Enough of Pokemon with Guns: Palworld sued by Nintendo and The Pokemon Company

Finally, the river of patience has evaporated and Nintendo, along with The Pokémon Company, has sued Palworld developer Pocketpair for infringement of patent rights. Palworld is so similar to Pokémon that it has been nicknamed ‘Pokémon with guns’ and that is something not taken lightly by Nintendo.

Palworld sued by Nintendo and The Pokemon Company

For the unaware ones, Palworld is a super successful game title that integrates war mechanics with characters and features quite identical to what we see in the Pokémon franchise. Some of the most common concepts are that Palworld also allows the players to catch the monster with balls and these monsters belong to different elements that have their own advantages and disadvantages over other monsters in the game.

At the time of launch, many players pointed out that the Pals from Palword look quite similar to Pokémon and Nintendo can sue Pocketpair for that, and the same is happening now, for real. As for the lawsuit, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Palworld developer Pocketpair in the Tokyo District Court on September 18, 2024. As claimed by Nintendo, they are filing the lawsuit to deliver a strong message that none of the copyright infringement cases will be spared.

Until now, Palworld developers have not issued any response against the lawsuit. However, one of the biggest mysteries here is that Nintendo took almost eight months to file the lawsuit against Pocketpair.

As of now, Palworld is available for both PC and Xbox in the early access stage. Leaks related to the game suggested that the franchise is planning to go big in the Tokyo Game Show. Rumors also have it that the game will be announced for PlayStation in the upcoming event. No one could provide a clear picture of the future of Palworld considering the multiple infringement lawsuits in action. However, fighting against giants like Nintendo and The Pokémon Company could be more than exhausting for Pocketpair for sure.