The success that Palworld has achieved has attracted the attention of one of gaming’s biggest global publishers, who’s reportedly planning to develop not one but two Palworld-like games for mobile.
Tencent, an absolute titan in the gaming industry, is reportedly working on two mobile games “in the style of viral hit Palworld” at its TiMi and Lightspeed studios, according to Bloomberg. The company is reportedly in dire need of a “mega-hit” on mobile.
According to the Bloomberg report, the two companies “are both building games in the style of genre-blender Palworld,” complete with “pet companions and stylized violence.” TiMi Studio Group has developed several different super-successful and highly grossing mobile titles, including Call of Duty: Mobile, Pokémon UNITE, Honor of Kings, and Arena of Valor. Lightspeed is most well known for co-developing PUBG Mobile with Krafton.
Palworld’s wave of financial success started soon after the game launched in January, with one million copies sold in the first hours, four million sold in the first three days, and eight million sold just on Steam in less than six days. Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe told Bloomberg that the company has made tens of billions of yen in profit from Palworld, so much so that the profits are “too big for a studio with our size to handle.”
Naturally, a game that produces so much profit that its developer can’t even handle it all was going to attract other publishers and developers to make their own attempt at the genre. Chinese developer Manjuu Network Technology is working on an Azur Lane spinoff that’s very much Genshin Impact meets Palworld.
According to the sources that spoke to Bloomberg, Tencent is “incubating multiple, competing projects to breed the best results,” which ironically sounds like how most players breed their Pals in Palworld. The new titles from Tencent will reportedly “combine open-world, survival and crafting elements with the nurture of virtual pets.”
