Installing Ark dev kit gets stuck on "Preparing"

The launcher lets me choose a file path for installation but once it gets to the “Preparing” stage the whole launcher freezes up and won’t respond at all. I don’t receive any error message.

I have plenty of space on my computer and nothing else is trying to use the internet connection, so can’t see anything on my end that could be causing this. I’ve tried installing multiple times now and it always freezes at the same point. I tried leaving it for three hours last night just to see if maybe it needed to be given time. No dice.

Also tried shutting down the launcher with the task bar and then resuming the download. It just instantly freezes again and never makes any additional progress. Uninstalling and then trying to reinstall fresh also doesn’t help.

It may be related to a similar issue I’m having atm. Attempting to re-install Ark Dev Kit after a clean wipe, it prepares, then immediately errors with an “unable to download installation instructions”. Currently have sent a help desk ticket to both UE4 and Ark to see about a solution, still waiting on response. Thinking it should come tomorrow since the weekend. Would be interesting to see if your problem is related to mine.