Palworld, the monster-taming survival game, seems to not be able to catch a break thanks to its popularity. First, gamers accused the team of plagiarism and AI-generated content. Now, Pocketpair CEO said that Palworld bloating server fees could “bankrupt” the company.
On X (previously Twitter), CEO Takuro Mizobe revealed that the server bills are expected to increase by 359% and exceed 70 million Yen (around $478,000). That means Pocketpair might have to shell out $5,7 million just to pay for the servers this year. He added that, jokingly, this cost could make the company go under.
Huh, could we go bankrupt from the server fee?”
Takuro Mizobe (@urokuta_ja), Pocketpair CEO
Not long after, network engineer Chujo Hiroto encouraged any Palworld players that are worried about the server fee. In another tweet in English, he said that the team has been ordered to keep the server up “no matter what” despite the cost. Then he ends his post by contemplating how in the world their game could cost $478,000 in server cost alone.
Following the order to never let the service go down no matter what, we have prepared servers without regard to cost. We will continue to give our all to ensure that all players can enjoy to the fullest!
$478,000…
Chujo Hiroto (@chujohiroto), Palworld network engineer
Responding to the banter, Japanese players sent their thanks to the Palworld development team and proposed some ideas to reduce the server fees.
“[Make an] in-game donation platform!” wrote user @redcrimson246. Meanwhile, @SiLuk3925 suggests that players can and will support them through exclusive paid costumes and a battle pass system. @ri_ramensuki said that, like Minecraft, the Game Pass platform owner (aka Microsoft) should provide server resources through “building a dedicated server.”
Palworld is definitely showing no signs of slowing down, as more and more players are joining the game every day. Released on January 19, 2024, it has sold over 12 million copies on Steam and attracted around 7 million players on Xbox and Game Pass.
The survival game easily surpassed Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 as the most-played game on Steam, with a peak of 2 million concurrent players. And it achieved all this while being in Early Access, meaning that the game is still unfinished and buggy. As long as Palworld keeps up this pace though, and gains support from Microsoft, this server fee issue should stay as a joke.
