Palworldis a smash hit, making it onto theSteamtop ten for the highest player counts of all time. With more than 850,000 players online right now - and rising - Palworld is in tenth place, poised to overtakeBaldur’s Gate 3.
Its current player count also makes it the second most played game on Steam right now, only beaten byCounter-Strike 2which sits at around 960,000 players. However, with the weekend only just kicking off and Palworld spreading through word of mouth, we may see it take the top spot.
The success isn’t just limited to Steam either. According to Palworld’s developer Pocket Pair, Inc., it’s sold more than two million copies in just 24 hours. This is despite it being a day-oneGame Passrelease for bothXboxandPC, so the full scope of its success is yet to be realised.
In any case, this is a clear win for the devs, who had a lot to prove when Palworld entered early access yesterday. Since its reveal, it was mostly known as that “Pokemon with guns” game, yet in just 24 hours, it has forged a community of its own. Admittedly,there are still those that point to the titular Pals as being very reminiscent of Pokemon, and wonder how the team is getting away with this. However, if Xbox is putting it on Game Pass, it must be fairly confident that parody defences would trump any claims fromNintendo.
Of course, despite similar aesthetics, there’s more going on here than what you’d get in a Pokemon game. Palworld also throws in some survival mechanics, and if you’re not in the mood to let monsters right, you’re able to whip out a gun. Maybe this is what Nintendo should explore if it wants to bring some excitement back to the series…
Palworld is only in early access right now, and we don’t know when it will get its full launch. The developer has previously indicated that it will be in early access for at least a year, but we’ll have to see if those plans change in the wake of the huge success of the early access launch weekend.
