Cozy no longer needs to be lonely when new MMO Palia launches into open beta next month. Palia has been going through smaller closed beta tests since its original announcement, and after a server stress test earlier this month is ready for its first real wave of players to join the world on August 10 with a short closed beta beginning a week before.
Instead of grand quests and boss battles, Palia is an MMO focused on life sim and social sim activities like farming, fishing, cooking, hunting, crafting, and decorating your own house plot. “We designed Palia to challenge genre conventions and bring people together in a cozy MMO where they can forge new friendships, and we’re thrilled to finally welcome new players to create the coziest versions of themselves,” says Singularity 6 game director Aidan Karabaich.
I've been hoping for something a bit different than more RPGs in the MMO space for a while and as a hopeless farm simmer I'm quite interested to see how Singularity 6 adapts such a quaint, small-stakes genre into a massive online affair. Palia has shared details on its site while working through development about its monetization (free-to-play with cosmetic sales) and combat (there isn't any) and a bit of the story. While bigger MMORPGs continue dabbling in things like player housing and fishing and gathering, Palia has basically snapped those parts off and made them the whole point. It's a whole world for the cozy gamers.
Palia enters open beta on August 10. You can register now on the Palia website for a chance to get into the closed beta week which Singularity 6 says it will be granting rolling admission to beginning on August 2. Have no doubt that this is the time to try it because Singularity 6 says players "will maintain their account progress through Palia’s Closed Beta, Open Beta, and beyond," so no progress resets between open beta and launch, it sounds.
The developers have also planned a first look at gameplay livestream for Tuesday, July 18 at 10am Pacific on YouTube. There isn't yet a full launch date announced for Palia but it has made plans to launch on the Nintendo Switch this holiday season.
