Palworld

Overly Dramatic Review in One Sentence

"Pokemon with Guns" plus some seriously difficult bosses and a grind that isn't for the faint of heart.

The Actual Review

Game time:

PC: 30.5 hours

Gameplay

This is probably the only survival game that I have played a substantial amount of time with. Part of that was because of my friends doing a ton of the heavy lifting in the base building, automation, and research. The other was the fact that after it was automated, I didn't have to do much. I have enjoyed the survival elements of other games, but at some point it gets in the way of the gameplay and story. Which is also what happened here.

The collecting of Pals and fighting against the different factions was a lot of fun. You really do get this sense of an expansive world that just has differing opinions on what to do with the Pals. I never felt that I needed specific Pal types for different enemies, but I did not reach the end game bosses where I have heard it is completely required unless there is some cheese you can do.

I think the biggest upside and downside was the number of Pals that you could find to give you a mount. Or in general the way they could be used with you in your party. For instance, the sheep one could be a piece of armor, there were hundreds of rideable Pals, and others could be flamethrowers and the like. Crazy amount of ideas and thoughts for this. However, with that expansive list, you had hundreds of saddles needed to be able to use them and collecting those resources didn't match the level you were when you unlocked the schematic. I wish the saddles were a bit more streamlined by type of use. Land mount, flying mount, gun, armor, etc.

Graphics and Sound

I applaud the what was probably, somewhat, most likely (I might have even heard it was), maybe, partially AI generated sounds that came from each Pal. I don't know if it was, but at no time did I feel like there was a lot of repetition, but after a while you just kind of forget about it. Mainly because there is no ambient music. You'd think a company that beat Nintendo in a law-suit would have some running around music, but you'd be wrong.

Graphically this was a very beautiful game. Tons of diversity in the biomes and you really got to see a multitude of different affects. It wasn't groundbreaking, but it was cool.

Story and Characters

I have no idea. Something about the world and something happened. Couldn't tell you.

My Rating

This was a fun game. Mainly because of the friends I got to play it with. I enjoyed us all working together, mainly Carter, to achieve the roles, but I think the requirement to grind for 10000000s of resources to make one item quickly got in the way of fun. If I wasn't running my own server where we could make a couple of adjustments to the base requirements (Such as Pal's not needing as much food), it would have been a second job to keep the base up and running. Much like Dune Awakening. That is where you lose the fun of survival and why the 3 of us never finished the game. We have talked about going back, but I don't see it happening with the games coming out this fall/winter. This is worth a playthrough if you like a good grind and base building. That is where I think it will exceed most peoples expectations, it just isn't something I'd play too much without friends.

For someone who really got into it and enjoyed it, watch Mr. Fruit and his friends play

Parental Rating

The human violence is non-graphic. There is limited sexual involvement. The language would only be from written sources, mainly because I don't remember anyone talking to me.

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