Nintendo Co., Ltd., together with The Pokémon Company, filed a patent infringement lawsuit in the Tokyo District Court against Pocketpair, Inc., the developer of Palworld, on September 18, 2024.
Ever since Palworld was first revealed, people had been comparing the game to Pokémon. Nintendo and Pokémon Co. said they would look into the game to see if there were actually any instances of copyright infringement or other unlawful doings, and clearly both companies now feel that’s the case.
This lawsuit seeks an injunction against infringement and compensation for damages on the grounds that Palworld infringes multiple patent rights.
Nintendo says it 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.
UPDATE: Nintendo has shared an official statement with Kotaku concerning the lawsuit. It reads as follows:
“We filed the lawsuit at this timing after careful investigation of the content that is the subject of this lawsuit. We will refrain from commenting on topics that relate to the content of the lawsuit.”
UPDATE: Pocketpair, the developer of Palworld, has released a statement on the lawsuit from Nintendo and Pokémon Co.. You can read the statement in full below.
UPDATE: Palworld dev Pocketpair says Nintendo and Pokemon Co. are looking for 5 million yen plus late payment damages concerning patent infringement for a game program that lets you throw an item to catch a character. You can see Palworld’s full press release on the matter below.
As announced on September 19, 2024, The Pokémon Company and Nintendo Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as the “Plaintiffs”) have filed a patent infringement lawsuit against us. We have received inquiries from various media outlets regarding the status of the lawsuit, and we would like to report the details and current status of this case as follows:
1: Details of the Lawsuit
The Plaintiffs claim that “Palworld,” released by us on January 19, 2024, infringes upon the following three patents held by the Plaintiffs, and are seeking an injunction against the game and compensation for a portion of the damages incurred between the date of registration of the patents and the date of filing of this lawsuit.
2: Target Patents
- Patent No. 7545191
- [Patent application date: July 30, 2024]
- [Patent registration date: August 27, 2024]
Patent No. 7493117
- [Patent application date: February 26, 2024]
- [Patent registration date: May 22, 2024]
Patent No. 7528390
- [Patent application date: March 5, 2024]
- [Patent registration date: July 26, 2024]
3: Summary of the Claim
- An injunction against Palworld
- Payment of 5 million yen plus late payment damages to The Pokémon Company
- Payment of 5 million yen plus late payment damages to Nintendo Co., Ltd.
We will continue to assert our position in this case through future legal proceedings. Please note that we will refrain from responding individually to inquiries regarding this case. If any matters arise that require public notice, we will announce them on our website, etc.
Add Comment
Most Upvoted
lucius6
Good, I hope they win, F Palworld.
lucius6
3M agoGood, I hope they win, F Palworld.
kingbroly
3M agoI'm VERY CURIOUS to see what patents they're going after here. This certainly isn't the angle I expected them to take.
pc2
3M agoAwww snap, it finally happened.
tendonin
3M agoTerm of patent is 20 years from filing, meaning that this can't be related to any patents filed based on the series' origin in Red and Green. This case has to be based on something introduced after 2004.
(It would be very embarrassing if it were a patent filed for Scarlet and Violet.)
cheesus 2
3M agoSuing for what? Making a game that looked like it was developed after 2010? Nintendo needs to step up when it comes to the Pokemon franchise
hawk
3M agoI was hoping Palworld would light a fire under GameFreak and force them to compete with better products. I wasn't hoping for their rivalry to take them into the courtroom.
thegreatking
3M agoIt was about time, palworld devs are talentless thieves, they have admitted to just copy whats popular and use AI for the rest. They are creative and morally bankrupt. They deserve to lose this lawsuit, the shameless copy of pokemon is clear
ninjablaze
3M agoI'm surprised Nintendo even responded to that request for comment from Kotaku of all places. I thought they had that site justifiably blacklisted.
.full.1188173.jpg){kind=spacer}
ovenmitts
3M agoI hold no love for Nintendo's legal division. I think it going to be a pretty hard case to pin Palworld on patent infringement of all things. At least if we are taking character designs, I would feel copyright or trademarks would hold more water.
I'm glad Pocketpair has teamed up with Sony Music Group some time ago, hopefully, they can get access to some of those lawyers. Especially since I think the company is only like 50+ people strong.
This can definitely be added to the pile of lawsuits I'm rooting for Nintendo to lose. I would love to see David beat Goliath.
smasher89
3M agoI wonder what angle they go for, resembling characters i think they only patent more heavily towards kanto pokemon and starters (hence why there is so much repeats with them compared to other pokemon), gameplay is very different even if you catch monsters in balls, maybe its just a thing where nintendos legal department wants to keep a high budget and do something to show they are working and required said budget.
That’s the thing. It’d a patent. So something like game mechanics. They are not suing over anything like character design - those wouldn’t hold up anyways. Pokémon Co wouldn’t have a case there.
enthropy
26d ago"UPDATE: Palworld dev Pocketpair says Nintendo and Pokemon Co. are looking for 5 million yen plus late payment damages concerning patent infringement for a game program that lets you throw an item to catch a character."
Just...wow.
Wow because they can actually sue because of something like this and wow that it's just 5 million yen.
Yeah, to me, that's a little scary. There are a lot of ways you can "throw an item to catch a character" in a video game--throwing a net or a glue trap for instance. Makes you wonder how far this kind of lawsuit could go.
Granted, Palworld's "pokeball capture" looks really similar to Pokemon and that's probably what triggered the lawsuit. So I'd hope Nintendo would be sensible about things and only go after egregious copycats.
When thinking about it being only 5M yen, something the Palworld team can pay easily(32745USD), it seems to be a bit like a warning. Perhaps a slap in the face for their copying them so hard.
I sure hope it's not something they'll be using a lot. Like with nets and glue traps =)
Comments (14)