Palworld is a buy-to-play early access game. There’s no cash shop, no DLC, no battle pass, and to this point, no suggestion that was going to change. That assumption got a bit jarred last week when an interview with Pocket Pair CEO Takuro Mizobe translated by Automaton indicated that he was mulling over a business model shift.
In the interview, Mizobe discussed a few of the benefits and drawbacks of making Palworld free-to-play with a live service business model including a battle pass or cash shop cosmetics, noting the profitability of such a move while also remarking the challenges of making that shift for the survivalbox.
“When you think about it from a business perspective, making [Palworld] a live service game would extend its lifespan and make it more stable in terms of profitability,” Mizobe was quoted as saying. “However, the game was not initially designed with that approach in mind, so there would be many challenges involved in taking it down the live-service path.”
The interview – and the suggestion of Palworld going GaaS – gained some traction when IGN picked up the story, which prompted Pocket Pair to quickly issue a statement against the assumption of a business model shift and even explaining that the interview was conducted several months ago.
“Palworld was never designed with that model in mind, and it would require too much work to adapt the game at this point,” the statement reads. “Additionally, we are very aware that this just isn’t what our players want, and we always put our players first. […] We are still discussing this internally, as it is quite challenging to find the ideal path, but we have already decided that the F2P/GaaS approach is not suitable for us.”
Regarding the Future of Palworld
TL;DR – We are not changing our game's business model, it will remain buy-to-play and not f2p or GaaS.
Recently, an article was published in which we discussed the possible future direction of Palworld and ideas for continuing the game for a…
— Palworld (@Palworld_EN) September 14, 2024
