SOME OF MY FAVORITE(?) PALWORLD PALS
(and an attempt at an objective review)
Released in "early access" form in 2024 and "fully" released in 2026, Pocketpair's Palworld is an independent (comparatively speaking) open-world survival RPG that doesn't just bare an awfully strong resemblance to Pokemon, but inextricably mangles whatever lines you might have tried to draw between being a nostalgic homage, a friendly parody, a spiteful parody, a social satire, and a shameless ripoff. Marketed with a darker undertone to an older player base, it's a game whose surface level still invites you to play a bootleg Ash Ketchum, loving and cherishing a collection of elemental monster "pals" on a grand adventure powered by nothing but your childlike wonderment and plucky optimism...but it's also a game in which you can fight a wild pal to the death with your bare hands, butcher it for meat so you have anything other than berries to keep you from starving to death, fashion a coat out of its fur and skin so you don't die from hypothermia, enslave its kind en masse to till your crops and mine for precious ore, sell them on the black market, force them to build you a personal fortress, turn your fortress into an assault rifle factory, arm pals with assault rifles, and, oh yeah...capture more than just monsters in the same "pal spheres," to do all the same with.
Controversy has surrounded the game ever since its 2021 announcement, and not just for matters of questionable taste. Many "pals" are glaring imitations or hodgepodges of actual Pokemon, to the point that it can look as though some of them were simply modified from Gamefreak's own 3D models, some designs are suspiciously similar to fan-made Pokemon whose original artists were never approached for permission, and the CEO's public interest in generative AI has lead to speculation that it was used in the design of some of the game's assets, which its development team has repeatedly denied, and it's worth mentioning that Palworld did begin development before you even could AI-generate an even half-passable creature design, but new assets have of course been steadily introduced to the game in the years since.
These are all valid concerns, but concerns that have made no visible dent in the fact that Palworld's actual reception and success as a game has staggeringly surpassed anyone's wildest expectations (or fears), significantly exceeding the initial release sales of any actual Pokemon title as well as the total number of players for just about any online Steam game in 2026.
It's a fire ironically fueled by perhaps no one quite so diligently as Nintendo itself, which scrambled to take any legal action it could to stop Palworld in its tracks and has thus far failed at every single one of them. including attempts to retroactively patent some of Pokemon's core game mechanics, regardless of whether Pokemon was actually the first franchise those mechanics ever appeared in, which would have theoretically given Nintendo grounds to take many other gaming properties to court.
Actual "gaming journalists" have covered all of this in far better detail than I ever could have, and many have offered a much clearer overall opinion on the whole ordeal than you're probably going to get from me. I share some of those same concerns about creative integrity with certain caveats I'll be getting to later, but its survival through the wrath of Mario's dad is a big victory for pretty much everybody. Having actually played some of it myself now, I can also honestly say that it is, technically speaking, a significantly better version of the same gameplay experience that Pokemon's eighth and ninth generations were clearly aiming for, and its immediate success isn't something Nintendo can rationally dismiss. The people have spoken, it seems, with a fairly resounding this is what we wanted from this genre, and at least in terms of gameplay, I'm forced to agree.
But I'm known for creature design opinions, and it's the creature designs I'm actually a "fan" of far more than I was ever truly into the Pokemon games themselves. So, with nearly 300 "pals" available at the time of its 2026 release...do I have favorites?
Sort of. Kind of. Yeah? Well...
HOODLE: "Vanishing Master"
"When it sleeps, it deflates.
When it sleeps, it's no longer there.
A sleeping Hoodle cannot exist; Therefore, Hoodle never sleeps."
I'm not sure what the "Vanishing Master" title refers to exactly, but if you're a Pokemon fan, this is kind of like looking at that old optical illusion of the rabbit that's also a duck, except this is sort of a Mimikyu that's also a Sableye that's maybe also a Scraggy. An unseen, shadowy specter with big, glowing blue eyes gazing from the mouth of a "costume" or "doll" of a pink and black, reptilian goblin sort of critter, with long jester-cap horns, floppy arms, a jagged ghostly skirt instead of legs and a flat, three-pronged tail that looks dipped in pink paint. For good measure, there's also markings like dribbling blood drooling out of the mouth.
This is by far not Palworld's most glaring Pokemonoid, but it makes the list of ones that I "like" because I do like each individual ingredient in its formula and it teeters just on the edge of something more original. It wouldn't take much adjustment to set it farther apart from its obvious inspirations, beginning with simply a pair of legs to break the perfectly Mimikyu-shaped outline of its head and body. In a vacuum, as its own thing, this is actually one of my favorite pals! But that still won't save it from getting a 2/5, which I guess in this review can be taken to mean you've got POTENTIAL, kid.
RATING:
I'm not sure what the "Vanishing Master" title refers to exactly, but if you're a Pokemon fan, this is kind of like looking at that old optical illusion of the rabbit that's also a duck, except this is sort of a Mimikyu that's also a Sableye that's maybe also a Scraggy. An unseen, shadowy specter with big, glowing blue eyes gazing from the mouth of a "costume" or "doll" of a pink and black, reptilian goblin sort of critter, with long jester-cap horns, floppy arms, a jagged ghostly skirt instead of legs and a flat, three-pronged tail that looks dipped in pink paint. For good measure, there's also markings like dribbling blood drooling out of the mouth.
