// KOTAKU — GAMING
Phantom Blade Zero Just Rocketed Onto Steam With +700,000 Concurrent Players
Phantom Blade Zero is a not-quite-Soulslike action-RPG from S-Game Studio, a Chinese developer that had previously only made mobile games. In less than 24 hours after its initial release on Steam, it’s already peaked at over 700,000 concurrent players, cementing its spot as the 15th most-played game at launch ever on Valve’s storefront.
Reviews for the kungfupunk adventure were pretty strong when they arrived earlier this week, but Phantom Blade Zero‘s launch day momentum now puts it within a stone’s throw of records previously set by single-player GOTY winners like Baldur’s Gate 3 and Elden Ring. We’ll see if the opening of the sprawling 30-hour story campaign is enough to hook people over the Halloween weekend. “Another Chinese studio came out of nowhere and made a banger game. Just beat the first ‘boss.’ So far so good,” reads one early Steam user review.
It’s a reference to previous debut hits out of China like Black Myth: Wukong. That action game holds the second-biggest concurrent player launch on Steam ever at 2,415,714, roughly a million behind PUBG at the start of the battle royale craze. Will Phantom Blade Zero follow a similar arc? An interesting analysis by Shenzhen-based consultant Daniel Camilo suggests a definitive answer of “no.”
“Phantom Blade Zero is eagerly awaited by core gamers in China, and across the world,” he recently wrote. “It’s not a cultural phenomenon anywhere however. Not even in China. That’s the key difference. Grandparents in China knew about Black Myth Wukong when it launched. They don’t know about Phantom Blade Zero. It’s that degree of ‘mainstream’ I’m trying to make clear here as a critical reach differentiator between the two games.”
We’ll see how it all pans out in the weeks ahead. Black Myth: Wukong also didn’t have to contend with Grand Theft Auto 6 sucking all the oxygen out of the room, though that blockbuster won’t be on PC at launch. In the meantime, S-Game has already released Phantom Blade‘s first major patch which should, among other things, help improve performance across weaker hardware.
“We’ve spent a great deal of time refining the game’s rasterized visuals so that each environment stays true to our art direction even with ray tracing turned off,” the studio wrote. “We’ve also extensively tested the game on mid-range and lower-end PCs, as well as handhelds, and encourage you to give it a try.”
The patch is 5GB and the developers also suggest rolling back from the latest Nvidia driver versions if people are having other performance issues. Studio boss and creative director Soulframe Liang also left fans a heartfelt letter about Phantom Blade‘s creation alongside the day-one patch announcement.
“[Phantom Blade Zero‘s] roots lie in the indie game I created during my student years, at a time of hardship and uncertainty. But it also holds everything we have been able to give,” he wrote. “This is a game of immense scale, made with all the passion in our hearts. It is a gift from a small group of gamers who just happen to be developers, to every gamer who shares our love for gaming.”
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