Palia had me at a cozy community sim Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) game. A free-to-play game from Singularity 6, Palia offers a true MMO experience for everyone in love with the cozy aesthetics and gameplay of other community sims. Set in a whimsical world, players build a homestead, make friends (and romances) with villagers, craft, cook, and otherwise immerse themselves in a stylized and vibrant world.
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To kick things off, players get to create their avatars based on two non-gendered body types which they can then pick clothes, face types, skin tone (of which there are 11), voices in two branches (labeled “A” and “B”), and then hairstyles which thankfully include a wide range of textures. While the inclusivity of a character creator is always constrained by the art style of the game, Palia makes every effort to allow players to create a character that looks like them, with body size being the only limited option. Additionally, before you jump into the world of Palia you choose your display name and your nickname, the latter of which will be what villagers close to you call you.
Once you’ve chosen who you’ll play as, your adventure in Palia begins as you appear in the world from a portal with no memories of how you got there, only that you’re human and there aren’t many others like you. The quest system, at first, focuses on your ability to gather, mine, garden, cook, fish, bug catching, hunting, and furniture building, with each skill leveling up and allowing you to access new materials and recipes. In addition to those quest types, you do have a main story quest that you can progress through, though I challenge you to not be sucked into the crafting and gathering side of the game.
Because Palia focuses on relaxation and community, hunting is an action that doesn’t yield a dead animal but rather a cute pop into a sack of goods. When first starting out, the little Chapaa, an invasive but adorable pest, is easy to knock into a sack with one arrow whereas the Sernuk takes two. Since it takes time to level up your bow, the Sernuk take a certain level of skill, requiring two shots in quick succession, the second fired at the animal while it’s running away.
Additionally, bug catching involves stunning the bug with a smoke bomb and then grabbing it when it politely complies. While it may sound like a trivial element, this lets Palia maintain its cozy core while also allowing the player to become involved in elements of crafting beyond just chopping down trees and mining.
Palia also offers a unique fishing mechanic as well. Using the rod, you can fish in most bodies of water (you just can’t swim—Hello Kitty Adventures remains the only cozy community sim with an underwater biome). That said, by aiming at ripples in the water, you can increase your chances of catching rare fish that can catch a great price or be put into your tank to decorate your house. The difference that Palia makes with its fishing mechanic is how you reel in the catch of the day. Instead of timing, catching fish in Palia is about precision. As you reel in the fish you have to keep between two brackets which turn green when the fish is in the middle.
To keep the fish from drifting out of the brackets for too long and escaping, slow and steady work as you pull back the reel and adjust the placement. Hunting, bug catching, and fishing all add a unique spin to those traditional elements of a game and have enough difficulty to keep you invested in the action without becoming too overwhelming. This is a balance that Palia strikes well between immersing the player in the intricacies of the world while always keeping the ways you play inviting.
As you advanced in each skill, you unlock the ability to sell items in the shop, but in the interim, your home is equipped with a selling bin where you can place items and have them sold while you’re away. But selling items isn’t all you can do with your slice of Palia. You can also garden, build and decorate your house as you develop the land and build your house larger.
Outside of the mechanics that involve player action, the community sim part of Palia also has a lot to embrace. Communicating with NPCs allows you to choose responses that will help shape your in-game personality. Your personality also impacts how the Palians respond to you, how much of a friend they become, and of course who you can romance down the line. Fit with a gift-giving system, Palia allows for NPC social immersion just as much as it does with chat features and requests that players can make to other players in game. Adding to the social aspect, you can easily party up with friends and visit their homesteads as well. Connection building is of the utmost importance in Palia and every social mechanic leans into that.
Marketed as a “shared-world online multiplayer gameplay experience,” Palia embodies the idea of a shared world in an extremely wholesome way. By emphasizing relaxation, and community, and developing meaningful in-game connections, players are allowed to just enjoy the lush and dynamic world that Singularity 6 has created—which can be increasingly cool with a glider too.
The game is available on PC in Beta for players in North American and Western European regions August 10, 2023 via palia.com.