This is by far not Palworld's most glaring Pokemonoid, but it makes the list of ones that I "like" because I do like each individual ingredient in its formula and it teeters just on the edge of something more original. It wouldn't take much adjustment to set it farther apart from its obvious inspirations, beginning with simply a pair of legs to break the perfectly Mimikyu-shaped outline of its head and body. In a vacuum, as its own thing, this is actually one of my favorite pals! But that still won't save it from getting a 2/5, which I guess in this review can be taken to mean you've got POTENTIAL, kid.
RATING:
DUMUD: "Perpetual Procrastinator"
"When too relaxed, its reaction time drastically declines.
Even if it were sliced from head to tail, it probably wouldn't even realize that it should be dead until the next morning."
Unlike Pokemon, there are criminally few Pals designed to look, for lack of a better term, stupid. The Pokedex is full of dopey, dorky goofballs, but Pals overwhelmingly seek to look more dazzling, so Palworld's "Psyducks" and "Slowpokes" feel kind of like rare and precious jewels. Dumud's facial expression is pretty much exactly that of Slowpoke, but it's not a facial expression that was actually invented for Slowpoke anyway. Its description is almost exactly a rewording of Slowpoke's original pokedex entry, true, the one about Slowpoke taking time to register pain, except that it's more graphic and violent, but this is where words like "homage" and "parody" come into play.
Dumud is also fun because it's an amphibious fish, basically a mudskipper, but it's shaped like a big fat blimp-shaped shark with a slimy brown aesthetic. So you could say it's Slowpoke, Mudkip, and Clodsire, and it's not quite as memorable as any of the three, but I still really like the overall idea of a dopey giant mudshark, and it certainly stands out among Pals.
RATING:
Dumud is also fun because it's an amphibious fish, basically a mudskipper, but it's shaped like a big fat blimp-shaped shark with a slimy brown aesthetic. So you could say it's Slowpoke, Mudkip, and Clodsire, and it's not quite as memorable as any of the three, but I still really like the overall idea of a dopey giant mudshark, and it certainly stands out among Pals.
RATING:
SWEE & SWEEPA:
"Curious Floof" & "King of the Floof"
"Crawling along the ground, it eats microscopic organic matter.
After a while, it discharges any substances that provide no nutrition.
By using it as a mop for cleaning, everyone wins!"
"While hibernating, a large number of Swee hide within its voluminous body hair. The most ever recorded is 101." There are a whole lot of Pals clearly designed as if they should "evolve" from another Pal, but there's actually no evolutionary mechanic in this game at all, so creatures that look similar are more like close cousins, upgrades or variant species. The only difference between Swee and Sweepa is that Sweepa is larger, and has a mustache, which makes it name kinda cute, like "pa" as in "dad?"
Both creatures are otherwise just a dome of pale, shaggy fur, with two pointy ears and two little black dot-eyes. Absurdly simple, but still in a very appealing way with their intentional resemblance to mop heads. Perhaps the sheer simplicity of them is how they manage to not look like a ripoff of anything else.
RATING:
"While hibernating, a large number of Swee hide within its voluminous body hair. The most ever recorded is 101." There are a whole lot of Pals clearly designed as if they should "evolve" from another Pal, but there's actually no evolutionary mechanic in this game at all, so creatures that look similar are more like close cousins, upgrades or variant species. The only difference between Swee and Sweepa is that Sweepa is larger, and has a mustache, which makes it name kinda cute, like "pa" as in "dad?"
Both creatures are otherwise just a dome of pale, shaggy fur, with two pointy ears and two little black dot-eyes. Absurdly simple, but still in a very appealing way with their intentional resemblance to mop heads. Perhaps the sheer simplicity of them is how they manage to not look like a ripoff of anything else.
RATING:
PRIXTER: "Bad Boy"
"It has about 5,000 types of venom.
Some of them are deadly enough to cause instant death, but none are present in a high enough concentration to have any effect."
Prixter is one of the tragically few arthropod-based Pals, and even fewer arthropod-based pals that I find all that appealing. It also looks very much like someone's alternate fan-evolution for the Pokemon Skorupi, with the same spherical segments and purple coloration of its evolution Drapion, a dash of Scolipede, a pinch of Scizor, and finally, a grinning black sphere for a face that comes almost straight from Cloyster.
And yet, even moreso than Hoodle, this concoction really works for me. I LIKE the Cloyster head encircled by the purple helmet, I like the feeling of a scorpion guy with this dastardly personality. And to be brutally honest...I like it a lot more than I like Drapion.
RATING:
Prixter is one of the tragically few arthropod-based Pals, and even fewer arthropod-based pals that I find all that appealing. It also looks very much like someone's alternate fan-evolution for the Pokemon Skorupi, with the same spherical segments and purple coloration of its evolution Drapion, a dash of Scolipede, a pinch of Scizor, and finally, a grinning black sphere for a face that comes almost straight from Cloyster.
And yet, even moreso than Hoodle, this concoction really works for me. I LIKE the Cloyster head encircled by the purple helmet, I like the feeling of a scorpion guy with this dastardly personality. And to be brutally honest...I like it a lot more than I like Drapion.
