An effort is now underway to grow the Palworld franchise beyond the current game. Today, Sony Music Entertainment, Aniplex, and Pocketpair announced the creation of a new joint venture known as Palworld Entertainment. Palworld Entertainment plans “to expand and develop new businesses associated with the hit game.” While Pocketpair will continue to focus on expanding the game itself, this joint venture will look for other opportunities in terms of merchandising and establishing Palworld as a brand. Given the fact that Pocketpair is a relatively small developer, it makes sense that the company might need a hand when it comes to building up the property.
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According to the press release, the joint venture “will be responsible for developing the reach of the intellectual property and for expanding commercial business endeavors, including the global licensing and merchandising activities associated with ‘Palworld,’ outside of the interactive game.”
From that description, it sounds a lot like Palworld Entertainment will serve in a capacity similar to The Pokemon Company. It remains to be seen whether Palworld Entertainment will have nearly as much to manage, but the first Palworld products will be made available later this week at Pocketpair’s booth at Bilibili World 2024, which will take place this weekend. Pocketpair has previously talked about a lot of other ambitious plans for expanding the brand, including the possibility of a manga series.
Palworld has been one of the video game industry’s biggest success stories in 2024. Released in early access in January, Palworld has found huge success on Steam, selling more than 15 million copies, and on Xbox Game Pass where it’s been played by more than 10 million people. There has been talk about bringing the game to other platforms, and it seems like PlayStation is a very safe bet, especially now given Sony’s involvement with Palworld Entertainment. While the initial hype surrounding Palworld has cooled quite a bit since launch, the game’s concurrent user numbers on Steam remain very strong, and there have been notable jumps as new content has been added.
It remains to be seen whether Palworld can continue to attract an audience, or if the game can find a following outside the games. However, Palworld Entertainment, Inc. is the first step towards making that a possibility. Hopefully the company will be able to find opportunities that make sense for the audience!
What kind of Palworld products do you want to see? Do you think the creation of Palworld Entertainment will help expand the brand? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp, on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!
