Highlights

  • The latest Palworld update has broken the game's compatibility with older multiplayer save data versions.
  • Some players have reported losing all their progress following the April 9 patch. The developer is currently investigating the problem.
  • The issue is exclusive to the Xbox and Microsoft Store/PC Game Pass versions of the game.

Pocketpair is currently advising non-Steam Palworld players to refrain from attempting to load their old multiplayer save data. The Japanese developer's warning was offered in response to numerous reports of people losing their multiplayer progress on the latest version of Palworld.

Palworld update 0.2.0.6 initially rolled out to Steam users on April 4 before making its way to the Xbox ecosystem five days later. The patch itself debuted dozens of content additions, quality-of-life features, and bug fixes. But it also introduced some new issues, including a problem that seemingly broke compatibility with older multiplayer save data.

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New Palworld Update Broke Older Multiplayer Saves

Shortly after the April 2024 Palworld update reached Xbox consoles, dozens of player reports complaining about lost multiplayer progress emerged online. Pocketpair promptly acknowledged the problem, having said that it managed to confirm that multiplayer save data created on prior game versions is presently not loading correctly on the 0.2.0.6 build. The root cause of the issue has yet to be ascertained, with the Japanese group stating that it is currently in the process of investigating the situation.

The Issue Is Exclusive to Non-Steam Versions of Palworld

Based on Pocketpair's communications and social media reports from the fandom, the newly identified issue appears to be exclusive to the Xbox version of Palworld. That includes its Microsoft Store build, which is the one that's distributed to PC Game Pass members. Although there's simply not enough information to accurately estimate how long the developer might take to address the issue, Pocketpair has so far been fairly quick to resolve game-breaking bugs of this kind, usually managing to react in a matter of days.

The 0.2.0.6 update has also introduced another bug, which prevents Palworld players from placing eggs inside incubators. This particular problem affects all versions of the game, including the Steam one. But it is ultimately much less consequential, not least because it can be side-stepped by simply rebuilding any bugged incubator, which makes the revised contraption work as intended. Pocketpair has already identified the cause of this issue and intends to deploy a fix "in the next few days," having said as much in an April 9 tweet.

With Palworld being an early access game, some amount of growing pains of this sort is to be expected. That notwithstanding, the crafting RPG's newest update has generally been well-received by the fandom, with many players praising it for its comprehensive quality-of-life improvements, as well as the plethora of new content—including Bellanoir, the game's first-ever raid boss—that it introduced.