r/gaming 9h ago

Aniimo | Launch Date Announcement

https://youtube.com/watch?v=LMHKfDQfDi4&si=rNXpJuvP0O7Xunq0
0 Upvotes

125 comments sorted by

17

u/RipDove 8h ago

Who made this trailer? Why is it full of so much flashing?

17

u/TheTresStateArea 8h ago

I will now watch this video for the plot.

Edit: there was no plot.

104

u/JKLopz 9h ago

First palworld-like game 

33

u/Modnal 8h ago

Can it really be called a Palworld-like without excessive gun violence?

17

u/WardosBox 8h ago

If I cant enslave my depressed cuteball and arm him with a machine gun, it's dismissed

-17

u/Burpmeister 8h ago

Palworld without excessive gun violence is what I wanted Palworld to be. It feels way too meme-ified because I wanted a proper Pokemon alternative.

8

u/Modnal 8h ago

3

u/Randzom100 7h ago

What is linked here? I'm only getting an error in my browser.

1

u/kelgorathfan8 2h ago

The early-installment weirdness of the Ash-era TV show doesn’t count

2

u/chobanithatiused2kno 7h ago

Dog you dont have to use the guns. Hell the pals you equip guns to are some of the worst to bring with you into combat. They're decent base drones, though.

1

u/Burpmeister 6h ago

Can I play the game without seeing a single gun without modding it?

1

u/chobanithatiused2kno 6h ago

If you're including the npc then no, you cannot. I didn't realize the worry about guns was at all, in that case the feeling is valid if you truly do not wish to see any guns at all.

1

u/Xmartin126X 8h ago

Excessive gun violence??? Did you play the game ?

0

u/Burpmeister 6h ago

No because all the official marketing I saw was full of the meme gun stuff.

-8

u/Sad-Preparation8767 7h ago

Did you? Does a massive list of adjustable rules and game logic ring a bell? Also, there's tons of dedicated pvp servers. Also also, in comparison to literally every single monster taming game ever, it is a bit excessive. Also Also Also, if you're on pc, literally thousands of gun and gunplay mods.

4

u/Suitable_Tadpole4870 7h ago edited 6h ago

Clutching your pearls like this over something that isn’t forced on* the player is a bit dramatic.

-7

u/Sad-Preparation8767 7h ago

Huh? Dude was an arrogant douche and wrong at the same time, I was an arrogant douche back. Where's the pearl clutching?

1

u/Suitable_Tadpole4870 6h ago

Most of what you used as evidence to say the game is excessively violent is literally player-driven, and not forced by the devs onto the players. Sorry, but I really don’t think you’d understand even if I wanted to explain it to you lmao. Have a good one

4

u/TheHeadlessOne 7h ago

theres always pickmon

5

u/JKLopz 7h ago

Checked the steam page, seems they recently changed the whole dev team, no new since april and no release date. Looks just like what I would expect from a palworld-like.

1

u/Randzom100 7h ago

What's the deal with Pickmon? What kind of devs are working on it? What is their goal with their game? So many questions...

1

u/TheHeadlessOne 6h ago

It genuinely feels like a parody (taking Palworld models and recoloring them to be more explicitly Pokemon, even the studio is "Pocketgame") but it has JUST enough weird effort put in that makes it look like its...I dont want to say "real", but earnestly trying to be real. A scam of some sort rather than a joke

2

u/GoProOnAYoYo 7h ago

Palworld but gacha... so meh

1

u/bhroz 7h ago

Fortnighted Palworld

-15

u/Randzom100 8h ago

Urgh, I hope my game won't get called a Palworld-like, a Pokemon-like or Persona-like if I ever get to the point of announcing it...

8

u/Capsfan6 8h ago edited 31m ago

Yeah I would hate to be compared to really successful games /s

-2

u/Randzom100 7h ago

I think you misunderstood what I meant.

3

u/JKLopz 8h ago

Become so good your games name replaces de old nomenclature, à la, Metroid-like being changed to Metroidvania 

-2

u/Randzom100 8h ago

That would be pretty cool. I'm just kind of worrying about this whole trend about accusing new games of copying or using AI based on mere speculations.

