Palworld Developer Has No Idea Why Nintendo's Suing Over Its Pokemon-like Game 30
An anonymous reader shares a report: Pocketpair has responded to the lawsuit filed against it by Nintendo and The Pokemon Company. The studio that developed Palworld, the game at the heart of the suit, issued a statement early this morning saying it doesn't know what patents it violated. "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," the statement read.
According to Nintendo's press release, the reason for the lawsuit has to do with Pocketpair allegedly infringing on multiple as yet undisclosed patents. The details of the lawsuit have not yet been made public, so we do not yet know which patents, and according to Pocketpair's statement, it doesn't know, either.
According to Nintendo's press release, the reason for the lawsuit has to do with Pocketpair allegedly infringing on multiple as yet undisclosed patents. The details of the lawsuit have not yet been made public, so we do not yet know which patents, and according to Pocketpair's statement, it doesn't know, either.
Software patents. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
I remember when Slashdot was against them. And when they were against huge corporations using them to crush the small indies.
Lets back up a step. I remember when accusers felt actually responsible for telling the “violator” what they actually did wrong.
Right now this looks far more like a huge corporation abusing rumor and clickbait bullshit to destroy a small company. They need to prove otherwise or knock that cheesy shit off.
Re: (Score:1)
I remember talking to the lead developer of Palworld at a Satanic orgy when he told me "Our goal is to make a game just like Pokemon but for adults."
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds legit.
Re: (Score:2)
Lets back up a step. I remember when accusers felt actually responsible for telling the “violator” what they actually did wrong.
Exactly: they should first send a "letter before action" or a "Cease and desist" [wikipedia.org] which gives the alleged violator an opportunity to change what they are doing and avoid legal action.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Those are the things that you do, if you have a solid case. Otherwise, you just sue and hope that you can bankrupt your smaller competitor before they can defend themselves in court.
Thats a corrupt tactic. Not one based on actual infringements. Might as well call the big players dictators and be honest about it.
Re: (Score:2)
they should first send a "letter before action" or a "Cease and desist" [wikipedia.org]
This seems to be a concept in USA law. But both companies (Nintendo, Pocketpair) are in Japan.
Re: (Score:3)
It is about designs (first line of the previous slashdot article, linked in the summary). Registered designs are not patents, but some people call them "design patents"*. This lawsuit is something Disney would do. You can't just make a lookalike of famous characters, sell 2 million copies in 24 hours, and hope nobody notices.
* by extension because they're also a sort of a visible (publicly-available) document providing legal protection; which is what the word "patent" (visible, obvious) originally referred
Re: (Score:2)
From my understanding, and I merely skimmed through articles about this, it seems that they aren't suing about the artistic design patterns, so much as the gameplay ones.
There are only so many ways you can design a "fire dog" or "electric rat" before infringing on pokemon territory. Of course the question would be "Why are you designing electric rats and fire dogs when those are pretty much iconic to pokemon", but that's a different question.
From what I saw, though, it seems that Nintendo is suing because t
Re: (Score:2)
Probably because electric rats and fire dogs were taken from historical cultural stuff. For example, "Fire Dogs" and "Hell Hounds".
Re: (Score:2)
Oh yes, the mythological Mexican Electric Rats from Southern Sri Lanka...
Re: (Score:2)
> Whether this has ground to stand on remains to be seen.
Huh? This is a no brainer. It was ruled back in the 1980s [americanbar.org] that you couldn't protect the rules of game.
It will be VERY interesting to see Nintendo try to weasel on how their IP is being infringed.
Re: (Score:1)
they're japanese not american.
Re: (Score:2)
This has actually come up. The idea of catching monsters into small objects long predates Pokemon. You can't trademark/patent gameplay.
Palworld apparently had lawyers go over everything before publishing. They may come close on some things, but at least under Japanese law, they should have been good according to said Lawyers.
So not really knowing WHY Nintendo is suing makes some sense. While it being in Japan changes some things, if Nintendo doesn't cough up specifics rather quickly, Pocketpair will win
Re: (Score:2)
There are only so many ways you can design a "fire dog" or "electric rat" before infringing on pokemon territory.
Last time I saw this on /., an article had some comparisons of the 3d models. This isn't just "fire dog". They're often damn near the same model, same proportions, details copied verbatim, etc.. Here's a couple of the google hits about it:
https://www.ign.com/articles/p... [ign.com]
https://www.videogameschronicl... [videogameschronicle.com]
But I don't have a firedog in this fight or a ponyta in this race.
Re: (Score:2)
That would be copyright, or potentially trademarks, and not design patents. It's easy to see all the design patents that Nintendo has (at least US ones) - https://patents.google.com/?q=... [google.com]. They are mainly for the physical design of objects, like chargers, or cables, etc. Nintendo has some for the design of a charger that looks like a Pokeball, etc.
IANAL, but I would expect Nintendo would only be able to claim infringement based on trademark or copyright, not patents. I'll be interested to see what they cla
Re: (Score:2)
"Patent" as a noun comes from "letters patent", or "litterae patentes," (open letters) which were documents issued by monarchs conferring a right or license or similar.
Design patents, copyrights, letters of marque, the deed to your house and the registration for your car are arguably "patents" and some of them might well be called that in the local legal lingo.
Re: (Score:2)
> It is about designs (first line of the previous slashdot article, linked in the summary).
Since the patent in questions have not yet been revealed, this is not quite yet clear cut. People have linked to this new utility patent granted in August 2024 to Nintendo as more probably the "patent" being infringing :
https://patents.justia.com/pat... [justia.com]
This is obviously not a "design" but an actual game mechanic. It would be like Capcom patenting the Hadouken and suing Midway for Liu Kang's fire ball.
Plus as some
Re: (Score:2)
> I remember when Slashdot was against them. And when they were against huge corporations using them to crush the small indies.
Finally, hard hitting facts.
Maybe (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure if you can really patent the idea of "A game where you capture pets in traps that look like a ball and train them", because that's about where the similarities between Palworld and Pokemon end.
Honestly, the game felt more like they were borrowing game play elements from World Of Warcraft (Like riding/flying mounts, crafting weapons, boss battles and dungeon raids) to me when I tried it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Either you're being factual or this is brilliant fiction writing.
I do hope it's fiction or else "what the clownworld hell?"
In other words... (Score:3)
Palworld developer has shocked Pikachu face...
Huh? (Score:2)
How do you file a lawsuit without saying what it's about?
Re: (Score:2)
That may be how it works in Japan.
Misleading headline. We all know WHY (Score:2)
We just don't know what specific justification they want to try their luck with. If Nintendo could sue them for leaving the toilet seat up it would be that.
Re: (Score:2)
Surely Nintendo should be paying them for the effort it took to lift the toilet seat. Lowering it is the easy part.