Sony joined a joint venture with the Japanese game development company Pocketpair to create Palworld Entertainment. In a July 10 press release, the three Japanese companies, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony’s subsidiary Aniplex, and Palworld’s developer Pocketpair, made a joint announcement about the new venture. Palworld Entertainment will create intellectual property for the growing Palworld fan community.
The new venture aims to expand businesses associated with Palworld, including licenses and merchandise. The companies will develop exclusive merchandise to debut during Bilibili World 2024 before launching Palworld Entertainment. The event will be held in Shanghai, China, on July 12.
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The multiplayer survival game launched in January and garnered millions of players online within its first month. After selling over 15 million copies on Steam only, the game became one of the biggest games ever launched, rivaling games like Elden Ring, Dead by Daylight, GTA, and Cyberpunk 2077.
Despite dropping significantly over the past few weeks, the game is still among the top 50 games on Steam by revenue. Player numbers have also reduced since January, but there remains a good stream of gamers engaging with the game today. Palworld has a ‘Very Positive’ overall review on Steam for its gameplay and Pokemon-like characters.
Palworld may launch on Sony platforms
Palworld is currently available on Xbox and PC, with plans to launch on MacOS still in the works. However, after hearing about today’s partnership, some fans expected the game to launch on Sony platforms. There still hasn’t been a straightforward announcement suggesting this development.
On June 23, Pocketpair’s Global Community Manager Bucky tweeted a cryptic message on X, which made many in the gaming world assume Palworld would launch soon on PlayStation. The tweet featured a black heart for PC, green for Xbox, white for Mac, and an added blue heart, which many speculated to be PlayStation.
🖤💚🤍Palworld🤍💚🖤
I want to add more hearts, but not sure what colour would fit…hmm…how about….
🖤💚🤍💙Palworld💙🤍💚🖤
Looks good I think!
👀
— Bucky 🔜 BitSummit | Palworld (@Bucky_cm) June 22, 2024
Some gamers commented ‘PlayStation time,’ while others suggested adding a red heart for Nintendo would be nicer. Pocketpair has not commented on such a partnership, but rumors continue to spread about talks between both companies to make the ‘Pokemon with Guns’ available on PS.
Pocketpair released the first Palworld update on June 27th, introducing a new arena and island, a level increase, new pals, and more. The Sakurajima update also launched 7 new weapons, 11 pal cosmetic hats, 5 new buildings, 6 NPC cosmetic hats, 4 new items, a skins feature, a new merchant, and a new resource.
Some think Palworld is a Pokemon ripoff
A section of the gaming community showed mixed reactions toward the game, especially with staunch Pokemon fans seeing the game as a ripoff. Gamers tweeted about the similarities between Pals and Pokemon. Some gamers also believed that the survival game wouldn’t last. Others begged to differ, saying the game has proved its haters wrong.
On January 25th, The Pokemon Company released a statement mentioning its customers’ inquiries about a game released during that month that looked similar to Pokemon. The company said it had not permitted any other organization to utilize its intellectual property. The Pokemon Company insisted that it would investigate any infringement of its intellectual property and take action.
“We intend to investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights related to the Pokémon.” said the Pokemon Company. Bucky mentioned in a January 21 tweet that people continued to make ‘outlandish claims’ about Palworld. He also hinted that the Pocketpair team had been receiving death threats after the game’s launch.
Cryptopolitan reporting by Collins J. Okoth