RATING:
KILLAMARI: "Emotionless"
"It wraps itself around an enemy's head, sucking out their insides.
Pal mummies are occasionally found, but these are in fact Killamari victims.."
Of course I love a Cephalopod that feeds like a lamprey, and this water/dark Pal even has a secret, terrifying mouth to match:
Precious!! Just like the rest of the design, which is basically a grey pac-man ghost with a pair of additional squid arms and a floppy, hat-like mantle with the "ear" fins of a dumbo octopus. I do feel there are improvements you could make to the model, and it's maybe kind of "basic" for a squiddy critter, but it would still make a lovely child stage Digimon, and it's probably the single most appealing design in the first hundred Pals. I found a Killamari slightly above my level very early into my own attempt at the game, and it instantly became my go-to protector.
RATING:
Of course I love a Cephalopod that feeds like a lamprey, and this water/dark Pal even has a secret, terrifying mouth to match:
Precious!! Just like the rest of the design, which is basically a grey pac-man ghost with a pair of additional squid arms and a floppy, hat-like mantle with the "ear" fins of a dumbo octopus. I do feel there are improvements you could make to the model, and it's maybe kind of "basic" for a squiddy critter, but it would still make a lovely child stage Digimon, and it's probably the single most appealing design in the first hundred Pals. I found a Killamari slightly above my level very early into my own attempt at the game, and it instantly became my go-to protector.
RATING:
XENOVADER: "Interloper from Outer Space"
"Can send information and convert it into energy by forgetting it.
Regularly seems to be sending information to someone.
- Respond. Target located. Proceed to immediate destruction"
Xenovader gives a very similar impression to the Pokemon Golisopod, to the point that it could even pass for a reskinning of Golisopod, as is the case with many other Pals and their close or close-ish equivalents. Xenovader also has a little in common with the Pokemon Darkrai, in the face, and probably a couple of other legendary Pokemon, with a horned head and toothy underbite enclosing its eyes kind of like the visor of a samurai helmet. Spawning from crashed meteorites, the idea of this Pal seems to be that it's like a Gigeresque xenomorph, which is not nearly as creative as a giant deep-sea isopod warrior and doesn't look as visually striking, but it's not bad for what it is. It's one of the nicer looking Pals, for sure.
There is also "Xenogard," clearly related, but Xenogard is a more dragon-like creature, with a fan of giant crystals on its back, that actually does rip some details almost directly from Golisopod with virtually the exact same forearms and very similar legs. I'm glad Palworld doesn't do evolutions, because I'd hate for my perfectly serviceable Xenovader to have to mature into this more egregious collage project, which even completely loses any resemblance to a "xenomorph" wannabe.
RATING (for just Xenovader):
Xenovader gives a very similar impression to the Pokemon Golisopod, to the point that it could even pass for a reskinning of Golisopod, as is the case with many other Pals and their close or close-ish equivalents. Xenovader also has a little in common with the Pokemon Darkrai, in the face, and probably a couple of other legendary Pokemon, with a horned head and toothy underbite enclosing its eyes kind of like the visor of a samurai helmet. Spawning from crashed meteorites, the idea of this Pal seems to be that it's like a Gigeresque xenomorph, which is not nearly as creative as a giant deep-sea isopod warrior and doesn't look as visually striking, but it's not bad for what it is. It's one of the nicer looking Pals, for sure.
RATING (for just Xenovader):
CAWGNITO: "Shadow-Cloaked Schemer"
"Long ago it freely soared the skies.
After losing a contest with Galeclaw, it abandoned the skies, and now lives a secretive life in the dark of night."
My feelings on this Pal are more mixed than you might have thought. It's a flightless stork-like bird with the motif of a plague doctor, executed in Palworld's off-Pokemon style so straightforwardly, I don't really need to describe it from there. I promise, if you're not able to see images, it's still exactly what you think it looks like, exactly like innumerable fan-made Plague Doctor Pokemon that have never stopped coming ever since the concept of Plague Doctors became more mainstream household knowledge in roughly the 2010's.
This sounds like a point against Cawgnito, and if this design made it to Pokemon...I would honestly give it a 1/5, for those exact reasons. Because Pokemon, for all its faults, still gives most of its designs and concepts a little more bake-time than this, and USUALLY avoids implementing the most obvious ideas people are already clamoring for.
This is not a Pokemon, however. This is a Pal. However generic and predictable this concept may now be, it's still something a lot of Pokemon fans sincerely wanted, and would have stood out as a fresh, creative idea if Pokemon had done anything like it early enough, in the first generation or two. The far, far fewer kids who would have been familiar with the reference up to the release of I guess Shovel Knight would have been awed by a dark or ghost type Plague Doctor Pokemon!
I write all of my reviews on this website with pretty much no outline, I should mention. I usually know which creatures I'm going to talk about and I usually already know which ones I like or dislike the most, but the writing is all done in one sitting, without a rough draft, putting my thoughts together in real time while I look at the design. I almost wasn't going to include this one at all, because it wouldn't have stood out in any other Mons game, but in the process of writing this article, the measure of what makes a Palworld Pal is really starting to "click" for me, and something that would have been "too" obvious as a Pokemon is kind of exactly what Palworld was made for, so, by Palworld Pal standards:
RATING:
My feelings on this Pal are more mixed than you might have thought. It's a flightless stork-like bird with the motif of a plague doctor, executed in Palworld's off-Pokemon style so straightforwardly, I don't really need to describe it from there. I promise, if you're not able to see images, it's still exactly what you think it looks like, exactly like innumerable fan-made Plague Doctor Pokemon that have never stopped coming ever since the concept of Plague Doctors became more mainstream household knowledge in roughly the 2010's.
