Even before entering early access, Palworld was already receiving attention as the game dubbed ‘Pokémon with guns’. And true to predictions, the monster-taming survival hit quickly shot to the top of Steam’s best-selling list, selling more than four million copies in three days.
This latest milestone comes after it surpassed one million sales mark just eight hours into its release, though developer Pocketpair didn’t clarify if the numbers included Xbox Game Pass and Epic Games Store players. Previously, it was reported that Palworld saw over 1.3 million concurrent players across all platforms, making it only the sixth title to ever cross the one million threshold, joining the ranks of Cyberpunk 2077, Dota 2, Counter-Strike 2, PUBG: Battlegrounds, and Lost Ark.
According to an update on X / Twitter, the momentum has only increased, with sales coming in at 86,000 units per hour (as of the time of writing). The huge influx of players at launch has caused game servers to buckle under the weight, however, as connection issues became commonplace over the opening weekend of 19 January.
It should also be noted that the Xbox version is currently lagging behind the Steam version in terms of functionality, with some concerns surfacing amid the game’s launch success. Apart from sharing design similarities to the Pokémon series, fans have highlighted the studio CEO’s pro-artificial intelligence (AI) stance and the use of AI in its other games, prompting allegations that Palworld was created in the same way.
A new report has since offered a bit more context, shedding light on some interesting bits on the project’s background (not that it excuses Pocketpair’s past actions regarding AI use):
Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth’s theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia’s greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really.
