You may have heard of a little game called Palworld that was released on Steam and Xbox at the beginning of this year. The game, created by Pocketpair Inc, exploded in popularity when it launched in earlier access, making it one of the most played games of the year. Part of what helped the game become so popular is its similarities to the Pokémon games. Palworld is an open-world survival game which sets it apart from the Pokémon franchise. What doesn’t set it apart is how similar some of the Palworld monsters look to Pokémon. They look so similar in fact that many gave Palworld the nickname, “Pokémon with guns.” Now, Nintendo has officially announced that it is suing Pocketpair Inc. for copyright infringement over Palworld.
Nintendo posted the following news release on its website earlier today. The image below shows the official filing notice of copyright infringement against Pocketpair, Inc. The letter states, “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.”
This is something that many feared Nintendo would do when Palworld was first released back in January of this year. When no lawsuit was filed, many thought Pocketpair had escaped Nintendo’s wrath. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be the case as Nintendo will be moving forward with the lawsuit in the Tokyo District Court.
We are not sure how much standing the lawsuit but many have mistaken the Palworld’s characters for those found in Pokémon. For instance, Pals such as Anubis, Pengullet, Robinquill, Grizzbolt, and Lamball are similar to Pokémon such as Lucario, Piplup, Decidueye, Electabuzz, and Wooloo. There are other Pals that players have pointed out look similar to those found in the Pokémon series. Of course, these similarities only go so far as the game as a whole is vastly different from the Pokémon franchise. We will just need to see how the lawsuit progresses moving forward.
