The Pokémon Company confirm investigation into Palworld

it seems that they want some money!

Nintendo don't own an art style, so there's nothing that they should be thinking of doing; the game has nothing related to them other than using the same art style as them but totally different designs. I am sick of people saying Nintendo owns a quadrupedal animal design like they're gods or something; the originator of these designs is God himself. Also,  don't tell me that they've copied the monster-catching formula from Nintendo because they weren't the first to invent monster-catching games.

Well, the overall style of most pals is something that derives heavily from pokémon. I think that's the issue, more than the game itself. Some Pals are flagrant Pokemon copies. It's not about the game per se being a copy of Pokémon. It's about the pals being pokémon copies.

This was probably spurred up by Pokemon cultists frothing at the mount in anger on reddit who no doubt were hounding Nintendo and Pokemon company every 5minutes to sue/delete PalWorld!

This was probably spurred up by Pokemon cultists frothing at the mount in anger on reddit who no doubt were hounding Nintendo and Pokemon company every 5minutes to sue/delete PalWorld!

The state of social media is frankly batshit crazy, people frothing at the mouth "defending" Pokemon and Nintendo, going on some kind of crusade as if Nintendo gives a shit about anything but profits. It amazes me how people knight for companies like this, I've rarely seen anything like it. People absolutely determined to find things wrong with Palworld.

I'm never going to stick up for actual plagiarism if it's ever proven (which as of yet, it is not) of course.

It's about the pals being pokémon copies.

My thought too. Googling for "Palworld screenshots" shows me some pals that look like carbon copies of

- Eevee (ger. Evoli)
- Meowth (ger. Maunzi)
- Electabuzz (ger. Elektek)

I thought at first that the "flamethrower" Pal looks like a Pokemon too, but it ends up just being most vaguely similar to something in between the fire version of Eevee (Flareon, ger. Flamara) and Vulpix. So on that one I am conflicted. "Fluffy canine-like fire breather" is generic in the grand theme of monster-catching games, and the "orange to red" for fire monsters too. The fluffy sheep-like ones vaguely remind me of something, but I'm not sure its even Pokemon.

But the three listed above are too close for Nintendo not to sue. Not about the gameplay, but about the specific designs.

On the plus side, that's an issue that can be fixed without taking down the game entirely.


Last edited by Klaus on 25 January 2024 at 12:16 pm UTC

We generally have a very tenuous grasp on what is legally distinct or not, and the game clearly wants to be as close to pokemon as possible.

I personally think it is fine, but I have seen people comparing the 3d meshes and they look way closer - with textures it is clearly distinct, but I don't know if the meshes being too similar might be infringement?

But I must say that I really, really don't care for Nintendo's intellectual property. As far as I'm concerned, anyone should be able to sell games containing the Nintendo-created Pokemon. The original 151 are almost thirty years old, IMO they should be on the public domain already. So yeah, screw Nintendo, they might find a valid legal argument but morally fuck them.

Honestly all creative arts are based off ideas previously thought up or done, its transformative arts afterall.

The issue is when it comes to DIRECT copying works. And this is where it gets grey because AI algorithms take works of arts and modifies them, but without the original authors works it has nothing, cannot come up with anything on its own.

This is not the case with humans, we can spin up crap without original concepts in our head, it just rarely happens.

So I don't think PalWorld can be sued for plagiarism! that would break the entire legal system and put us into a dark future where everyone gets sued by the big powerful companies.

But they can sue if they find a model that is a 1:1 copy of their works or has stolen assets, that is copyright infringement which has a place in the courts.

That is my 2 cents about it all. Sorry if I'm misinformed about something, just the way I understand it atm.

carbon copies

NONE of them are carbon copies, some are quite close, but none are carbon copies from what I've seen. A simple vertices inspection would reveal that.


Last edited by TheRiddick on 25 January 2024 at 1:15 pm UTC

- Eevee (ger. Evoli)
- Meowth (ger. Maunzi)
- Electabuzz (ger. Elektek)

- cartoonish desert fox.
- bipedal anime/cartoon/children book cat, done multiple times before Pokemon creator was even born.
- ogre in full tiger suit? stylized golem?
...just make any cartoonish style real/phantasy creature or thing and will "infringer" one of 1000+ Pokemon. No doubt, would find some sport team mascot looking like some Pokemon, conceived years or decades before Pokemon game... just wearing teams attire/logo.

There is already clear-cut solid evidence of plaigiarism on the part of Pocketpair.

But since they made so much money from Palworld, one would hope they would use it to hire on a few more artists so that the Pokemon ripoff designs can be replaced with less infringing designs and models.


Last edited by Talon1024 on 25 January 2024 at 1:29 pm UTC

There is already clear-cut solid evidence of plaigiarism on the part of Pocketpair.

You seem to fail to even listen to what anyone is saying. Simply making something very similar is NOT illegal or grounds for massive legal pursuits, especially when those concepts were taken from games/media before it!

You are basically saying the idea of these models is OWNED by Nintendo/Pokemon, but they really aren't, and if they won a case on that basis, it would send shock-waves throughout the gaming industry because it would open a legal pandora's box.

In case its not blunt enough. You can't sue based on similarities to works of arts you stole the ideas from other games/media!

The people continuing to ignore this obvious fact or listen to reasoning have clear bias motive in play.

There is already clear-cut solid evidence of plaigiarism on the part of Pocketpair.