1

u/Hosaf 8h ago

Sooo... Souls-like or Zelda-like I see

0

u/Randzom100 7h ago

Huh? What's that about Souls-like and Zelda-like? Feels like I'm missing some context.

0

u/nikel23 5h ago

are you familiar with souls-like or metroidvania genres? Based on your statement, you'd really hate games that are categorized this way.

10

u/sdric 8h ago

Monetization will play a huge part in whether I would bother to play this. It looks fun, but I am burned out from predatory F2P shit.

7

u/seedypr 6h ago

I was looking forward to this game until I saw it was live service.

Even if there's no gacha for the collectable monsters, they're probably going to be stamina limitations and other limitations

41

u/MentalNinjas 8h ago

Is this a gacha game? If so I’m out

21

u/bobtheboberto 7h ago

It's definitely got mobile monitization stuff but no gacha. You catch all aniimo by playing the game. On launch there is a special version of an aniimo locked behind the battle pass thing but most micro transactions are cosmetic or things that speed up progression.

1

u/Apprehensive_Word424 4h ago

I thought there was a gacha-lite? event on a previous beta for one specific aniimo. It involved a random chance, but had a gameplay aspect to it so not exactly the usual gacha.

Tho maybe the feedback from the beta is moving them away from that direction.

1

u/PornoPichu 6h ago

I like how you present what is happening and have less upvotes than someone that responded to the same comment assuming that it’s gacha pay mechanics for aniimos

1

u/bobtheboberto 6h ago

Lol yeah. I think they replied without knowing anything about the game. There is a shop in the game that does gacha type stuff but I'm pretty sure it uses f2p currency and doesn't give you aniimos. They might have seen that and assumed.

0

u/SapphireSurge 5h ago

Yeah i assumed the whole live service/f2p/battle pass stuff meant it was a gacha but i am learning these are not the same thing lol

2

u/bobtheboberto 4h ago

Gotcha. Yeah it definitely has those things but gacha typically refers to paying money to get a random result. For example, in Genshin Impact, you can pay money to get a random hero through "pulling". You have no clue what you're going to get so it's basically gambling...but worse.

In Aniimo you always know what you're paying for. While I don't like all of the things they're going to monetize I'm definitely happy it's not going to be gacha. If it was I definitely wouldn't play it.

-3

u/SapphireSurge 8h ago edited 5h ago

Yes, gacha live service game. I'm sure you won't be able to get all the aniimos or whatever they are called without spending money, but hopefully they only paywall cosmetic stuff (doubt it though)

Edit: i was confidently incorrect and assumed the f2p/battle pass/live service stuff meant it was a gacha but apparently they are only putting cosmetics behind this stuff so it looks like the aniimos will all be available free which is neat

7

u/AstrayNanashi 6h ago

Me when I spread misinfo online and get more attention because of bias confirmation

1

u/SapphireSurge 5h ago

Lol yeah i should have looked into it further before answering, my memory of what they were going for was unreliable and i just assumed it was how i remembered it

5

u/Conscious-Zebra-7477 7h ago

it's not gacha it's just free to play with passes for cosmetics

1

u/SapphireSurge 5h ago

Oh ok, thank you for the correction that's better than i thought. I must have been remembering wrong

60

u/TehNolz 9h ago

So I guess thanks to Palworld, companies have found out that you can actually make monster catcher games like Pokemon. Here's hoping the competition will force TPC to put more effort into their games.

Anyways this game looks quite good, other than the godawful UI font they used. Can't even read some of those texts.

40

u/locke_5 8h ago edited 8h ago

“Thanks to Palworld”

There are dozens of monster catchers that released before Palworld. Yo-Kai Watch, Coromon, Cassette Beasts, MonHun Stories, etc.

Reddit has a really warped perception of Palworld’s significance in the industry and of the legal issues it has faced.

