Keeping Palword Fun Forever
If you’re a gamer — and, we assume you are — you’ve probably heard of Palworld. There’s a pretty fair chance you’ve dipped into it, too. After all, Pocket Pair’s game sold over eight million copies in less than a week. Everyone knows Palworld as “Pokémon with guns,” but that only scratches the surface of why the game is so popular. There are elements of Minecraft mixed in, not to mention bits and bobs of Breath of the Wild. Maybe the best part — at least it is for me — is that Palworld doesn’t take itself too seriously, and there’s a lot of fourth wall breaking satire, cartoon violence, and a hint of darkness.
However, not too long after the initial flurry of interest and popularity, the number of players actively engaged with Palworld dropped precipitously. Why? Well, there are lots of probable causes. For one thing, people (and most gamers are people), lose interest in just about anything after a while. For another, Palworld was, and is, in direct competition with several other new survival crafting games like Enshrouded. Finally, playing Palworld is a long-term commitment. It takes a while to get to the good stuff.
Now, there are still over 700,000 players on Steam, which is a pretty hefty number. It isn’t like the game is dying. But to ensure it survives and thrives — and, most critically, entertains players — here are five things we suggest the developers consider.
1. Improve Pal AI
Of course, there’s no doubt that the developers will continue to fix bugs, add features, and improve the game. One minor headache for players is managing the Pals assigned to their bases. They get stuck on stuff and each other. They slack off for no good reason or prioritize jobs in a way that doesn’t make sense. How about adding a Pal base captain who can give the Pals orders? Or what about generally expanding the range of interactive Pal behaviors at your base? It would be cool to see them create their own little cultures and traditions around working for you.
2. Keep Adding Detail to the World
Palworld is already a pretty vast open environment, with lots of different biomes. But there are some big areas without much detail or meaningful interactivity. Players want more of everything — more stuff to do, more NPCs with entertaining stories and quests, and of course, more Pals to capture and fight. There’s no doubt a lot of this is coming.
3. More Varied Dungeons, Raids, etc.
This one comes under the category of obvious fixes, but right now dungeon variety is very limited and pales in comparison to most open-world games in the genre. Players moving into the late game need more than just the big boss monsters to fight. They need some challenging, intricate, and puzzling dungeons to explore alone and with others.
4. Spinoffs and Merch
Palworld has only been out a few months and there are already lots of Lamball plushies and Depresso t-shirts on Amazon. Palworld has relatively few superstar characters, but it isn’t too soon to start thinking about spinoff games and other products. The cartoon violence and hint of darkness in the game means other products don’t need to be exclusively aimed at younger players. Are there Lego Palworld sets in the works? If it works for Minecraft and Pokémon, it’ll work for Palworld.
5. Have a Satisfying Experience At All Levels of Commitment
What I mean here is that Palworld should have self-contained and satisfying gameplay arcs and mechanics that reward both short-term and highly committed players. Sure, there’s an extensive and somewhat slow-moving tutorial, but what about having a 10-hour game-within-a-game that feels complete? It makes casual players less afraid of having to make Palworld a lifestyle to get to the good stuff. This could even be one of the abovementioned Palworld spinoffs, perhaps. The Depresso Chronicles, anyone?
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