Nintendo And The Pokémon Company File Lawsuit Against Palworld Developer

Time to make some popcorn then

On the surface this seems petty af. But seeing as it's a lawsuit regarding patent infringement and not copyright, who knows what kind of "dirt" the Nintendo lawyers has dug up.

Doubt they'd sue unless it has some legs. I guess time will tell.

Nintendo and Pokémon think they own the whole world. As if they haven't been inspired by others...

THERE'S the Nintendo ninjas. Wondered where they got to.

Just when they finally look like the less bad console vendor they do this. I swear the console business doesn't WANT to exist. Curious what patents this allegedly violates. It has a very visually similar look but gameplay isn't similar at all.

Pokemon itself was literally adapted from SMT. Should Sega sue Nintendo for infringements now? Are we really back to 1990s playgrounds?

Every day this industry wants me to hate it more and more.

Seems the patents in question are related to ''database management, simultaneous server quarries, and object management within a virtual space'. So the stuff related to the PC/Storage, of all things. This feels like an out of court settlement unless they have some damning evidence it was flat out ripped... or are that insecure about the quality of the Pokemon IP as of recent.

@acmiguens ME love popcorn

@NEStalgia so according to some people in NintendoLife, there are 3 patents Nintendo has regarding Pokemon (20240100432, US11782898B2 and US11782898B2). So these patents deal with software, coding techniques, Data base infrastructure. So its not copyright that TPC is going for but patent. If Palworld is using those patents, then it is a big deal.

I would like to thank @HeadPirate for this information.

So Battlefield should sue COD or rpg a should sue rpg b. Nintendo is the sleeziest of the console companies their petty about everything and just cheap. If its about database management unless some one from palworld worked for the devil and copied documents they shouldn't be able to harass them for using a system that works. So another car company cant use wheels because Ford thought that up first? Its just them being petty. The big question for any court is palworld having similar structure actually hurting Nintendo in some tangible way?
@NEStalgia at this point it is like their just sitting around thinking whats the next crazy evil thing we can do for fun? Do they have a bet about what the craziest thing someone will tolerate? Are they just upping the ante for kicks?

Wow, this reads as ‘Nintendo being Nintendo’, to me. I’m kind of surprised they haven’t sued Sony for the new Astro Bot game yet, as it sounds like it’s as enjoyable as their Super Mario games.

@shoeses I would think they have found something incriminating considering they took a nice long while.

@VisitingComet1 seriously with the way the industry is behaving these days if I wasnt already switching to PC I think I'd just switch to phone games. I can't stand supporting these whack jobs anymore.

@anoyonmus That's interesting information. Though it also seems very dubious. Patenting coding techniques? And how would they even know that was violated without reverse engineering palworld which is itself a copyright violation. I think the biggest crime here is that the uspo actually granted these patents to begin with.

Still going after palworld for internal things that probably should never have been patentable seems like such an obvious witch hunt to find "something" to pin on a product they didn't like existing. after Nintendo was allegedly pressuring organizations in Japan to disassociate with pal world.

@NEStalgia If you want to know more about this patent thing, you should go to the NintendoLife article on this. One user has posted a lot of information that is actually quite interesting.

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2024/09/nintendo-and-pokemon-file-lawsuit-against-palworld-developer-pocketpair

@Banjo- a reminder that Akira Toriyama was such a powerhouse that his art for one of the spinoff DQ games was heavily lifted by Gamefreak. He had the midas touch, even when he wasn't involved.

Edit: For those unaware of the name, Akira Toriyama was the creator of the manga Dr. Slump, and then went on to create the Dragon Ball manga (later anime juggernaut), and was the artist for the Dragon Quest series. Later, he worked on art for Chrono Trigger, and Blue Dragon (Xbox 360). Most recently, his manga Sand Land was turned into a game by Bandai Namco. He was a titan, and of course he did more than just what I've mentioned, but these are his bigger hits.

@anoyonmus Yeah I took a look at all that. That still seems amazingly tenuous. Those parents may be legal but they're parents on obvious systems that anyone doing similar things would end up doing largely. Shameless. Legal but shameless. Palworld was shameless in copying the Pokemon aesthetic. Nintendo is shameless in pressuring media and stores to ignore the game and now searching to find something to attack for. Unless someone at palworld is former game freak or obviously reverse engineered and duplicated Pokemon systems and can be fingered, then I really question if Nintendo violated copyright and tos to reverse engineer palworld to find this supposed violation. Is like a pair of bandits saying "wasnt me, he did it"

@NEStalgia I think you make a good point on why was it even allowed to be locked up in the first place. The we only did evil to prove and stop them from doing evil is a going defense today everywhere.
It basically comes down to this how much is suing them going to cost and did this game really cost them any money at all.
It would be one thing if its a game featuring a cross dressing Mario that might hurt an ip.
They could have easily gone the so you like that game let us tell you about our game pokeman and made more cash off of this then they are ever going to see from this.
I actually worked for a huge company that was doing gangbusters but they made short sighted decision after decision and constantly pissed on the little guy until I gave up and moved 5 states away for a different job. Hopefully the big 3 will have their hens come home to roost and pay the consequences. Like you I am probably done with any console I was a big Xbox guy but they have been out of touch since the Kinect if I am totally being honest.

