Pocketpair, the studio behind monster catching and survival crafting game Palworld, has spoken about how the Early Access title’s 1.0 release is going to be its biggest update yet in the past. However, in a new interview, publishing head and communications lead John Buckley has noted that players are going to be shocked at just how extensive the 1.0 update will be. Speaking to GamesRadar during GDC 2026, Buckley discussed the new content coming to the game, and how Palworld 1.0 is aimed at offering “something for everyone”.
“Survival crafting is a very unique genre. It’s a very Steam genre, for all its woes and highs,” he said. “There’s so many incredible, incredible survival crafting games, but I think every survival crafting gamer has their like ideal version of what survival crafting should be, and we hope Palworld 1.0 will be that kind of something for everyone, lose yourself in this world, survival crafting game.” He went on to say that, “Palworld is going to be the survival crafting game everyone always wanted.”
While he was still coy about the exact details of the new content coming to Palworld’s 1.0 release, Buckley did note that the update will polish and flesh out just about every single aspect of the game. This also means that players will have the choice of jumping into the game with their old characters, or starting afresh. However, the studio does recommend starting from scratch, thanks simply to the large amount of changes that will be made to the entire game.
“It’s still quite top secret,” said Buckley about the 1.0 update. “There’s gonna be things that surprise people. I think people will be shocked by what we’ve been able to achieve for 1.0. 1.0 is going to fall at kind of a weird point for players. You can jump into 1.0 with your existing character if you want to. We’re not force wiping anyone. You can jump in. But we are going to kind of softly recommend you start from scratch, because kind of everything is going to change from the beginning to the end – It’s all going to change.”
As for players who want to continue their existing saves, Buckley explained that “a huge chunk of quote unquote end game content will be added.” This means that “if you really want to continue from where you left off, sure you’re not missing out on the full experience, but you are missing out on some things. We’ve tried our best to expand everything. Not just the end game, but also improve the early game, add more to the early game, flesh out the middle game, kind of something for everyone, really.”
As for the studio’s plans for after the 1.0 update is released, Buckley spoke about how Pocketpair doesn’t have any plans to turn Palworld into a No Man’s Sky-styled situation.
“A lot of our hardcore fans and players would love for Palworld to be this No Man’s Sky situation where it’s like a decade of continuous, massive updates,” he explained. “But realistically, that’s probably not on the cards for Palworld, not only because of engine limitations, but also, it’s a survival crafting game. I think there’s only so many times you can add five levels, add 10 levels, until it gets to this massive bloat point.”
Palworld is available on PC, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S.