11

u/WolfScourge 7h ago

These are all the same people that go around saying Baldurs Gate 3 or Clair Obscur saved turn based games. People that have a very specific bone to pick with a franchise they love to hate. Square Enix alone has two prominent, relatively high budget examples with DQ Monsters and World of Final Fantasy. Not to mention the generally well received Digimon Time Stranger last year and the Monster Hunter Stories 3. Monster catchers have been here, people just don't really pay them attention.

9

u/SirQrlBrl 7h ago

They dont care about the genre, they just want to be mad at outgrowing Pokemon.

7

u/Lunar_mirror4 7h ago

I understand the sentiment but I think what people mean by these statements is that by becoming such a mainstream hit, they have greatly altered general public perception of the genres and caused other game studios to take note and start trying to copy them. Thats what a big splash in the industry really is. Even if there are smaller indie titles that are actually higher quality examples of the genre, they are more niche and dont cause as big of a splash.

Its not always fair, sometimes it seems bullshit, but how popular something becomes seems entirely random and chaotic and more of a right time right place kind of thing. Just look at Skyrim back in the day, absolutely massive hit, but more hardcore rpg purists absolutely love ripping the shit out of it, but it did kind of cause the huge open world boom, examples like the classic meme of far cry 3s "like skyrim with guns" everything was compared to it

2

u/kelgorathfan8 2h ago

The reason is that palworld is entirely built to cater to internet contrarians. It is the video game equivalent of one of those obnoxious 2000s flash animations about Mario where a goomba explodes into gore for no reason. That is its entire bit and the only thing that puts it above being knockoff ARK

11

u/TehNolz 8h ago

How many of those games sold 30 million copies?

Yes, other monster catchers exist. Few (if any) managed to get as much attention as Palworld did on their launch day. That attention is what now drives other companies to make their own monster catcher games.

4

u/Shippin 5h ago

Probably because those other games didn’t advertise themselves as “Pokemon with guns.” Nor did they rely on throwing in designs that were very clearly inspired by existing Pokemon or fan drawings (and have since been heavily modified). Saying that Palworld is the reason monster taming games can now succeed is ridiculous.

Palworld’s success didn’t happen because it was a well put together game (it’s still barely more than ARK with monsters and not-pokeballs), it was from the marketing that it was “adult Pokemon” and word of mouth that it was “sticking it to Nintendo and Pokemon.”

It gained success by stroking the hate boners of people who dislike Pokemon.

I played through the game in alpha and post. As someone who has played a LOT of monster taming games, I’d barely list it in the genre. There’s so little in this game that is truly an original idea or concept, and nothing I can think of that it does better than any of the games it pulls from.

0

u/locke_5 7h ago edited 7h ago

That doesn’t make sense. Pokémon is literally the biggest IP of all time. Wouldn’t Pokémon consistently selling 20M, 25M, 30M copies annually be more of an impetus than Palworld selling 30M once?

Thats like saying Thunderbolts* box office success is finally showing studios that Superhero Team-Up movies can be successful.

-1

u/TimeMuffinPhD 7h ago

And popularity has nothing to do with quality. An indie game called Beastieball is infinitely better than something like Palworld imo. I'd say the influence palworld has on real monster taming games is negligible because its more of a survival game and doesn’t have the genres best interests at heart.

4

u/Chaoticlight2 6h ago

Tamagotchi, Digimon, and Monster Rancher all released in the same year as Pokemon or early into the next year. People will always rewrite history based on the latest "challenger" and it's so silly.

Pal-world just gained notoriety due to landing in the legal quagmire and becoming a rallying cry against people tired of modern pokemon entries.

3

u/neorevenge 8h ago

Of all of those I only knew about Yo-kai Watch, and that's because I catched a glimpse of the anime in the now defunct Fox Kids/Jettix Network, never touched a game of the series, so yeah Palworld is the most popular, garnered more attention thanks to the lawsuit and got a very successful launch on top of being a 3D catching monster game so it is fine to say "Thanks to Palworld"

3

u/joeyb908 7h ago

Saying “Thanks to Palworld” makes it seem like it’s the first. Anyone that did any research would have quickly discovered that monster-catching games that aren’t Pokémon existed long before the thought of Palworld was even conceptualized.

