exposure matters, private live streaming servers offer an exciting way for brands and creators to shine.
The boost in engagement for Ark: Survival Evolved comes at a pivotal time, as the remake, Ark: Survival Ascended, is set to release at the end of the month in early access. It will be interesting to track the performance of the new game to see if it can sustain similar viewership.
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