This sounds like a point against Cawgnito, and if this design made it to Pokemon...I would honestly give it a 1/5, for those exact reasons. Because Pokemon, for all its faults, still gives most of its designs and concepts a little more bake-time than this, and USUALLY avoids implementing the most obvious ideas people are already clamoring for.
This is not a Pokemon, however. This is a Pal. However generic and predictable this concept may now be, it's still something a lot of Pokemon fans sincerely wanted, and would have stood out as a fresh, creative idea if Pokemon had done anything like it early enough, in the first generation or two. The far, far fewer kids who would have been familiar with the reference up to the release of I guess Shovel Knight would have been awed by a dark or ghost type Plague Doctor Pokemon!
I write all of my reviews on this website with pretty much no outline, I should mention. I usually know which creatures I'm going to talk about and I usually already know which ones I like or dislike the most, but the writing is all done in one sitting, without a rough draft, putting my thoughts together in real time while I look at the design. I almost wasn't going to include this one at all, because it wouldn't have stood out in any other Mons game, but in the process of writing this article, the measure of what makes a Palworld Pal is really starting to "click" for me, and something that would have been "too" obvious as a Pokemon is kind of exactly what Palworld was made for, so, by Palworld Pal standards:
RATING:
FINSIDER: "Eyes from the Abyss"
"It looks like something is peeking out from inside a costume, but even if you reach inside, there's nothing there.
In fact, you can keep reaching deeper and deeper.
Perhaps the universe itself lies within."
"Even if you reach into its mouth, there's nothing inside—it just keeps going. Thinking it might be an interdimensional space, one researcher tried climbing in like a sleeping bag. But when the gag reflex kicked in, they realized... it's definitely part of the creature's body."
I guess I'll always fall for the old eyes-in-mouth look, and I especially like that this example is some kind of dark-matter-void entity, like Digimon's Digitamamon, occupying a fish body. Egg shaped, with its own dot eyes and some big triangular shark teeth. This one definitely doesn't feel like a Pokemon, or even too much like the aforementioned Digimon. I think this little guy might be one of my top favorites?
RATING:
"Even if you reach into its mouth, there's nothing inside—it just keeps going. Thinking it might be an interdimensional space, one researcher tried climbing in like a sleeping bag. But when the gag reflex kicked in, they realized... it's definitely part of the creature's body."
I guess I'll always fall for the old eyes-in-mouth look, and I especially like that this example is some kind of dark-matter-void entity, like Digimon's Digitamamon, occupying a fish body. Egg shaped, with its own dot eyes and some big triangular shark teeth. This one definitely doesn't feel like a Pokemon, or even too much like the aforementioned Digimon. I think this little guy might be one of my top favorites?
RATING:
MYCORA: "Cute as a Button"
"It views humans as nothing more than convenient parasitic hosts.
The reason Mycora has taken this form is to deceive humans into lowering their guard, allowing its spores to spread more efficiently."
We all know how people are about humanoid Pokemon. Walk into any anime or gaming convention, and chances are you can buy yourself an unauthorized body pillow of a blushing Gardevoir or big beefy Incineroar, right? Another criticism leveled at Palworld is the downright ridiculous number of Pals that look more or less like furry anime girls, how consciously Pocketpair appears to be baiting exactly that aspect of fandom, and how "uncomfortable" it is when we're talking about glorified animals the player literally captures and trains. But...that was already weird about Pokemon, wasn't it? How many Pokemon, by now, are obviously designed at a glance by artists who probably slept next to a Gardevoir pillow of their own? I'm not putting anybody down for having a crush on a cartoon monster (some of you have crushes on monsters I designed and drew myself, even, and THANK YOU for your ongoing support!) but Nintendo won't ever and logically can't ever acknowledge how many teens and adults turn to its characters as band-aids for physical and emotional loneliness, whereas Palworld is just kind of "saying the quiet part out loud."
So the design of this infectious mushroom Pal isn't all that interesting in itself, pretty much just a waifish lady (albeit with a bust) in a mushroom hat, but a parasitic Pal that evolved to exploit horny pal tamers is fairly funny, and I do appreciate some of its subtler details, like the stem resembling a pair of fused legs, and especially the lack of a mouth. The mouthlessness I think is most crucial to selling the idea that this a human approximated by a parasite that isn't even in the same taxonomic kingdom as a human. This in particular is a point at which several other humanoid pals fall short, often having the same complete copy-pasted anime face.
I just wish it had one more little dash of weirdness to it. Maybe its eyes could just be markings? Maybe it could have a mouth, but in the mushroom cap? Maybe a real mouth and real eyes up in the mushroom cap? As it stands, I like the notion of it enough to have it here, but it feels like it's missing a little something or other.
