2015 has a been a big year for dinosaurs. Back in May, Jurassic World stomped its way to the top of the box office, having raked in over $1.5 billion at the global box office so far. JW‘s incredible success no doubt contributed to the success of Ark: Survival Evolved, with Studio Wildcard’s dinosaur survival sim being released on Steam (via Early Access) just a few days later.

Ark: Survival Evolved contains all of the usual survival sim gameplay, with players able to hunt for and grow their own food, as well as craft items and use their gathered resources to build shelters. But the real draw of Ark: Survival Evolved is that it includes a variety of dinosaurs, from great, hulking behemoths, to much smaller beasts no bigger than the player character.

While Ark: Survival Evolved players can take on these dinosaurs, working with other players in the game to take down the bigger monsters, players can also train and even ride the dinos. They just knock the dinosaur unconscious, nurse it back to health with some grub and then the player can ride it around the game – or even fly it about if they train up a pterodactyl. So with all of that, it’s unsurprising that the game has garnered mostly positive reviews on Steam and why it sold over one million copies in under a month.

Ark Survival Evolved Sales

Studio Wildcard will be looking forward to more positive reviews when Ark: Survival Evolved is also released on Xbox One. During the company’s Gamescom 2015 press conference, Microsoft revealed that the game would be coming to the Xbox One Preview Program in ‘Winter’ (early 2016). And although the Preview Program is invite only (and therefore not all Xbox One players will be able to play the game when it lands on the platform), it does mean that for a few months Ark: Survival Evolved will be an Xbox One console-exclusive as the dinosaur sim is also scheduled for a full release on PS4 in June 2016.

However, while Ark: Survival Evolved is a fantastic bargaining chip for Microsoft (between this and EA Access, which provides early access to demos), some have criticized the announcement. Many Steam players argue that their version of the game should be finished first before the developer starts thinking about the Xbox One, PS4 and Project Morpheus versions of the game.

DayZ is another Steam Early Access game that had console versions announced – despite the delays of its full Steam version – and its developer drew the ire of the fanbase as a result. Ark: Survival Evolved‘s developer would surely want to avoid the same thing happening here.

Ark: Survival Evolved will be released on Xbox One (via the Preview Program) in winter. The game is currently available on PC, Mac and Linux via Steam Early Access.