Aniimo is proving that a game can split opinion and still fill its servers. The free-to-play creature-catching open-world RPG, released on 16 September, has passed 160,000 concurrent players on Steam while its user reviews remain rated “Mixed”. Monetisation has drawn most of the criticism since day one, yet the score has climbed noticeably in the space of a few days. And the audience is about to grow again, with the mobile version arriving this Wednesday, 23 September. Here is where Aniimo stands, what players like, what they do not, and what could still shift.
At a glance
Aniimo has peaked at 167,956 concurrent players on Steam, according to Steam Charts as of 21 September.
Steam reviews have climbed from around 50% positive at launch to almost 70%, still rated “Mixed”.
The iOS and Android versions arrive on 23 September, after PC, PS5, Xbox Series and Game Pass.
A launch everywhere at once, Game Pass included
Aniimo went wide from the start. According to Pawprint Studio’s launch announcement, dated 16 September, the game released on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC through Steam, the Epic Games Store and the official Aniimo site. The studio describes itself as both developer and publisher, backed by FunPlus.
The same announcement sets out what comes next: iOS and Android on 23 September, one week after the other platforms, and a Mac version at a later, unannounced date. Aniimo also joined Xbox Game Pass on day one across the Ultimate, Premium, Essential and PC Game Pass tiers, with a monthly reward pack for subscribers.
That rollout goes some way to explaining the numbers. A free game that is available almost everywhere, and included in a subscription on top of that, asks nothing of a curious player. Trying Aniimo costs nothing but time.
Aniimo passes 160,000 concurrent players on Steam
The first figures arrived within hours of launch. Automaton reported, using SteamDB data, a peak of more than 101,000 concurrent players in the first three hours, enough to place the game among the ten most played on Steam at the time.
The momentum carried on through the week. As of 21 September, Aniimo’s Steam Charts page shows an all-time peak of 167,956 concurrent players, reached within the last 30 days, with an average of around 109,700 over the same period. When we checked, just over 74,000 people were playing at the same moment.
Those numbers cover Steam alone. As Automaton itself pointed out, the real player count is likely higher, since the game also runs on the Epic Games Store, its own launcher, PS5, Xbox and Game Pass. Pawprint Studio has not shared a combined figure.
The crowd did not appear out of nowhere either. Automaton notes that Aniimo was first announced in June 2025, ran a closed beta the following month and gathered more than 30 million pre-registrations worldwide over the course of a year.
Mixed reviews aimed squarely at monetisation
The other side of that success shows in the reviews. When Automaton published its piece on launch day, the Steam version sat at “Mixed” with around 50% positive reviews out of just over 1,000. Negative reviews cited overly aggressive monetisation, a slow gameplay loop and poor controller optimisation.
Automaton also flagged another recurring complaint: several problems raised during the beta had apparently not been fixed for the full release. For a game with a long testing period behind it, that is the kind of criticism that lands hard, because it suggests feedback went unheard.
Five days on, the picture has moved. On 21 September, Steam lists 12,223 reviews, 8,556 positive and 3,667 negative, which works out at almost 70% positive. The rating is still “Mixed”, but it has gained roughly 20 points since launch. The score is recovering, and the monetisation debate is still open.
What keeps players in: Idyll, collecting and Twining
Part of the answer lies in what the game offers. Aniimo is set in the open world of Idyll, home to creatures also called Aniimo. Players, known as Pathfinders, explore the continent, fight alone or with others, and befriend the creatures they meet.
As Automaton describes it, each creature has its own element and a three-stage evolution system, and some take different forms depending on the environment they live in, which gives collectors a reason to explore every region.
The standout mechanic is Twining, which lets you transform into one of the creatures in your party and use its elemental abilities directly, whether to solve puzzles or to fight. It is the feature Pawprint Studio puts front and centre in its announcement, and the one that sets Aniimo furthest apart from a plain collecting game.
What the mobile launch could change
The next step comes quickly. The iOS and Android release on 23 September opens the game to people who may not own a PC or a console, and how that audience responds to the monetisation will shape what happens next, in one direction or the other.
The rising Steam score could reflect newer players who are happier than the launch-day crowd, or adjustments by the studio, and the numbers alone cannot tell the two apart. For anyone curious, the maths is simple: Aniimo is free to try on the platform of your choice, and a few hours will tell you whether Twining and the world of Idyll outweigh a business model that is still dividing players.
To see what’s landing over the next few weeks, the Hitbox release calendar lists every date with its official source.