Pawprint Studio's free-to-play creature collector Aniimo arrived on Steam in mid-September 2026 and immediately found an audience. Concurrent players climbed past 127,000 in the first day. The review score did not follow that surge. Early user ratings landed in Mixed territory as players argued over whether the game is a charming catch-em-all or a live-service shop wearing cute clothes.
A hit that still feels contested
Aniimo puts players in the world of Idyll as Pathfinders who catch more than 200 creatures, then Twine with them to take on their abilities. The pitch sits between Palworld, Pokemon, and fashion-forward open-world titles like Infinity Nikki. Steam reviews praised the creature designs, the open world, and the novelty of becoming the thing you just caught.
The same pages filled with complaints about energy gates, monthly passes, Companion Handbook tiers, and a shop that appears early. One widely quoted review called the game "very much a gacha game" after an hour of play. Another said Aniimo promised a gacha-free collector and delivered a storefront.
The gacha fight is about feeling, not banners
Developer comments before launch were blunt. Executive producer Jovi Zhang said gacha mechanics would not be used to obtain Aniimo. Creatures are caught in the world. After backlash in the final beta, the studio also dropped Rift Exploration, a premium-currency loop that many testers treated as a stealth banner for a legendary creature.
That change did not settle the argument. Players still pay real money for Lumin Crystals, battle-pass style handbooks, cosmetics, storage, and speed-ups. The roster is not behind a pull button. Progression still looks and sounds like the live-service games those players already distrust. For a free title, that overlap is enough to sour a first session.
What landed and what still stings
Even negative reviews often concede the basics work. Exploration has pull. Twining gives catching a purpose beyond filling a log. Housing and collection loops give slower players something to do. Critics and press scores have been kinder than the Steam pile-on, hovering in the high 70s in some aggregates.
The launch friction is elsewhere: login queues, controller issues for some players, and a UI that keeps pointing at paid boosts. Mixed does not mean the game failed to find players. It means a large share of those players felt sold to before they felt invited in.
The next test is trust
Mobile arrives on September 23, which will add another wave of players and another wave of shop pressure. Aniimo already proved demand. The question left on Steam is simpler. Can Pawprint keep the catching fantasy in front of the cash shop long enough for Mixed to become something warmer?