'Palworld' Developer and Sony Form New Company, Palworld Entertainment

Pocketpair, the Japanese developer behind Palworld, and Sony have inked a deal to form a new company called Palworld Entertainment.

Sony hasn’t bought Palword but rather Palworld Entertainment is a “joint venture company” that’ll be led by Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe. On its new website, the company is described as being responsible for all of Palworld’s global licensing and merchandising operations.

Palworld Entertainment was launched in partnership with Aniplex specifically, a Japanese subsidiary of Sony that predominantly focuses on producing and disturbing anime.

The 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,” Palworld Entertainment’s official announcement reads.

It’s possible that Pocketpair and Sony are working on adapting Palworld into an anime series. For starters, however, the company’s first project will be creating Palworld-branded merchandise that’ll be sold at Shanghai’s Bilibili World 2024.

Often compared to Pokémon, albeit a bit more violent, Palworld rolled out in January 2024 and clocked over 25 million players within its first month.