Palworld becomes only second Steam game to reach 2m concurrent players

Pocket Pair’s new action-adventure survival game, Palworld, has surpassed two million concurrent Steam players, achieving the second-highest peak in the platform’s history.

It has been five days since its release, and the game has already sold over seven million copies. Apart from Palworld, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds holds the all-time concurrent player record at just over 3.2 million.

[2nd highest all-time peak in Steam history! ]The number of Steam users currently playing #Palworld has exceeded 1.85 million!

Thank you for playing the game even though it is a weekday!

The team is working hard to ensure that you can enjoy the game even more comfortably. pic.twitter.com/v8IBwXCB3C

— Palworld (@Palworld_EN) January 23, 2024

Earlier this week, Pocket Pair reported that the game was selling 86,000 copies an hour, hitting the four million copy mark on Monday.

Palworld, despite being an early access game with several bug issues, surpassed the renowned FPS sequel, Valve’s Counter-Strike 2, to achieve the prestigious second position.

Palworld CEO on the possibilities of a PvP mode

CEO Takuro Mizobe told Automaton, “I think all the basic functions are set, so perhaps about 60% complete?” adding that “the next phase is all about further perfecting the game.”

“The important points that remain are how we’re going to implement PvP and to what extent we’re going to release new content. We’re also prepared to add new game functions, so we will observe user reactions and decide what to prioritize based on what everyone wants,” he stated.

Mizobe admitted that he, along with the other developers, “made the mistake of thinking we can ‘just casually add PvP later on,” while acknowledging that it would be challenging to add Player vs Player mode to the game in its current state.

Mizobe openly discussed the challenges, stating, “PvP is really difficult. First of all, we need to think about why we are introducing PvP to Palworld.” He stressed the need for a distinct reason for players to engage in PvP within Palworld, considering the variety of other games offering enjoyable PvP experiences.

“Of course, using Pals you caught in battle is one unique point, but only games that give players a good reason to play can survive in the long term. In this sense, I think it’s a very harsh territory,” Mizobe explained.

He expressed Pocket Pair’s cautious stance on PvP, adding, “I said earlier that we have created a great game, but with PvP games, you can’t know if you’ve failed or succeeded until the very end. I think that our chances of success are below 10%. That’s how high the hurdle is to succeed in PvP.”

More Palworld pages you might be interested in

Featured image: Canva / Palworld