In celebration of their nomination for “Best Use Of A Farm Animal” in the Steam Awards, Ark: Survival Evolved is introducing an actual farm animal: the sheep! It has its own Ark-like twist to the design with more facial horns, but it’s a bona-fide farm animal to fit the category they’ve become a finalist in.
In a post on the Community Forums, the developers elaborate, “Whilst ARK’s animals may be non-traditional in modern farming, some have held such roles in the past, and ARK contains a variety of animal farming mechanics: such as wild animal taming, breeding, slaughtering/harvesting of animals, workhorse animals (for resource/crop farming), and of course who can forget working with animal byproducts (manure, milk, and other substances).”
These fancy new sheep can be sheared multiple times and cooked when killed. You may also ride it in order to get up steep inclines. However, the ovis aries is very slow, so they should probably be reserved as a climbing mount and a herd you safely keep inside a gate, as they’re pretty defenseless.
Ark: Survival Evolved is available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. It’s a finalist for the “Best Use Of A Farm Animal” Steam award, and you can vote on the Steam Awards page.