@NEStalgia "Everyday this industry wants me to hate it more and more"

Awh come one, you love it!
Relax, enjoy the show and let's have some popcorn that @acmiguens made

Nintendo behaviour loses them my money.

@NEStalgia What if instead of reverse engineering they got an informant hired into the Palworld game company and they went snooping around the code? Just a NDA breakage.

@LogicStrikesAgain Lol, the popcorn sounds good but this industry has become a shadow of itself. Well, except Nintendo. They were ALWAYS shady AF 😂

@Scummbuddy Good Old corporate espionage....

Ugh.

Now, you are playing with power!

I wonder if Nintendo will look into Astro Bot next.

The amount of people everywhere confusing patent infringement with copyright is alarming.

Now I'm no big city lawyer

(everyone gasps)

But it seems to me that this lawsuit goes deeper than the surface level "Palworld looks just like Pokémon" story that has been at the forefront of pretty much all Palworld coverage since the game was announced. If that was Nintendo's case, then surely

1. It would've gone after every creature collecting game under the sun. Palworld, Cassette Beasts, Nexomon, Coromon, TemTem, etc.
2. It wouldn't have taken this long for Nintendo to pursue legal action against PocketPair.

Patent infringement, to me anyway, implies that there's something else going on. Maybe it's the actual stealing and modification of Pokémon in-game assets? Maybe it goes even deeper; maybe there's code that was lifted from Pokémon games?

Again, I'm no game developer and I'm no lawyer, but I don't believe that Nintendo would've taken this long to file a lawsuit against PocketPair for the kind of surface level stuff that people are assuming.

@Banjo-
I agree Banjo. remember
When everybody plays we all win???

Come on nintendo. You'll won't be top dog forever.
We need fresh games that may be inspired by others of great gaming goodness. Don't knock them, we need alternatives to samey modern games, remasters and sequels of today.

I have to say that when I played it I thought it was sailing very close to the wind! I wonder if now that the game is a success, this lawsuit will be more of a cash rinse than an attempt to stop it.

Nintendo seeing all the bad press for Xbox and PlayStation and thinking…… yeah, let’s have me some of that! 🤪🤦‍♂️

@NEStalgia pokemon was adapted from shin megami tensei?

@Cherip-the-Ripper Pokemon consists in collecting monsters and choosing what abilities to keep and what abilities to forget and having monsters with inherited abilities and that's the core mechanic of Shin Megami Tensei and also of the dungeon part of Persona (Shin Megami Tensei spin-off). Many Nintendo developers have revealed in interviews how they have been inspired by other developers and artists, yet they think that every concept and idea belongs to them, like when they wanted to patent shooting arrows mid-air.

I have no idea what any of this means or what will happen. What I will say is that the state of Pokemon is laughable, the newer games are technically awful, dull and uninspired. The franchise needs a major overhaul.

@GotRedOnMe73 just wait. I'm sure they're working on it.

@Banjo- oh another bit of gaming history that was completely unknown to me, I never did play any of the smt games but thanks for enlightening me!
Wouldn't ever have considered Pokemon to be drawing from smt 😂

@Nic-Noc20th-C @Cherip-the-Ripper @Elbow Greetings. I don't know any publisher as warring as Nintendo. In EU and UK they even challenged the law regarding customers' rights. That and everything discussed here and how they sue fans for making art, videos or whatever is disproportionate. It makes Nintendo less friendly and less nice than what the games they make represent. It breaks my inner child's heart because I grew up playing on Nintendo consoles.

@Mustoe No one is arguing the concept is original, but "capturing critter with object" is not unique to Pokemon. Pokemon blatantly ripped off Dragon Quest's designs back in the day, while Palworld, conceptually, is a dime-a-dozen idea. Or are you referring to the designs of the pals? Because I can agree they do lean towards an obvious inspiration that can't be denied.

I'm not trying to sound hostile I just legitimately want to know exactly what you mean by ripping off Pokemon.

