When I started Palworld, some things immedietely stood out to me. My first thought was "wow this looks like a breath of the wild clone", and in all honesty the art style and UI made it feel like a cheap mobile game. Taking inspiration from that game wasn't necesarily a bad thing, as BOTW was fantastic and had great exploration and gameplay. Also, I hadn't gone into this game blind, and had already seen a good amount of clips, but if this had been my first ever experience of the game, I probably would have been less likely to give it a try.
Dropping into the world, one thing immedietely stood out: the world was huge. Far in the distance I could see places of interest that I knew I would want to see at some point, and the world felt somewhat lively with small Pals walking around and the occasional NPC. On the topic of NPC's, they're writing was pretty bad and seemed mostly there just to give the player a goal to reach. Again, this isn't a bad thing if the game can make up for it in different aspects.