A patent infringement lawsuit has been filed by Nintendo against Pocketpair, which developed Palworld. Palworld is heavily reminiscent of the Pokémon series and has received some criticism for its creatures.
“This lawsuit seeks an injunction against infringement and compensation for damages on the grounds that Palworld, a game developed and released by the Defendant, infringes multiple patent rights,” Nintendo writes in its announcement.
“Nintendo will continue to take necessary actions against any infringement of its intellectual property rights including the Nintendo brand itself, to protect the intellectual properties it has worked hard to establish over the years.”
Nintendo Believes It Will Win Palworld Lawsuit
Immediately following the release of Palworld, there was debate as to whether the game was a Pokémon rip-off or merely a charming parody. New games capitalizing on the success of popular games is nothing new, but Palworld was bordering on being too similar to Pokémon.
According to some commentators, Pokémon 3D model meshes are similar to Palworld’s, which prompted Pocketpair dev lead Takuro Mizobe to assure the public that the studio “has no intention of infringing on other companies’ intellectual property.”
Towards the end of the month, it became clear that the lion had been prodded. Nintendo– Nintendo’s The Pokémon Company– announced that it would “investigate and take appropriate measures” to address any intellectual property infringement.
Fortunately, the debate around the game has quieted since then. Mizobe told GameFile in June the studio had heard nothing about a lawsuit. However, it took Nintendo around eight months to take legal action, and they will fight it vigorously.
According to business lawyer Richard Hoeg on X, Nintendo may have a challenge on its hands depending on what’s at stake.
“Probably going to need more specifics before I can comment more completely, but Palworld is such a different type of game from Pokémon, it’s hard to imagine what patents (*not* copyrights) might have been even plausibly infringed. Initial gut reaction is Nintendo may be reaching.”
