Nintendo and The Pokémon Company have filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Pocketpair, the studio behind this year’s surprise hit Palworld.
Per Nintendo’s news release on the matter, the two companies have “filed a patent infringement lawsuit in the Tokyo District Court against Pocketpair, Inc.” on September 18, 2024. According to Nintendo, the lawsuit is seeking an injunction against any found infringements as well a compensation. The lawsuit hinges on the belief that Pocketpair Inc. “infringes multiple patent rights.”
“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,” the company states.
In a prompt response to the matter, Pocketpair Inc. states “We are unaware of the specific patents we are accused of infringing upon.” The Japanese game developer also claims it has “not been notified of such details.” It will now pivot resources to investigating the claims.
“It is truly unfortunate that we will be forced to allocate significant time to matters unrelated to game development due to this lawsuit,” Pocketpair Inc. says. “However, we will do our utmost for our fans, and to ensure that indie game developers are not hindered or discouraged from pursuing their creative ideas.”
Palworld, which launched in January of this year, is commonly described as “Pokémon with guns” amongst the community. The game was released in early access but rose the charts on Steam and Xbox, amassing more than five million copies sold in its first three days on the market.
While sharing many similarities to Pokémon, the game also incorporates many open-world and survival elements like cooking, crafting, and base building. Although some Pal designs in Palworld share qualities with the monsters in Pokémon, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company are targeting patents versus copyright infringement.
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