Palworld has become a huge hit and is the second most-played game of all time on Steam. It turns out that merging open-world survival with Pokemon makes for a fun game. And luckily, there are more like it. Here are my picks for the top 10 games like Palworld.
Top 10 Games Similar to Palworld You Can Play Right Now
10. ARK Survival Ascended
The ARK series is probably most similar to Palworld, as it mirrors both the co-op survival aspect and taming wild creatures. Whether the original or ARK Survival Ascended, you can explore a vast open world while manufacturing tools, building bases, and training prehistoric beasts of massive sizes. You can even breed them and create an army.
Once you have your horde of titanic beasts, you can either engage in co-op action exploration or fight PVP battles against other players’ dino armies. Survival Ascended also supports mods for nigh unlimited content from the community, including new areas, creatures, weapons, and tons more. The game’s still in Early Access, but it has a bright future and a vast community. And has proven its staying power over the years.
9. Cassette Beasts
If you’re just looking for a well-designed Pokemon experience, check out the next few titles starting with Cassete Beasts. It’s an open-world RPG where you tame, train, and summon magical critters through cassettes. The turn-based combat is similar to Pokemon but with its own twists.
For example, you can fuse any two cassette beasts to create fully animated and hand-crafted evolved versions with brand-new abilities. Bytten Studio has put in a ton of work to create seemingly numerous combinations you can enjoy over multiple playthroughs. The game even has a developed social interaction system as you meet and bond with new NPCs while traveling, exploring, and fighting across a vast open world. The best part? You can play the game in couch co-op mode with a buddy over.
8. Temtem
Where Cassette Beasts is a tailor-made single-player experience, Temtem is a massive online multiplayer. It offers a similar experience as Palworld in the sense that you’re taming and leveling up magical buddies and then interacting with other players. You can travel across the open world and battle other tamers or join in on their adventure, exploring or defeating the eight Dojo leaders.
Temtem also offers a pseudo base management system, though it’s not based on survival. Instead, you buy and customize your house. You can furnish and decorate it while inviting friends over for a chill session. The biggest pull here is the MMO aspect and the well-designed turn-based tactics combat against other players focused on being competitive with picks and bans.
7. Pokemon Legends: Arceus
If you want the official experience, then I recommend Pokemon Legends: Arceus. It’s one of the 3D new-gen Pokemon games with an impressive roster of regions and different Pokemon. It’s a single-player experience where the story revolves around your trainer trying to find and capture all the Pokemon in the area for the region’s first Pokedex.
It offers a much more customizable RPG experience, and you can evolve Pokemon and rearrange their move lists to create unique builds. The exploration aspect isn’t as extensive as some of the other games, but the story isn’t bad, allowing you to interact with plenty of fun NPCs throughout the game world. Overall, it’s one of the best ways to enjoy official Pokemon today.
6. Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin
The Monster Hunter setting has always had tons of epic magical creatures that are less light-hearted and more high fantasy raid bosses. Wings of Ruin merges these massive beasts with the Pokemon aspect of forming bonds with them and fighting together. The result is this JRPG focused on training huge monsters and battling them against other huge monsters.
Like Palworld, the game has a multiplayer aspect, where you can play co-op and train monsters together or engage with PVP. Instead of elements, the combat focuses on three attack types Power, Speed, and Technical attacks. Predicting your enemy’s attack and countering with the right one can help you deal massive damage. Also, similarly to Palworld — and unlike Pokemon — you can go to battle alongside your creatures wielding titular Monster Hunter weapons and armor. Why should they do all the fighting after all?
5. Don’t Starve Together
Returning to the survival aspect of Palworld, I also recommend Don’t Starve Together. It’s a co-op survival game where you gather resources and construct a base during the day while staving off monsters at night. Besides the fact that you can do it with a buddy, Don’t Starve Together also offers a companion system similar to Pals in Palworld.
You have critters which are immortal pets introduced in A New Reign update. They can be adopted and raised to follow you around though they’re not combat-focused as Pals. Still, this is a fun dark fantasy survival game with Pal-like creatures that’s perfect for a co-op chill session. The chill stops when night strikes.
4. Cult of the Lamb
If managing and exploiting a horde of creatures looking to be fed and pampered is what makes Palworld fun for you, then check out Cult of the Lamb, where the creatures literally worship you. Cult of the Lamb switches out the survival mechanics of Palworld for an action roguelite system where you dive into dungeons battling eldritch gods and hire followers for your cult. These followers worship you and grant you increasingly more powerful abilities.
Returning from your dungeoneering adventures, you delve into the base management system. You can build new structures with your followers and assign them to perform different jobs. That said, you must also feed and clean up after them, but it’s a small price to pay for divinity. Cult of the Lamb is inspired by the Binding of Isaac, so you know there will be vast item combinations, awesome boss fights, and endless replayability. This is the perfect time to jump into the game as the Sins of the Flesh DLC is out.
3. Slime Rancher 2
Hear me out: not Pals, but slimes. Tons and tons of colorful slimes. In Slime Rancher 2, you explore a charming and positively weird sci-fi world structured like a sandbox experience. It’s a base management game where building your own farm and taming and managing slime creatures in just in a day’s work.
Slimes are used to make money, unlock upgrades, create gadgets for exploration, and unlock new areas. There are numerous types of slimes, and you can even mix and match to create new ones. Essentially, they’re the main mechanic for the pseudo-combat and exploration system. I guarantee you haven’t played a game like this though you may recognize certain survival and base-management elements of it.
2. Monster Sanctuary
If a 2D game is more to your liking, I present Monster Sanctuary, a creature collector Metroidvania. In classic Palworld fashion, you collect numerous new species of monsters. The neat part is that you use them for turn-based RPG-focused combat and traversing the world. Certain areas are locked until you can get a flying creature or one that can break walls.
As for the combat system, it’s quite diverse and decently in-depth, offering elemental combinations from Pokemon but with its own twists. There are 111 monsters to find and tame, and they can evolve into new and powerful forms. The RPG element comes with the fact that you can find and equip gear to modify your creatures, and each one has a skill tree to progress through and unlock new combat and exploration skills.
1. Valheim
At the end of the day, if you’re just looking for a great open-world survival crafting experience, I highly recommend Valheim. This is my favorite. While there’s no creature-management system, Valheim takes the survival genre and pushes it to new heights. It’s because of the crafting system and the teamwork-focused boss fights.
There’s an incredible amount of variety in the weapons you craft and their playstyles. Valheim allows you to experiment and find what combat style suits you best. Then there’s the online co-op, where base-building with your friends and fighting massive bosses together defines the experience. And let’s not forget the immersive exploration experience with a great soundtrack and visuals. Best of all, the game has a vibrant modding community, so you’re always getting new content.
Those are my choices for the Top 10 games like Palworld to play after beating Pokemon with guns. Check out our Palworld guides for more content on the game, like the best Pals for your base or how to get guns.
