Today Palworld developer Pocketpair announced that the popular survival crafting game achieved over 32 million players across all platforms.
The announcement made on the game’s official Discord Server shows that the game’s success is far from over.
The tracking website SteamDB shows Palworld’s daily peak concurrent players well over 50,000 on Steam, which is definitely flattering for a game that has just passed its first anniversary.
Palworld brings to the table an interesting take on the survival crafting formula adding a bit of Pokémon-style flavor with a massive variety of critters that can be tamed (or ruthlessly terminated, which is certainly a big difference compared to the cozy franchise by Game Freak).
It was initially released only for PC and Xbox in January 2024, also getting a boost by launching on Game Pass on Day one. PlayStation players had to wait a little longer, but a PS5 version launched in September 2024 globally and in October in Japan.
The game was successful since the beginning, as millions of players were drawn to its concept, and it recently received a massive update, which will be followed by more as it trucks along its early access roadmap toward full release.
Unfortunately, the folks at Pocketpair have had to fend off some controversy, as furious Pokèmon fans have leveled unfounded accusations of plagiarism and use of generative AI against the developer.
Nintendo and the Pokémon Company themselves have launched an ongoing lawsuit against the developer, but couldn’t find arguments to support a copyright infringement case, so they had to resort to building a Patent infringement case.
The lawsuit is still ongoing, and Poketpair is currently fighting against the gaming giants in order to defend its game.
Palworld also attracted positive attention from other large corporations, with Krafton investing in a mobile game based on the IP and a deal with Sony to launch Palworld Entertainment, which will handle the IP on a broader scale.