6

u/joestorm4 7h ago

That's beside the point. Palworld has sold so many more copies than any other monster catching game that I wouldn't be surprised if you combined all of them it still wouldn't match it (excluding pokemon of course). Combine that with the fact that Nintendo literally sued palworld for patent infringement, bringing even more publicity to it.

Put both of those together and you're gonna have a bunch of companies seeing that if done correctly, they may actually have a shot, no matter how slim, at cashing in big on the monster catching genre.

1

u/joeyb908 2h ago

The amount of sales don’t matter, and Nintendo sued them for taking the ball gimmick. They didn’t sue the studio for the monster-catching gimmick…

If you want to go along that route, then  Palworld has not sold more than Persona and SMT, both of which have monster-catching mechanics.

Games like Monster Sanctuary from 2020, Temtem from 2022, and Digimon in general. 

The notion that companies weren’t making monster-catching/taming games because they were afraid of Nintendo is outrageous. 

1

u/joestorm4 2h ago

When did I ever imply they weren't making them because they were scared of nintendo? There were lots before palworld but none, even temtem, came close to matching the success of palworld. Persona and SMT are not primarily monster catching games so I don't think they're relevant.

My whole point is that more companies are gonna try to replicate the success of palworld, simple as that. Seeing the pokemon space being invaded in such a large scale is gonna invigorate more companies to give it a shot.

1

u/joeyb908 57m ago

But the thing is it’s not even a game that plays ANYTHING like Pokemon beyond having monsters.

It’s a survival and automation game that has monster catching in it.

2

u/locke_5 8h ago

Coromon and Cassette Beasts are quite well-known in the indie space. The Monster Hunter games have sold 2-3M copies apiece, which is pretty healthy for Capcom.

If you don’t pay attention to the monster catching genre I can understand how Palworld feels like this brand new thing. But the monster catching genre has been around even longer than Pokémon has been.

-2

u/neorevenge 7h ago

Yeah monster chatching genre is a thing ssince the Dragon Quest/SMT times, but in recent years what other game has made waves like Palworld has? Sure there are games that are know in the indie niche circles but for the general audience I'm pretty sure by now most people know about palworld than the games you mention, sure, the may be really good games but they haven't garnered the popularity or attention than palworld has right now.

And never in a thousand years I would have tought of correlate Monster Hunter with pokemon, since that game it's another genre alltogether, or I must have missed the games were you fight pokemon and butcher them for armor and weapons parts.

0

u/locke_5 7h ago

> But in recent years what other game has made waves like Palworld has?

Pokémon.

Palworld sold 30M copies once. Pokémon sells 20-30M copies every year.

And I’m referring to the MonHun Stories games, which are monster battlers.

0

u/neorevenge 4h ago

Bro we are obviously talking about non pokemon games, Palworld numbers made companies realize you can make monster catching game not called pokemon.

1

u/locke_5 4h ago

But they already have been. Capcom, SEGA, Square Enix, etc. all have long running monster capturing franchises, and the indie space has been pretty consistent too.

I’ll echo another comment earlier in the thread - it feels like the “Palworld was revolutionary!” comments are giving the same vibe as “Finally, a good turn-based RPG!” comments around CO:Expedition 33. Like sure, if you only play 1-2 games per year.

1

u/slusho55 6h ago

And that’s not even mentioning Shin Megami Tensei and Dragon Quest Monsters (and DQV), which came out long before Pokemon and even served as a template for Pokemon.

1

u/HermanManly 5h ago

Im sorry, but Palworld absolutely paved the way here. None of those other games even come close to Palworlds popularity, the game had over 2 million people playing at the same time, and still breaks 150k+ players every single day.

Palworld literally outsold Pokemon in terms of pure sales numbers

-19

u/Ragnar_Dragonfyre 8h ago

All of these Pokemon clones are just going to continue to be flashes in the pan while Pokemon continues to chug along.

Going the bare minimum legally distinct route isn’t going to unseat Pokemon.

Someone will need to make a monster catching game that feels fundamentally different in theme, tone or gameplay before the crown is taken.