RATING:
We all know how people are about humanoid Pokemon. Walk into any anime or gaming convention, and chances are you can buy yourself an unauthorized body pillow of a blushing Gardevoir or big beefy Incineroar, right? Another criticism leveled at Palworld is the downright ridiculous number of Pals that look more or less like furry anime girls, how consciously Pocketpair appears to be baiting exactly that aspect of fandom, and how "uncomfortable" it is when we're talking about glorified animals the player literally captures and trains. But...that was already weird about Pokemon, wasn't it? How many Pokemon, by now, are obviously designed at a glance by artists who probably slept next to a Gardevoir pillow of their own? I'm not putting anybody down for having a crush on a cartoon monster (some of you have crushes on monsters I designed and drew myself, even, and THANK YOU for your ongoing support!) but Nintendo won't ever and logically can't ever acknowledge how many teens and adults turn to its characters as band-aids for physical and emotional loneliness, whereas Palworld is just kind of "saying the quiet part out loud."
So the design of this infectious mushroom Pal isn't all that interesting in itself, pretty much just a waifish lady (albeit with a bust) in a mushroom hat, but a parasitic Pal that evolved to exploit horny pal tamers is fairly funny, and I do appreciate some of its subtler details, like the stem resembling a pair of fused legs, and especially the lack of a mouth. The mouthlessness I think is most crucial to selling the idea that this a human approximated by a parasite that isn't even in the same taxonomic kingdom as a human. This in particular is a point at which several other humanoid pals fall short, often having the same complete copy-pasted anime face.
I just wish it had one more little dash of weirdness to it. Maybe its eyes could just be markings? Maybe it could have a mouth, but in the mushroom cap? Maybe a real mouth and real eyes up in the mushroom cap? As it stands, I like the notion of it enough to have it here, but it feels like it's missing a little something or other.
RATING:
OMASCUL: "Hundred Faced Apostle"
"The mask it wears is not its face, they say.
It seems in front, but it's not there, no way.
From shadows deep, it watches night and day.
Glance away, and closer it will stray."
Now we're getting into the cooler stuff, relatively speaking. This dark-element Pal looks at first like a tall, pitch black owl with stubby little penguiny feet and a face like a white, heart-shaped porcelain mask. It doesn't stand out terribly much amongst other dark-type Pals, it should be mentioned, because a lot of them have the "noh mask" look, but it is admittedly ALWAYS a cool look, and I kind of like there being a recurring motif like that in one of the game's types. The cool thing about Omascul, though, is that it's not an owl or even a bird, and like its entry states, the mask is not a face.
The mask is really Omascul's upper jaw, which flips open like a hatch to expose its lower teeth, while four long arms with talonlike hands pop out of its back. This is one I'd even consider a decent quality design in an actual Pokemon game. It's fun! It's our first 5/5! I'm just not really doing these in any special order.
RATING:
Now we're getting into the cooler stuff, relatively speaking. This dark-element Pal looks at first like a tall, pitch black owl with stubby little penguiny feet and a face like a white, heart-shaped porcelain mask. It doesn't stand out terribly much amongst other dark-type Pals, it should be mentioned, because a lot of them have the "noh mask" look, but it is admittedly ALWAYS a cool look, and I kind of like there being a recurring motif like that in one of the game's types. The cool thing about Omascul, though, is that it's not an owl or even a bird, and like its entry states, the mask is not a face.
RATING:
DUALITH: "Twinhearted Azure Construct"
"One entity, two minds.
When their wills clash, it's impossible to tell where the armor will wander until they reconcile."
This is one of the newer, 2026 "full release" pals, as are many on this page, which is where you can see a clear uptick in creative effort. Dualith is a humanoid figure built from large, stone blocks with glowing blue "circuitry"-like etchings, matching the ancient ruins scattered around Palworld's map. Its little cubical head features one glowing round eye, but half the head looks crumbled away, encrusted with moss and a little plant sprout. This is fairly cool on its own, but a fracture in its hollow chest is also occupied by some sort of little green blob pal, like a simple cartoon ghost, that always looks panicky and afraid as the bigger body lumbers around.
You'll just have to take my word here, but the animations for this one are a lot of fun, and thoughtful animations are honestly where Palworld Pals generally express a lot more character than in their designs alone.
Any "symbiotic duo" creature is always a lot of fun either way, and it's interesting that tihs Pal is a "ground" and "grass" dual-type, implying the blob is plant-based and perhaps tied to the patches of moss. The scant details we're given imply they're just two different beings working together, but I can't help thinking the moss-ghost is what brought the "golem" to life in the first place.
RATING:
This is one of the newer, 2026 "full release" pals, as are many on this page, which is where you can see a clear uptick in creative effort. Dualith is a humanoid figure built from large, stone blocks with glowing blue "circuitry"-like etchings, matching the ancient ruins scattered around Palworld's map. Its little cubical head features one glowing round eye, but half the head looks crumbled away, encrusted with moss and a little plant sprout. This is fairly cool on its own, but a fracture in its hollow chest is also occupied by some sort of little green blob pal, like a simple cartoon ghost, that always looks panicky and afraid as the bigger body lumbers around.
You'll just have to take my word here, but the animations for this one are a lot of fun, and thoughtful animations are honestly where Palworld Pals generally express a lot more character than in their designs alone.
