Why Does Palworld’s Audio Sound So Bad?

If you’ve played Palworld on Xbox, you’ve likely noticed that the game’s audio sounds like it’s being played through a musical greeting card. Is Palworld’s poor audio a bug or perhaps a deliberate callback to the early 90s? Let’s talk about it.

Can You Fix Palworld’s Sound on Xbox?

Don’t worry; there’s nothing wrong with your speakers or sound settings. Palworld’s compressed audio is a bug in the Xbox version of the game. Unfortunately, there’s no way to improve the sound quality at the time of publishing.

I’ve played Palworld on both Xbox Series X and PC (via Game Pass) and noticed a considerable difference in the audio quality. PC is crisp and clear, while Xbox’s audio sounds like it was recorded with tissue paper over the microphone.

As high-quality audio exists in the PC versions of Palworld, Xbox will likely receive an update in the near future to boost the quality by a few decades. Even if the terrible audio quality is unintended, I enjoyed the unintentional throwback to the Dreamcast era.

Nostalgia for a criminally underrated console aside, it turns out that the Xbox versions of Palworld are actually running on an entirely different version number than Steam. From DLSS support to item names, we’ve noticed a considerable discrepancy between versions.

Why Doesn’t Palworld Have Background Music or Ambient Audio?

Due to running on an earlier version, the Xbox releases of Palworld lack various audio elements, such as ambient sounds and some music. This includes the PC Game Pass version of Palworld, which, besides the audio bug, is identical to the console release.

Steam is currently running on Palworld version 0.1.2.0, while Xbox is still sitting at v0.1.0.0. Steam being two patches ahead has resulted in a lack of crossplay and various other features missing from the Xbox version.

So, will Palworld on Xbox eventually catch up to the Steam release? Yes! Eventually. Pocket Pair has commented that crossplay between Steam and Xbox is planned in the future, meaning all versions of Palworld will ultimately fall under the same version number. When that is, we’ll just have to wait and see.

Since Palworld on Xbox features slower crafting, you might want to assign your Pals some tougher work. Check out our guide on how to recover sanity to ensure your Pals — or humans — are all in tip-top condition.

This guide was written while playing Palworld on PC and Xbox Series X.