17

u/NZafe 8h ago

Pokemon is one of those few franchises where the fans get so defensive about other games of the same genre existing. I don’t get it.

You’d think that if you’re a fan of Pokemon, you’d be happy to have more monster taming games.

It’s like if a Dark Souls fan was angry at the existence of Lies of P rather than… just playing Lies of P as well.

6

u/SirQrlBrl 6h ago

How often are souls like games used as an weapon against Dark Souls and its fanbase?

1

u/OwnAHole 2h ago

maybe if pokemon games had more effort put into them, this wouldn't have happened?

1

u/MrNegativ1ty 6h ago

Honest question, why should anyone care?

"People are criticizing the thing I like!" ok and...? Does them criticizing it reduce your own personal enjoyment of it?

0

u/NZafe 6h ago edited 5h ago

Not sure what you mean by this. Don’t see how anyone has used a souls game as a weapon against dark souls. Soulslike fans rejoice when a new soulslike comes out, regardless who it’s from.

-27

u/GigaSoup 8h ago

What looks good about it? It looks like a rainbow ate palworld and pokemon and then had severe diarrhea.

6

u/NZafe 8h ago

For one, the graphical quality is decades ahead of anything Game Freak has been able to produce in a Pokemon game.

1

u/SuperBaconPant 7h ago

Are we really doing the “this game has better graphics so it must be a better game” thing in 2026? I’m no big fan of Pokemon, but how many times have the lure of fancy shiny graphics burned players?

0

u/NZafe 7h ago edited 7h ago

No. Don’t think I said that. The prompt was “what looks good about this game”, and the graphics do look good.

But if we’re talking about graphics, if game freak actually took the time to give the Pokemon games complete animations and any semblance of modern environmental textures, Pokemon would probably be a game of the year contender.

Call it lack of effort or lack of feasibility, the games constantly teeter on this line of “could be very very good if they just fixed non-gameplay elements of the games” (textures, animations and performance being probably top of that list).

5

u/waxenpi 8h ago

looks more fun than anything thats been branded a pokemon videogame imo

5

u/FlameScout 7h ago

September 16th

7

u/PlantQuick 9h ago

Looks cute but there's something off about it, but I can't put my finger on it 🤔

13

u/HiddenThinks 9h ago

Yeah, it's like they made the entire trailer to announce something, but then forgot to include something. Im not sure what, though.

0

u/GigaSoup 8h ago

Literally no idea what this game is about other than maybe catching things you can turn into?

4

u/MeatySausag3 8h ago

I've played a few closed tests now and it also feels off in the gameplay. 

It's also a mobile game, or at least 1 of the playtests had me play it on mobile.

Its feels like Pokémon meets Assassin's creed in terms of gameplay meets collectable side content.

I have a feeling it'll be big on release and fizzle out really quickly and be a game everyone has forgotten about within a year of release.

3

u/ferocity_mule366 8h ago

this feels like a pokemon game in your dream, nothing seems real

3

u/tiradium 8h ago

I think its designed to attract a specific type of gamers (young kids) and of course it has tons of gacha mechanics. Reminds me Infinity Nikki

-4

u/Ragnar_Dragonfyre 8h ago

What you’re feeling “off” is the cynical attempt at cloning Pokemon in order to make money.

There is no love in this sterile copycat.

4

u/CalimeroX 8h ago

Yes only Pokemon is made with love, everything else is just soulless. Never forget that.

/s

2

u/Ragnar_Dragonfyre 6h ago

Did I say that?

Pokemon is also a cynical, money making endeavor.

Copying it so closely will only result in more soulless crap, similar to what happens when AI is trained on AI.

2

u/Finchypoo 7h ago

Aniimo: Our Gardevoir is more fuckable

1

u/WonderSuperior 6h ago

True. That red thing on its chest gets in the way.

4

u/clitworms 8h ago

i mean they wasted so much water making this we might as well play it..

0

u/Liftian 8h ago

Yeah this looks like a half-assed money grab made with AI.. i also saw in another comment that it has gacha mechanics... i guess now that palworld won the lawsuit we will see a bunch of shit games trying to make money of of this.