Any "symbiotic duo" creature is always a lot of fun either way, and it's interesting that tihs Pal is a "ground" and "grass" dual-type, implying the blob is plant-based and perhaps tied to the patches of moss. The scant details we're given imply they're just two different beings working together, but I can't help thinking the moss-ghost is what brought the "golem" to life in the first place.
RATING:
LOOMEN: "Revealer of Truths"
"Its lantern glows with an eerie light that lays bare the truth of the world.
If that light strikes you as blinding, then you most likely have something to hide."
This "dark" and "fire" Pal is another of the later additions, and it's also one of several that kind of read to me as a "second try" at concepts in the original, 2024 batch. Most people, after all, were immediately reminded of naught but a Plague Doctor the moment this image loaded, but the resemblance is far looser than Cawgnito, and the meat of the design honestly compelling enough that it actually can compete with the best that Pokemon or Digimon has to offer.
The "winglike arms" even give an avian impression, but on close inspection this is more like some sort of spooky, gothic anteater kind of creature, and the shaggy arms are actually extensions of its long, wavy hair! That's a COOL body plan, with an equally cool aesthetic, and even the long, white snout isn't quite what it seems, since it's actually a lower jaw that just extends a whole lot farther than the upper beak:
RATING:
This "dark" and "fire" Pal is another of the later additions, and it's also one of several that kind of read to me as a "second try" at concepts in the original, 2024 batch. Most people, after all, were immediately reminded of naught but a Plague Doctor the moment this image loaded, but the resemblance is far looser than Cawgnito, and the meat of the design honestly compelling enough that it actually can compete with the best that Pokemon or Digimon has to offer.
The "winglike arms" even give an avian impression, but on close inspection this is more like some sort of spooky, gothic anteater kind of creature, and the shaggy arms are actually extensions of its long, wavy hair! That's a COOL body plan, with an equally cool aesthetic, and even the long, white snout isn't quite what it seems, since it's actually a lower jaw that just extends a whole lot farther than the upper beak:
RATING:
SILVANCE: "Immortal Shade"
"Since ancient times, it has remained within the World Tree, continuing its vigil.
What it protects, and for what purpose, Silvance does not know.
After all, the World Tree will tell it everything.
The spores it commands surely know who the enemy is."
This is one of the only other "Gardevoir-esques" to make my list, but I suppose it's more apt to compare it with Pheromosa, since it has very nearly the same proportions, a similar face shape and nearly identical legs to the Cockroach Ultrabeast. Silvance, however, has more of a moth motif, I think, unless you want to argue for a silverfish interpretation, which I kinda do, personally. Whatever insect or insects it's supposed to allude to, it is undeniably cool looking; it doesn't have any wings, but it has long, shaggy "sleeves" and a "dress" that certainly bring moth wings to mind, along with an extra-fluffy upper torso and huge, curling feathery antennae.
The large, irregular spots of dull purple, as well the purple striping of the legs, give this grass element Pal a real "poison type" coding, though the moves it comes with are an air attack, ice attack, and "holy burst." The "spores" referenced in its bio are toxic, explosive spores that drift through the gargantuan World Tree Silvance calls home, and its innate ability recreates their explosive effect on enemies.
A cockroach is cooler than a moth, and so is my silverfish idea, but even as a moth this is a very cool Pal, and a cool idea for a creature that lives in symbiosis with the mutated "World Tree."
RATING:
This is one of the only other "Gardevoir-esques" to make my list, but I suppose it's more apt to compare it with Pheromosa, since it has very nearly the same proportions, a similar face shape and nearly identical legs to the Cockroach Ultrabeast. Silvance, however, has more of a moth motif, I think, unless you want to argue for a silverfish interpretation, which I kinda do, personally. Whatever insect or insects it's supposed to allude to, it is undeniably cool looking; it doesn't have any wings, but it has long, shaggy "sleeves" and a "dress" that certainly bring moth wings to mind, along with an extra-fluffy upper torso and huge, curling feathery antennae.
The large, irregular spots of dull purple, as well the purple striping of the legs, give this grass element Pal a real "poison type" coding, though the moves it comes with are an air attack, ice attack, and "holy burst." The "spores" referenced in its bio are toxic, explosive spores that drift through the gargantuan World Tree Silvance calls home, and its innate ability recreates their explosive effect on enemies.
A cockroach is cooler than a moth, and so is my silverfish idea, but even as a moth this is a very cool Pal, and a cool idea for a creature that lives in symbiosis with the mutated "World Tree."
RATING:
DANDILORD: "Bewitching Lurker"
"Since ancient times, it has remained within the World Tree, continuing its vigil.
What it protects, and for what purpose, Dandilord does not care.
After all, the World Tree knows everything.
Only the mist it wields can reveal the truth."
Fully "poison type" in theme, this grass/dark Pal is probably my one clearest favorite design in Palworld, though that may be obvious to anyone who tracks my favorite Pokemon. Its black, stick-thin body has a simple fringe of long, thin, splotchy leaves that droop down around its legs, which end in comical curly-toed shoes. Its head, meanwhile, is a bell-like dome of fat petals that curl down into kind of a pumpkin shape, speckled purple, with electric blue tips that curl upward into points, with a smaller lotus-like flower set in the "crown" of black, arrow-tipped spikes on top of the whole thing. There's no eyes, no visible face. Just an ominous, gothic lampshade-like plant pod atop a botanical Jack Skellington.
