Bilawal Bashir 
Despite releasing on the same day, Palworld on Xbox runs an older game build with reduced performance and features.
Fans noticed the platform disparity, which was later confirmed by Palworld’s community manager, Bucky, on the game’s Discord server. Bucky explained that although both Palworld versions are named 1.2, they are not the same between Steam and Xbox. Players who have played the wildly popular game on Xbox and Steam noticed significant differences between the two versions. The biggest one is framerate stability on the console; the game hovers between 25-60 FPS depending on load and is jarring when the action gets going.
Palworld developer Pocketpair is aware of the issues and is actively working to bring crossplay to the game.
Is Palworld the same on Xbox and PC?
Palworld’s community manager has confirmed that the Xbox and PC versions of the game are different, with the Xbox version being worse.
The community manager explained on Discord that Steam and Xbox are running two fundamentally different game versions because of the architectural differences between the platforms. They also clarified that the Xbox version does not lack features, but that some features may behave differently. These changes in the game’s features are attributed to another issue and not the “older build” by the community manager.
However, the versions have noticeable differences including character naming, crafting speeds, and entirely missing sound effects on the Xbox console. It’s not known why all of these changes are in place. While PC games having advantages over their console counterparts like mod support and customizable settings has been the norm for decades, this is even more profound with Palworld.
Why is Xbox running an older Palworld version?
Xbox is running an older Palworld version because Microsoft certification takes time to be granted.
Palworld developers have been submitting patches and hotfixes to Microsoft, but they aren’t implemented as quickly on Xbox as they are on Steam. The company stated that updates that were shipped on Steam days prior were still lingering in Xbox’s certification queue. They stated that the developers are “desperately trying to speed this up.”
Palworld’s goal is to have the same version running on both platforms but according to Bucky, it can only happen when crossplay gets released. Despite those growing pains, Palworld has sold 5 million in the three days after launch and is currently one of the biggest games on Steam.