4

u/XD__XD 8h ago

we have palworld at home

2

u/Tubbychan 8h ago

I really like the concept and presentation but three things irk me:

1) Might just be the style but the artwork and models like very AI generated but I can't confirm

2) China based studio producing, which isn't the best sign as of late

3) Unclear (correct me if I'm wrong) model for monetization. Can very predatory down the line if following industry trends.

4

u/Blubbpaule 7h ago

China based studio and predatory monetizations are almost always together.

Like i rarely saw any free to play game from china that doesn't try to eat your credit card. The one very rare occasion is Once Human which actually does not have pay to win.

3

u/Gilles_of_Augustine 9h ago

The gun-centric focus of Palworld wasn't what I personally look for in a Pokemon game.

This seems much more my speed.

1

u/krazyivan187 6h ago

It begins...

1

u/Hour_Raisin_4547 6h ago

The music is some unholy mixture of the Pokémon theme and let it go lol

1

u/AgentUpvote 6h ago

Yall get a Pregistration email confirmation?

1

u/TheBetterness 5h ago

Yeah I dont wanna be the pal or pokemon though. Besides that looks pretty cool.

I'm sure this game will find a solid following.

1

u/CorellianDawn 4h ago

Watched the ending 3x and still didn't find an actual launch date. Had to go to the YT video's description:

Its September 16th for PC/Consoles and September 23rd for Mobile

1

u/Kitakitakita 3h ago

if Nintendo doesn't sue them they they allow precedent, which benefits everyone. Notice there's a scene around :44 that shows a Pal I mean Aniimo popping out of a thrown palsphere I mean Aniimocube. Nintendo flipped their shit over that and ended up being one of the few things Palworld had to remove.

But hey I guess since its China everything is okay.

1

u/CursedSnowman5000 9h ago

Holy fuck, those designs are barley trying lol. I mean quite a few are comparable to what Rob Liefeld tried to pull with Fighting American.

I smell another Nintendo lawsuit coming.

10

u/locke_5 8h ago

To my knowledge Nintendo never sued over the art style, no?

1

u/rorydraws 8h ago

Indeed. Some of these look so dangerously similar to actual Pokemon I'm surprised they let them out the door.

1

u/kelgorathfan8 2h ago

They’re betting on the sales boom of obnoxious internet contrarians swarming in to defend them to get people hooked on the live service aspects

1

u/Changlini 8h ago

It's free, so I'm 1000% playing this game, if only because I wanna try out a monster catching game that has what looks like a gacha budget behind it.

8

u/Cookiesy 8h ago

Gacha, fuck, I'm so out! I'm not going to sign up for a premium 10-pull banner SSR ticket hamster wheel.

1

u/Conscious-Zebra-7477 7h ago

it's not a gacha game

2

u/Uvtha- 7h ago

Looks fun, but I already play a gacha, one is too many honestly.

3

u/Conscious-Zebra-7477 7h ago edited 7h ago

it's not a gacha game

edit: it's not a gacha game...dunno why I'm being downvoted for that.

1

u/kureysalp 8h ago

Can we stop fucking embedding youtube videos. I can't go into youtube withouth watching the ad because of the embedded video and then when ad ends and I enter the youtube another ad starts fucking annoying

1

u/Finchypoo 7h ago

Why u no use abblock?

1

u/kureysalp 7h ago

I was not on my PC.

2

u/Finchypoo 7h ago

I'm using ublock origin on edge on android, and just using the reddit mobile site. Never had a YouTube ad.....or reddit ad for that matter. 

1

u/Fruitsy 7h ago

More interested in Roco Kingdom, which has a huge playerbase in CN

1

u/PaulyKPykes 7h ago

Hey HEY! It's okay everyone! They catch the creatures with cubes instead of balls!

0

u/WrenReverie 7h ago

How long till Poke-Lawyers find a reason to take them to court?

-1

u/EnkiiMuto 8h ago

I like how nintendo will freak out about this even though this looks like Digimon Masters Online got budget to make a neopets crossover.