@Banjo- I have heard horror stories of the companies Nintendo outsources repairs to in EU. It's interesting to see how Sega and Nintendo are complete polar opposites when it comes to fan works/deviations on their games (well, within reason-- no selling fan made Sonic games is obvious, but Sega otherwise is incredibly friendly to fan projects.)

Sonic Mania and some ports of their older games to modern devices only exist because they hired the guy who was making impressive Genesis-accurate recreations of the original Sonic games on his own custom-made engine. That would get someone sued by Nintendo and a permanent portion of their earnings forever stipend by the company.

I do still love Nintendo's games, but I've always hated their business side.

(Edit: I posted two comments back-to-back so condensed my replies into one, realized I was borderline spamming, sorry about that.)

Nintendo continues to be my least favorite of the gaming platforms. I hope Palworld doesn't have to pay them a dime.

Surprised took this long for a lawsuit.

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2024/09/palworld-developer-responds-to-nintendo-lawsuit

So Palworld has responded to this and they said they are "unaware" of the specific patents they have been accused of infringing upon on. I will also point that a lot of people have actually tagged TPC and Nintendo about this game earlier as well. AND FOR THE LAST TIME, this is a PATENT infringement not a COPYRIGHT. PLEASE read the article more carefully.

"ensure that indie game developers are not hindered or discouraged from pursuing their creative ideas". I am sorry but didn't your own CEO say he doesn't have a creative vision??? And not only that but doesn't one of your own games literally seems to be 1:1 copy of HOLLOW KNIGHT?

If it was copyright, why hasn't Nintendo gone after Yo Kai or Monster Hunter Stories, or SMT/Persona??? They are not claiming to own an entire genre. There is a bunch of monster collecting games on the Switch. Now I am not sure who will win here, but. BUT IF PALWORLD has been using Nintendo/TPC , then they had it coming.

And also seriously. A lot of these people have been sending death threats to Nintendo and TPC. Grow up. You are no better than Nintendo. You're just as bad. Or in fact, WORSE.

If i had a guess Pal world got more popular then Pokemon and that made Nintendo jealous

@Banjo- @Cherip-the-Ripper It goes deeper than that. Game Freak was originally a gaming magazine, not a developer, founded by the same 3 guys that have been running it through today (all pre-Nintendo, who technically still does NOT own them, they simply have an investment stake in them which is why they were able to make Tembo and the horse racing game for PC/XB/PS. Nintendo just bought the Pokemon brand and invested into GF.)

Anyway, Tajirii was reviewing SMT1 for the magazine, which is actually the original monster collecting game, though I suspect there could have been something earlier that borrowed from, that was the first complete package. While he was reviewing it and coming up with criticisms he decided he could make a better RPG than SMT. He put together his childhood hobby of bug collecting, and the, then new, idea of the Game Boy Link cable allowing people to connect their games, and the ideas of SMT's demon collecting, and built it out into what became Pokemon, and the rest is history.

So, yes, Pokemon is literally based on/"inspired by" Shin Megami Tensei directly, back when GF was a indie outfit/magazine.

Of course Nintendo, in this case, is suing for patents from code/database implementation (??) not game similarity. But unless they have reason to believe a former employee jumped ship with proprietary information (maybe they did? We don't know, that would be genuine theft), or maybe thy reverse engineered (illegally) the game to find (not directly stolen but "similar things" to send to the patent team).

But what irks me is they've had it in for this game for a while, they were rumored to be pressuring retailers and media to ignore the game, and clearly spent their time digging for dirt to find anything to hang it with and found something, somehow, eventually.

OTOH, Palworld going out of it's way to copy the aesthetic of the #1 franchise in the world was playing with fire, and it's hard to be too sympathetic to them either. If you make a game copying GTA'a asethetic, or pokemon, or WoW, or whatever, you know you're going to have a bad time, it's like having a fireworks display in a DMZ.

@anoyonmus I can't see it any other way as they either found something damning, or they found something to stretch into a reason.

@shoeses considering the time they took, it looks they may have found something really damning.

Nintendo: but muh muh my billions.

@NEStalgia This is interesting to hear, but something's not adding up: SMT came out in 1992, didn't it? Pokémon was planned out in 1990 (though not finished until 1996, of course), and the monster capturing/trading mechanics were described in detail in its original design doc- with storyboards and everything!

GF also released their first game (Mendel Palace) in 1989.

So if Tajiri looked at SMT, it may have been more of a comparison thing, and not so much about drawing inspiration from it.

@smoreon Ah, my error, I said "SMT1", but it was really Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei (or DDS:MT2). SMT1 was basically a remake and reboot of DDSMT2 (same story etc.) So yeah, it was still "MegaTen", just the precursor to the "Shin" part of the series. Either way Pokemon's an Atlus ripoff. Cuter though. Much, much cuter.