Palworld was announced some time ago with a large number of short clips making it was to various social media apps. The basic premise of the game is Pokémon…with guns. I saw adverts for this game months before I decided to give it a try – months where I said, “This looks absolutely terrible!”
Don’t tell my parents, my partner, or my best friends this…but for the first time ever in my life (wink) I was very wrong. This game is perhaps one of the best and most ridiculous conceptual designs I’ve ever seen or played. Pokémon has existed for generations and its still using the same tired old formula. Palworld has been in my life for scarcely three days and already I’m obsessed!
This game is not just ‘Pokémon with guns’, it’s Pokémon with massive game mechanics. Let me give a quick run through. You start of the game as a stranded survivor on the Pelegos Islands – no money, no ship, no weapons and barely any clothes. You even have a customary ‘starter’ pal, something I’d assumed i’d get given Pokémon usually gives you a starter creature.
To be fair, Pokémon is a game for kids. I can’t imagine there are many children who have the patience to spend a good hour chopping trees, mining stone, and killing pals to get the basic resources you need to build slightly better basic resources. Yeah, that’s right! You don’t start off with a handgun and end up with a Dragon Laser, you have to work to get everything in this game.
You have to go through several stages of technology, at least thirteen levels, to go from basic equipment to advanced equipment – essentially advancing from stone age gear to bronze age gear with a Palworld twist. As you build up your knowledge through advancing through the technology tree, you access new amenities. These can be as basic as four walls and a bed or having a field to plant berry seeds. As you grow your base grows and when you base grows you suddenly have more things to do to keep your base in ship shape condition!
That’s where capturing Pal’s comes in! Each Pal has their own unique element and their own unique skills – for example Daydream is a Dark Pal whilst Lifmunk is a Grass Pal. Both useful but in different ways. For example, Lifmunk has medicine production meaning if you have a medical production table Lifmunk can automatically build any requested healing items there.
Pals can be assigned to your base and assigned to certain areas within your base. They can mine rocks or chop wood, they can drop eggs or wool, they can smelt ore into ingot. These resources allow you to build better and bigger weaponry and tools for going out into the world to fight and capture more difficult Pal’s, and those Pals can also be captured!
Pals can do almost anything; they can even be bred to produce stronger offspring Pal’s. The ultimate goal of the game is to advance to highest level and achieve the strongest Pal. It’s a long time to the top, my last two days of efforts have only just gotten me out of using a bow and arrow and instead a crossbow, but its so satisfying and rewarding.
The game comes with multiplayer and lets up to three other players join your world. Right now, the game is in early access on Xbox and PC, meaning its released but not in its final version. Playing the game it’s easy to see that a lot of elements are still lacking – some mechanics don’t work and others just fall flat. The full and final release of the game is currently in the air. However, if you have access to a Microsoft console or a computer, I highly suggest you pick up this game for hours of grinding fun!
Share This Post On
0 comments
Leave a comment
You need to login to leave a comment. Log-in
