Palworld is undoubtedly the biggest gaming smash of 2024 so far, peaking at a staggering 2,000,000 concurrent players. Like any game, however, Palworld has experienced a dropoff in players since its peak, with some reporting that Palworld has lost nearly 1.5 million players. While some might read this as bad news, one Palworld staffer slammed the discourse surrounding the loss of players, recognizing it as a normal part of the gaming world.
A Loss of Palworld Players
The Community Manager of Pocketpair, Bucky (@Bucky_cm), posted a tweet the other day responding to news that Palworld had lost nearly a million players. Bucky explained how anything above 50,000 players seemed unimaginable initially and how millions of Palworld players were an extreme surprise. Bucky then called discourse surrounding the loss of players as “lazy,” stating that “it’s probably also a good time to step in and reassure those of you capable of reading past a headline that it is fine to take breaks from games.”
Ouch. It’s true that Palworld is only in the initial stages of early access and has a long list of planned updates and features yet to come. Games like Pokemon tend to have a long shelf life, and Palworld already has some features that have players addicted to the game, such as base building or breeding Pokemon. Bucky then said that players “don’t need to feel guilty about hopping from game to game,” and hopes players who are currently done with the game will return when more updates are released.
Frankly, this is par for the course for any live-service game. I don’t think anyone seriously believed that Palword would maintain millions of concurrent players for a significant amount of time. As long as Palworld maintains a healthy player base, you can’t call this game anything but a major success despite some loss of players in the end.
