Palworld, the 'Pokémon with guns' survival and crafting game, sold more than five million copies in just three days, with an impressive rate of 86,000 copies sold per hour.
This sales pace outpaced major titles like Marvel's Spider-Man, God of War, and The Last of Us 2 in their respective first three days.
However, the success of the game has been marred by controversy and death threats directed towards its developers.
What Happened: There's an online debate regarding similarities between Palworld's creatures (Pals) and Pokémon, leading to accusations of plagiarism.
Although the developer, Pocketpair, insisted that Palworld is more aligned with survival crafting games like Ark Survival Evolved and Valheim, apparently this wasn't enough to stop the harassment from angry Pokémon fans.
"Frantically working through all my DMs and emails! I promise! However, you'll excuse me if I skip over the death threats, threats to the company and massively outlandish claims. If you're capable of writing like an actual human being though, I'll reply ASAP!," the developer's community manager wrote on X (previously Twitter).
Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe also took to Twitter to address the issue, saying: "Currently, we are receiving slanderous comments against our artists, and we are seeing tweets that appear to be death threats. "
"I have received a variety of opinions regarding Palworld, but all productions related to Palworld are supervised by multiple people, including myself, and I am responsible for the production. I would appreciate it if you would refrain from slandering the artists involved in Palworld," he added.
Moreover, in a recent interview with Automaton (via IGN), Mizobe addressed potential legal issues, asserting that Palworld underwent legal reviews and faced no actions from other companies. He emphasized their commitment to serious game development and their intention not to infringe upon the intellectual property of other companies.
Why It Matters: Palworld achieved remarkable success since its Jan. 19 early access launch on Steam, Xbox, and Windows PC.
It quickly surpassed CD Projekt ADR's OTGLY Cyberpunk 2077, becoming the most-played game on Steam with a peak concurrent player count of 1,291,967, making it the sixth game ever to reach one million concurrent players on the platform, IGN reported.
It also set other records, such as being the most-played Japanese-developed game on Steam and the second most-played paid game, trailing only behind PUBG.
Image courtesy: Pocketpair on Steam.
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