Palworld Developer Responds To Nintendo Lawsuit

Following the announcement of a patent lawsuit filed against Palworld developer Pocketpair from Nintendo and The Pokémon Company, the former has now released a statement responding to the complaint.

The lawsuit from Nintendo and The Pokémon Company mentions that Palworld “infringes multiple patent rights”, however Pocketpair has stated that it is “unaware of the specific patents we are accused of infringing upon”.

It goes on to express gratitude for the overall response to Palworld before stating that it will do its “utmost for our fans, and to ensure that indie game developers are not hindered or discouraged from pursuing their creative ideas”.

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.

It’ll be interesting to see how this one plays out over the coming weeks and, potentially, months. Nintendo is particularly stringent when it comes to protecting its intellectual property, so we imagine it has legitimate reasons for pursuing a lawsuit against Pocketpair. Regardless, the announcement hasn’t gone down well with some Palworld fans.

Many have taken to social media to express their anger and disappointment at the news, stating “If they are coming after you, you’re doing something right”, and “Nintendo really needs to be humbled, and competition is healthy for everyone involved”.