You seem to fail to even listen to what anyone is saying. Simply making something very similar is NOT illegal or grounds for massive legal pursuits, especially when those concepts were taken from games/media before it!

You are basically saying the idea of these models is OWNED by Nintendo/Pokemon, but they really aren't, and if they won a case on that basis, it would send shock-waves throughout the gaming industry because it would open a legal pandora's box.

In case its not blunt enough. You can't sue based on similarities to works of arts you stole the ideas from other games/media!

The people continuing to ignore this obvious fact or listen to reasoning have clear bias motive in play.

Out of curiosity, do you have an opinion on Tanya Grotter?

Out of curiosity, do you have an opinion on Tanya Grotter?

Yeah I don't know how original the Harry Potter books were or if they took ideas from other media (likely).

But those similarities seem mostly fine to me. It's very obvious Tanya is inspired by Harry Potter book series, almost in a mocking sort of way, lol (is it a parody?)

Out of curiosity, do you have an opinion on Tanya Grotter?

Yeah I don't know how original the Harry Potter books were or if they took ideas from other media (likely).

But those similarities seem mostly fine to me. It's very obvious Tanya is inspired by Harry Potter book series, almost in a mocking sort of way, lol (is it a parody?)

They tried to argue it was a parody (unsuccessfully, apparently). I don't know if it ever went to court, but JK Rowling and Warner certainly scared them enough. More details further up the Wikipedia page.

My personal belief is that this is not enough to constitute a derivative work...but I'm not sure how the courts saw it.

Oh no! Somebody else is making money! We can't have that because we are the only very special geniuses who can make games with pets or cartoony yellow mice!

My personal belief is that this is not enough to constitute a derivative work...but I'm not sure how the courts saw it.

It's very hard to judge without actually reading through those two books and comparing it in it's full context rather then nit picking out similarities and base opinion on that.

I see the similarities and to me Palworld clearly looks like a parody. But, is it such a problem that all these people are having fun?

There is already clear-cut solid evidence of plaigiarism on the part of Pocketpair.

But since they made so much money from Palworld, one would hope they would use it to hire on a few more artists so that the Pokemon ripoff designs can be replaced with less infringing designs and models.

Those examples are pretty conclusive. It's the 3D modeling equivalent of copying a paragraph, changing a few words, and then passing it off as your own work. I suspect, at the very least, the Pal World developers will be forced to remove those critters from the game.

I see the similarities and to me Palworld clearly looks like a parody. But, is it such a problem that all these people are having fun?

It is, because it's not Nintendo the one making money from it.
And this is extremely bad for both Nintendo and its fanatics.

Since I want to watch the word burn, I'll say that I hope Nintendo sues and wins so Palworld has to close and a massive internet war starts against Nintendo and its fanatics that takes them to the absolute oblivion.
But the world is not made for happy endings so this won't happen.
Instead, Nintendo will try to scare them, Palworld devs will say they don't give a crap, Nintendo will see they can't win this fight so they won't sue, and their fans will be left frothing in the mouth.
Can't wait for that to happen.

In other news, Palworld crossed 8 million copies sold now.

It's great to see that a game that the market has wanted for a long time is doing so well!

Well, the overall style of most pals is something that derives heavily from pokémon. I think that's the issue, more than the game itself. Some Pals are flagrant Pokemon copies. It's not about the game per se being a copy of Pokémon. It's about the pals being pokémon copies.

But the three listed above are too close for Nintendo not to sue. Not about the gameplay, but about the specific designs.

I've posted these before, but, take a look at them;


Bomberman Max (1999)


Keitai Denjuu Telefang (2000)


Robopon (1998)

No action was ever taken about any of these (and there are plenty more games I could've named besides), and as you can see some of them are almost-identical in design (hell, one of them, from Robopon, is literally just two non-Pokemon characters glued together - it's on the bottom row, it's literally Kirby with Pac-Man sitting on his head). There are plenty of elements about Pokemon that actually aren't as copyrightable as certain parties would want you to believe.

- ogre in full tiger suit? stylized golem?

Electabuzz bears a bit of resemblance to some depictions of oni and yetis, as well.

I personally think it is fine, but I have seen people comparing the 3d meshes and they look way closer - with textures it is clearly distinct, but I don't know if the meshes being too similar might be infringement?

There is already clear-cut solid evidence of plaigiarism on the part of Pocketpair.

But since they made so much money from Palworld, one would hope they would use it to hire on a few more artists so that the Pokemon ripoff designs can be replaced with less infringing designs and models.

Those examples are pretty conclusive. It's the 3D modeling equivalent of copying a paragraph, changing a few words, and then passing it off as your own work. I suspect, at the very least, the Pal World developers will be forced to remove those critters from the game.

It's worth pointing out that the person who did those comparisons has since admitted that they tweaked the models to make them fit together, and then backpedalled, claiming they falsified these examples of the meshes being identical because they feel that Palworld glorifies animal-abuse.

I see the similarities and to me Palworld clearly looks like a parody. But, is it such a problem that all these people are having fun?

It is, because it's not Nintendo the one making money from it.
And this is extremely bad for both Nintendo and its fanatics.

There is some worryingly cult-like behaviour out there regarding Nintendo. I'm a former fan myself, but never fitted in with the fandom because when the company got things wrong, I took issue with it and shared opinions on how they could improve, as any sane person would. That gets you run out of town in those circles!


Last edited by Pengling on 25 January 2024 at 7:20 pm UTC