Palworld News

AI Palworld accusations are currently based on vibes, a social deduction game, and the CEO's past tweets about machine-generated fakémon

Palworld has come under fire for its bootleg Pokémon aesthetic, with some commenters even cross-referencing models like amateur detectives wading into a crime scene. While the claims of straight-up model ripping are unlikely (even if the designs are very clearly derivative) another strain of discussion has emerged: Is the funny Pokémon-meets-survival genre game AI?..
Read more.

Palworld players discover you can kidnap and sell humans just like pals, although you will be warned it's not very polite

It's a Palworld, we're just living in it. Pocketpair's AK-equipped Poké-like has dominated both the charts and the discourse since it came out last Friday, and the debates and discoveries about it are coming out faster than I can keep track of...
Read more.

Fresh Palworld Xbox and PC update aims to finally stop it from getting stuck at a black screen on startup

A fresh update to the very popular, but also very controversial Palworld for Xbox and Microsoft Store-bought PC copies aims to stop the game’s app from grinding to a halt upon startup - leaving players staring at a black screen.

From co-op server problems caused by the sheer volume of people who’ve stampeded into the game to a stat point reset item permanently decreasing your Pal capturing ability, it hasn’t been totally smooth sailing so far for Palworld from a bugs perspective. However, after acknowledging that its developers are working on fixing the game’s most pressing issues, Pocketpair has already started putting out updates designed to rectify some of them.

In a string of tweets this morning, Pocketpair has revealed that it’s released a number of updates aimed at the versions of the game on Xbox and bought via the Microsoft Store on PC. While the first of these aimed - among other things - to rectify some “sound issues” players had reported, there’s already been another put out since then that aims to stop the game from “[launching] to a black screen”.

I didn't think it was possible for Palworld's animal sweatshop-style base building to get even more bleak and depressing than it already was, but it turns out I was wrong. Last night, I reached a part of the game's Technology tree that sent an actual shiver down my spine, it was that awful and morbid. No, it wasn't the option to arm my leaf monkey with an assault rifle, or my green squirrels with machine guns - though they were on the same tech branch. Nope, this one was even more sinister, and I absolutely refuse to unlock it.

Amid the ongoing controversy around the very popular Palworld, a former Chief Legal Officer for The Pokémon Company has had his say on the game, arguing that it “looks like the usual ripoff nonsense” he’d often deal with while in that role.

If you’re out of the loop, while its player numbers have climbed to very impressive levels, Palworld has been accused of bearing too many similarities to Pokémon games, especially by fans of the latter. Aside from some broad generalisations about the game’s monster-hunting premise, the main focus has been on perceived similarities between the models used by some of Palworld’s Pals and a number of Pokemon.

Now, Don McGowan, who served as the Pokemon Company’s Chief Legal Officer from 2008 to 2020 and spent almost four years as Bungie’s General Counsel after leaving the role, has offered his views on Pocketpair’s latest release to Game File. “This looks like the usual ripoff nonsense that I would see a thousand times a year when I was Chief Legal Officer of Pokémon,” McGowan said of Palworld, adding: “I’m just surprised it got this far.”