Admittedly, this Pal's body shape is *extremely* close to the alien clown Pokemon Blacephalon, while its head feels like a middle ground between the flower of Gloom and the arms of Mareanie, so it just so happens to mash together three of my all-time favorite Pokemon into the very "me" concept of a whimsical toxic weed-man. Okay. So what! I like what I like!
RATING:
Fully "poison type" in theme, this grass/dark Pal is probably my one clearest favorite design in Palworld, though that may be obvious to anyone who tracks my favorite Pokemon. Its black, stick-thin body has a simple fringe of long, thin, splotchy leaves that droop down around its legs, which end in comical curly-toed shoes. Its head, meanwhile, is a bell-like dome of fat petals that curl down into kind of a pumpkin shape, speckled purple, with electric blue tips that curl upward into points, with a smaller lotus-like flower set in the "crown" of black, arrow-tipped spikes on top of the whole thing. There's no eyes, no visible face. Just an ominous, gothic lampshade-like plant pod atop a botanical Jack Skellington.
Admittedly, this Pal's body shape is *extremely* close to the alien clown Pokemon Blacephalon, while its head feels like a middle ground between the flower of Gloom and the arms of Mareanie, so it just so happens to mash together three of my all-time favorite Pokemon into the very "me" concept of a whimsical toxic weed-man. Okay. So what! I like what I like!
RATING:
SKUTLASS: "Splashy Determined Draw"
"A bizarre species which temporarily separates its body and uses its bones to slice through enemies, at the risk of perishing itself upon taking too long.
While unconfirmed, older individuals are said to deliberately stay separated in order to trigger their survival instincts and prolong their lifespans."
While this isn't my personal favorite "me" kind of design, I feel I have to nominate Skutlass as the actual "best" design and best concept in Palworld. It's a long, tapering fish designed to also look like a fancy, fish-shaped scabbard, and its head can separate from its body to unsheath a "sword" formed by its skeleton. I don't need to really say much else here; this is a fully "Pokemon-worthy" design, but for once, it's a design that only Palworld can do proper justice, because the player in Palworld can also actually battle, with weapons, and yes, they let you directly wield this fish monster as a sword, whereas Pokemon can't stand to let the human player engage in violence as direct as their pets.
No, in Pokemon, you just make the rabbits and caterpillars do all your dirty work for you, putting themselves in harm's way. That's a constant of the whole genre, of course, but in Palworld, you do put yourself in exactly as much danger as your Pals, and even in a game where you can become a full-blown tyrannical despot if you feel like it, there's always something just so refreshing about a "monster trainer" who gets just as beaten, bruised and burned as their pets.
RATING:
While this isn't my personal favorite "me" kind of design, I feel I have to nominate Skutlass as the actual "best" design and best concept in Palworld. It's a long, tapering fish designed to also look like a fancy, fish-shaped scabbard, and its head can separate from its body to unsheath a "sword" formed by its skeleton. I don't need to really say much else here; this is a fully "Pokemon-worthy" design, but for once, it's a design that only Palworld can do proper justice, because the player in Palworld can also actually battle, with weapons, and yes, they let you directly wield this fish monster as a sword, whereas Pokemon can't stand to let the human player engage in violence as direct as their pets.
No, in Pokemon, you just make the rabbits and caterpillars do all your dirty work for you, putting themselves in harm's way. That's a constant of the whole genre, of course, but in Palworld, you do put yourself in exactly as much danger as your Pals, and even in a game where you can become a full-blown tyrannical despot if you feel like it, there's always something just so refreshing about a "monster trainer" who gets just as beaten, bruised and burned as their pets.
RATING:
What's Missing
I touched on this with Cawgnito, but Palworld is doing something that was never really intended to match or exceed its "inspiration." It began as not only a small, independent project, but there was a time, not too long after its 2024 release, that its developers said they weren't even going to keep expanding on it. It came very close to being all wrapped up, left to lie as a one-off novelty, until the negative attention of Nintendo and (overwhelmingly!!) positive attention from gamers seemingly forced them to reconsider, and the quality of what they've since added seems to show that they are taking it at least a little more seriously.Assuming Palworld is now in it for the long haul, I do hope any problems pointed out so far can be smoothed out, over time, and if any designs were generated with AI assistance or lifted without permission from fanartists, I hope Pocketpair might put its newfound profits to good use and provide good jobs to a proper art team. In which case, I would also love to see the level of creative effort continue to grow.
And perhaps it shouldn't matter at all, because like I was only just saying, Palworld does have a little of its own identity, and we're looking at it. It hasn't claimed to have any deeper ambitions than this oatmeal buffet of catgirl sludge, and I'm okay with that, even if its not for me.
Some of the newer pals, on one hand, do suggest that there are people involved who who might want to give this their all, but I've already shared many of the "most creative" Pals that I possibly, possibly could on this page, and that selection still doesn't hold a candle to the oddest possible selection of even first-gen Pocket Monsters:
Try this, and it's a creative exercise anybody can do: draw a design you think is cool. Easy! Now...draw a design that is anything but cool. Maybe it's just something cute? Maybe it's just something pretty? Maybe it's ugly, or funny, or plain weird? Just keep going, without repeating any of those "feelings" more than once, until you completely run out of any category you can come up with. See if you can draw something that has none of those factors, and whether you succeed or not...start back over again from the top, and mix it up a little this time. Maybe some combinations? What kind of monster is both cool and funny? Scary and beautiful? Cute and gross? What about all of these? That last one is likely just not possible to capture...but what do you get if you force yourself to consider how something could ever be equal parts cute, cool, elegant, hideous and absurd, or more?
