In an hour, Grounded 2 has already beaten the original survival game's all-time Steam player peak by 50%

Grounded 2 has launched into Steam early access and Xbox Game Preview, and it almost immediately broke the all-time concurrent player record that the first game set on Steam.

We don't have exact figures for the Xbox player base – who does seem to like the game, which has strong reviews on the Xbox store – but SteamDB shows that, within one hour of its July 29 launch, Grounded 2 cracked 48,880 concurrent players on Steam. That's almost exactly 50% higher than the 32,012 concurrent Steam peak that Grounded hit four years ago.

At the time of writing, the player count is only going up, currently sitting at 49,836. Early Steam user reviews for Grounded 2 have been more unstable, however. I don't know how you confidently review a game like this after mere hours, but it seems only 64% of early buyers are happy with their experience so far. As expected, performance issues and crashes have stonewalled some players.

That said, 412 (current) reviews is a very small sample size, and several in-depth early access reviews from critics have a lot of good things to say about the game. Our own Grounded 2 review calls it a promising sequel with a wealth of new creatures, even if it is a decidedly safe iteration.

Developer Obsidian released an updated early access roadmap during the launch rush, promising more recipes, armor, weapons, furniture, creatures, and quality-of-life improvements coming in the fall update. You know, stuff. Early access stuff. Japanese and Brazilian Portuguese language support (text) is coming in the fall as well.

Looking further ahead, the winter update will bring new "Tier III" equipment, more Buggy options, Steam Deck support, as well as major features like PlayGrounds and – I'm just double-checking here – "Coziness." Well, you can't forget that. (Also, Obsidian really is setting itself up for smarmy bug complaint posts by calling a core feature the "Buggy," isn't it?)

More vague and ambitious "future plans" include additional Mutations, yet more Buggy features, building materials, language options, base customization, and still more gear and creatures. This is the part where I'd normally unpack whatever details the devs wrote in the "Early Access Game" blurb on the Steam page, but the "what the developers have to say" section for Grounded 2 is currently, hilariously, blank. Finally, community management my quiet personality can get behind.

A lot of people seem to be struggling with this one, so here's that Grounded 2 Grass Seeds location you're looking for.