Over this past weekend, early access to Palworld launched on Xbox consoles and PC. At the time of writing this, Palworld has become the highest played Steam game ever, even surpassing the likes of Cyberpunk 2077, Counter-Strike 2, Dota 2, and PUBG. Not only has the game managed to acquire a player base of over 1.2 million, but it’s also managed to sell a little over 6 million copies in just 4 days. Now, some people may be thinking, “What the heck is Palworld? And why is there so much hype around it?” Well, that’s what we’re going to get into briefly down below, along with what I thought about the game during my first playthrough.
What is Palworld?
Palworld is an open-world survival game developed by Pocket Pair, Inc. In this game, you can capture mysterious creatures known as “Pals,” which you can then use to fight, farm, and craft. The setting of the game takes place on Palpagos Island, located in the Pacific Ocean. In addition to being the home of Pals, though, the island has also seen the arrival of numerous factions, each exploiting the island’s resources and creatures for their own gain. Upon first glance, Palworld is just another monster catcher with cute creatures and RPG mechanics. However, if you look a little closer, you can see that it borrows a lot of inspiration from games like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Minecraft.
That said, there’s also one series in particular that it really looks like, which is Pokémon. Consequently, this comparison has caused Nintendo fans to crawl out the woodwork with pitchforks and torches in hand. In some other discussion spaces, concerns have even been raised about how Palworld infringes upon Pokémon copyrights, despite CEO Takuro Mizobe stating otherwise. In fact, in an article posted by Amber at Automaton, Mizobe even went as far as to state that Pokémon is the “overwhelming leader of the monster collection/raising genre.” As far as we can tell, it seems like any problematic legalities have been handled behind the scenes. Although, Nintendo is incredibly strict about media used with its likeness, so we’ll see how the relationship between these two companies plays out in the future.
Moving on, while Palworld may look like a Pokémon game with guns, it seems like Pocket Pair tried to distinguish itself from the iconic Game Freak title in some ways. Instead of collecting gym badges, battling through the Elite Four, and catching legendary Pokémon, you have to survive on a hostile island with various weapons and your Pals. One important distinction that should be noted, is that unlike Pokémon, it’s not just your Pals doing the work. The player has to make use of tools to defend themselves, and it seems like the Pals are there more so for support. In terms of gameplay, Game Freak definitely hasn’t gone the human-on-monster violence route before.
Another unique difference that Palworld has over Pokémon is that there’s no story. Whereas Pokémon tends to have a linear narrative, which usually involves the mythos of a new region, Palworld is a massive sandbox that lets you create your own story. However, this doesn’t mean that Palworld doesn’t have its own lore. Throughout the game, the ruins, technology, and massive structures provide bits and pieces of Palpagos Island’s history. Although, keep in mind that nothing is ever explicitly explained.
What is My First Impression of Palworld?
During my first playthrough, I had to admit that I was pretty impressed. Given that I swear by Pokémon and my loyalty to Game Freak, I didn’t expect for Palworld to be anything special. Firstly, let me state that Pokémon, for some odd reason, has seen a serious decline in its trainer customization features. That said, the first thing you get to do upon launching Palworld is create your own character. You have a wide range of options between your skin tone, body type, face shape, hair style, and voice. It’s not often you find a game that manages to give you visually appealing slider settings and style choices for character creation.
After creating your character, you eventually wake up on Palpagos Island, where you’re given a few tutorials to familiarize yourself with the game’s basic functions. After gathering a few materials and setting up a workbench, you can start crafting some items. Obviously, we need some weapons to defend ourselves, so I ended up with a wooden club. In the screenshot I’ve provided, you can see that there’s some other neat items you’ll be able to create later on. One of those items, for example, is the Pal Sphere, which is Palworld’s equivalent of a Poké Ball. However, it’s still too early in the game for one of those yet. Unfortunately, this meant that instead of capturing some cute Pals, I had to whack them repeatedly with a wooden club like some primitive caveman.
Pal cruelty aside, though, eventually you do gain access to a Pal Sphere via an early game lootbox. Now, you can finally capture a Pal, and if we’re all sharing the same route, we’ll all encounter the same creature: Lamball. Lamball is, well, a cute little lamb that’s shaped like a ball. As you can imagine, while it’s not exactly on the powerful end of the Pal spectrum, it’s a nice little traveling companion to have early on. After playing around with the menu a bit more, you’ll find that you can feed, pet, and give your Pal different commands for battle. What’s more, is that if you want it to help you craft something, it can do that as well. Trust me, there’s nothing more precious than seeing a Lamball swing a hammer around.
Further into my gameplay, there was a lot more crafting, Pal Sphere throwing, and surviving. Eventually, you end up with more clothes to wear and tools that help you traverse Palpagos Island more efficiently. In the end, the first part of my playthrough did make me curious to see where the rest of the game goes. Palworld does have some qualities that make it more entertaining than Pokémon, but is it a worthy competitor to the franchise? I suppose we’ll have to wait and see.
Conclusion
Overall, I’ve enjoyed my time with Palworld so far. Like I said before, I think it’s a nice blend of titles like Minecraft, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and Pokémon. However, I’d be lying if I said that the resemblance to Pokémon wasn’t uncanny. For that reason, depending on how successful Palworld ends up becoming, I just don’t see Nintendo continuing to let the game exist in its current form. I mean, some of the design choices are just too similar to be coincidental.
That said, I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts on this. Have you tried Palworld? If so, how would you rate your experience? Is it something you’d continue playing? Do you think the Pal designs come too close to Pokémon designs? Do you see Nintendo taking any legal action against Pocket Pair in the future? If you‘d like to keep the conversation going, comment on this article. Alternatively, you can subscribe to me at ‘Keith Price’ to get my takes on everything related to Gaming, Tech, and the DCU!
References
Amber V. (January 19, 2024). Palworld dev says their game isn’t like Pokémon at all, but rather like ARK. Retrieved from https://automaton-media.com/en/news/20240119-25859/
Levi Winslow. (January 22, 2024). Palworld Devs Aren’t Worried About A Nintendo Lawsuit. Retrieved from https://kotaku.com/palworld-pokemon-lawsuit-pocketpair-nintendo-pc-xbox-1851184907
Wesley Yin-Poole. (January 22, 2024). Palworld Has Huge Weekend, Sells 5 Million and Overtakes Cyberpunk 2077 in Steam’s Most-Played Games List. Retrieved from https://www.ign.com/articles/palworld-has-huge-weekend-sells-5-million-and-overtakes-cyberpunk-2077-in-steams-most-played-games-list
Wesley Yin-Poole. (January 19, 2024). Pokémon Fans Are Coming for Palworld With a Vengeance. Retrieved from https://www.ign.com/articles/pokmon-fans-are-coming-for-palworld-with-a-vengeance
YouTube. (January 19, 2024). Palworld | Early Access Launch Trailer | Pocketpair. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IltMIJeK-1M