What, of any of those categories, can you easily slot Magneton or Starmie into, by the way? What about them fits those descriptors? Did you just realize Magneton is cute, without being a fuzzy bunnycat, and Starmie is cool as hell, without being a dinodragon? Keep experimenting with how your designs can each capture something different from the one before it, and see just how entertaining of a "bestiary" you just concocted.
The Satire Angle
...In all the discussion I see of Palworld, however, whether to praise it as The Pokemon "Killer" or denounce it as a plagiaristic, pandering cash-grab, a lot of people seem to overlook that the heart of the game's concept is still farcical. The world of Pokemon was already an ethically questionable one from the start; one in which humans have completely normalized the exploitation of highly intelligent non-humans, and the official word of God has always been that we just don't need to worry about it because it's just a game and aaacktchewuhllie it's canon that Pokemon LIKE being captured and LIKE taking orders from humans and LIKE fighting...all plot points that feel conceived of entirely to "defang" Pokemon's inherently rough-edged premise in the wake of early parental outcry.
Palworld is, in fact, so minimally "edgier" than Pokemon, you could just as easily criticize Pocketpair for what a low-effort punchline it all is. Like, duuude...what if Pokemon could kill you?...what if Pokemon had guns, bro?!... Holy shit, what if, like, what if you could catch people in the pokeballs?! That would be fucked UP!!!...But doesn't the "easiness" of that in itself say something about brands like Pokemon? I obviously don't think there's much harm in what Pokemon is about, how it's marketed or who it's marketed towards, but it is interesting to be reminded just how precariously its framing teeters right on such a razor-thin edge between cloyingly preschool-safe and comedically disturbed, which I must reiterate is a very big part of its timeless appeal, but an appeal that its public face tries to gloss over just a liiittle too transparently. A little too patronizingly, even (or especially) as something for young children to enjoy, in a similar sense to the corporate glamorization of everything Disney.
We're not supposed to worry about whether the Pokemon should like or dislike going in the Pokeball, or going in the battle arena, or being stored on a computer until they're traded away. We're not supposed to wonder why a monster called a "Scyther" doesn't draw any blood when it uses a move called "X-scissor" on a small rodent, or why a gout of fire breath "hotter than the sun" never leaves a Pokemon trainer's face peeling away from their skull, or whether an organized mafia syndicate armed with the power of domesticated dragons ever uses them to do anything a mafia syndicate actually exists to do, like murdering or trafficking people, which do not even seem to be concepts that the people of the Pokemon world ever imagined, but are questions that can be raised just as easily by any small child who's allowed to watch Batman cartoons. I'm not saying this indicates anything "wrong" with Pokemon, either, and I'm not suggesting it should explore these kinds of things, but someone might as well, and as with the game's predeliction for awkwardly girl-shaped pet cat-demons, the moral atrocities players can unleash upon the land of Palworld are only barely more extreme than the bonkers logic presented by the genuine article and its countless other imitators.
If we choose to contextualize Palworld as essentially the Spaceballs to Pokemon's Star Wars, even its laziest points begin to feel like a public roasting. Of course its "dex" is completely drowning in cat-rabbit-fox-furry nerdbait and repetitive, derivative Yugioh-esque bird-dragons. Of course it recycles bits and bobs from other properties and passes them off as original ideas. And of course the logical conclusion of its darkest gameplay paths can begin to look like the same sweatshop labor that probably sews the eyes onto 1500 stuffed Eeevees a day. I'm not saying these were consciously ironic decisions by secretly diabolical masters of satire, no, they were almost certainly driven first by what any common denominator gamer considers cool and second by whatever was the easiest path to take on a limited budget, but I am saying the results have the same effect as cutting commentary.
And yes, I know that dozens of other indie games have already put just every spin you can ever possibly put on the basic Pokemon formula. I know many of these are FANTASTIC games compared to the more formulaic competency of Palworld, but none of them actually look and play as close to the current "real thing" as Palworld. None of them ever wanted to. Almost every other original monster-collecting game, for all its similarities, still tries very hard to maintain a more personal identity than just "darker Pokemon," and I would argue that they're all actually quite successful at that. Successful enough that, no, titles like Monster Crown and Siralim are not filling the niche filled by Palworld. They aren't "darker Pokemon," or "Pokemon for more serious gamers," or "spoofing" Pokemon, even if those can describe elements within them. They are all distinct, original games that stand very effectively on their own within the genre that Pokemon helped popularize, and are all worth playing, and will maybe someday also get the reviews from me that they all rightfully deserve.
But there's only one franchise that I think has ever come close to what Palworld has attempted to do, or at least only one with even a fraction of the impact, however fleeting Palworld's impact may or may not prove to be. And unfortunately, the release of Pokemon's seventh generation was timed perfectly to bury what was left of the poor thing right when it was already suffering a tragic burnout spiral:
