Nintendo is suing Palworld developer Pocketpair for patent infringement

Nintendo's lawyers are gearing up to take on Palworld

Palworld / Pocketpair

Update - September 19, 2024 @ 2:00am PT: Pocketpair has responded to the lawsuit via a post on Twitter. The company says it has received notice of the lawsuit, and is beginning to investigate the claims of patent infringement. It also says that it does not know what specific patents Nintendo is alleging the company is infringing upon, and has not been notified of these details. The full statement is below:

Yesterday, a lawsuit was filed against our company for patent infringement.

We have received notice of this lawsuit and will begin the appropriate legal proceedings and investigations into the claims of patent infringement.

At this moment, we are unaware of the specific patents we are accused of infringing upon, and we have not been notified of such details.

Pocketpair is a small indie game company based in Tokyo. Our goal as a company has always been to create fun games. We will continue to pursue this goal because we know that our games bring joy to millions of gamers around the world. Palworld was a surprise success this year, both for gamers and for us. We were blown away by the amazing response to the game and have been working hard to make it even better for our fans. We will continue improving Palworld and strive to create a game that our fans can be proud of.

It is truly unfortunate that we will be forced to allocate significant time to matters unrelated to game development due to this lawsuit. 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.

We apologize to our fans and supporters for any worry or discomfort that this news has caused.

As always, thank you for your continued support of Palworld and Pocketpair.

Original story follows.

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Nintendo has announced that it, together with The Pokémon Company, is suing Palworld developer Pocketpair for what it says are multiple infringements on patent rights. The companies filed a patent infringement lawsuit in the Tokyo District Court yesterday, and are seeking an injunction against infringement and compensation for damages. 

A short statement released by Nintendo on its investor relations website reads as follows: 

Nintendo Co., Ltd., together with The Pokémon Company, filed a patent infringement lawsuit in the Tokyo District Court against Pocketpair, Inc. on September 18, 2024.

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 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 does not mention which patents Pocketpair allegedly infringed upon, but it’s worth reiterating that this is a patent infringement case, and not a copyright case, so the details are likely to be complex and very detailed. 

Palworld was released in early access on PC and Xbox in January 2024, after years of build-up in which fans started calling the game “Pokémon with guns.” The game was almost immediately successful, but attracted a host of criticism and allegations, including assertions that Palworld was developed using generative AI, that Pocketpair “copied” Pokémon designs, and that the company ripped and modified models from Pokémon games to create its Pals. None of these have been proven to be true. 

The accusations were so widespread that it caused an influx of people contacting Nintendo and The Pokémon Company about it, resulting in The Pokémon Company politely asking people to stop the Palworld spam. In a statement at the time, The Pokémon Company said it will “investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights related to the Pokémon.” 

The suit comes just days after Pocketpair released the Palworld 0.3.7 update, which introduced strengthened anti-cheat measures and improved processing load.