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On July 31st 2020, my wife Heather suddenly collapsed from a brain aneurism that hemorrhaged during a family canoe (tubing) trip, and was later pronounced deceased on Aug 1st. She was 34 years old, beautiful, loving wife, mother of our 4 children, and full time homemaker. Although her passing was tragic, and weighs heavy on the hearts of many, her decision to be an organ donor and give the gift of life saved the lives of many. She was a very kind, loving, crafty, and thoughtful person and her legacy will live on.
Heathers greatest passion and pass time was playing Ark on PC (Steam) with me, my sister, several close friends, and sometimes even our children on private dedicated unofficial PVE cluster servers that I run and maintain. She even had her own dedicated server that she ran on her machine and played when she wanted to try out new mods/builds. She last played Ark on July 30th (the day before she passed away), and has 3268 hours on record at the time of her passing. More than twice as many hours as any of us in the group.
Heather was the heart and soul of our experience on Ark. She was our anchor, the glue that kept us all together. She would always jump online or start the server if anyone wanted to play and was very passionate and helpful. She was our architect, as she did most of the gathering and building herself. With every base and build she made better and better improvements and spent days, even weeks perfecting and organizing our base/home. She loved to breed and imprint dinos and try to get colors/stats that she liked. Heather always dyed her armor, tools, and saddles to stand out and personalize her gear. She loved exploring the maps, and long adventures that took hours as we went hunting and scouting for new tames and gathering supplies from afar. Her favorite mods were Eco's ARK mods as she loved to decorate and even inspired her to look into trying to create mods herself. Valguero and Ragnarok were her favorite maps and were the maps she played the most.
A few days after Heather passed, my sister and I were talking about how we would never be able to play Ark again. It would never be the same, and there would always be this emptiness as we log in to see Heather "sleeping", knowing that she would never wake up. From now on, we would have to build and organize everything ourselves, and she would never be there to help or share the experience with. So my sister and I came up with an idea...
We decided that we should get together, build, prep, and parade transport Heathers in-game character to a safe place where we can lay her body to rest forever. We can make it a memorial adventure, record video and audio, and even take screenshots of our endeavor for keepsake. Once we get to the destination, we can make an alter of sorts, decorate the area, and make it a safe eternal resting place for her so she will always be there, and we can visit her whenever we want. That way we won't have that sadness as we log in to see her sleeping in bed next to me, or constantly seeing her floating name at our base. I would then save/backup the server, so in the event that something goes wrong, we will always have the moment preserved in time.
We were thinking since my wife loved Valguero so much, we would find a place there. My sister suggested "The Lost Temple" for the resting place since they found it together while exploring the map. They were both astounded by its beauty and mystery when they discovered it. I also stumbled across a red tree at the base of some waterfalls that I think would be a nice place. I plan on using a tek sleeping pod as sort of a "casket" as well. I placed one at the base of the tree to see what it would look like....
With that said, I am open to suggestions on locations and ideas for the adventure if anyone has any.
I'd also like to take this time to thank the developers of ARK: Survival Evolved, as this game has created years of amazing, unforgettable memories with my wife, family, and friends. The creators of ARK server manager for making it possible to create and maintain the perfect environment to make those memories with ease. Eco's ARK mods for the amazing and inspiring decor mods that my wife enjoyed so much, as well as all the other mod creators for their passion, time, and dedication to making ARK: Survival Evolved a much better and memorial experience. If anyone reading this has any connection with those mentioned above, please pass along my thanks.
EDIT: Thank you all for your kind words and condolences! And I appreciate the feedback. I will create a post sharing the stories and experience along with videos and pictures afterwards, when the time comes.
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