I’m not sure how the term “patent” is to be interpreted here. It could be used like back in the days when Apple sued Samsung because their phone had rounded edges too…
Like a “design patent” (sorry, I’m not a native English speaker, so I’m unsure if this is the correct translation).
A lot of the pals in the game look quite close to Pokémon. Not identical, of course, but so similar that one just has to wonder if the design has been “inspired” by Pokémon…
Pokemon design isn’t patented, they are secured by copyright. As long as they do not copy a Pokemon design directly, they are safe. Being inspired is not a copyright infringement. Patents usually are about hardware and other mechanical solutions, in example a certain dialog system. And it needs to be patented and all patents are open to see, I think.
Right, legally speaking that would be covered in the US.
But Japanese law is completely different and IIRC parodies are not covered which is why anime always censors their parody references to other anime. It’s stupid, but it’s the society that both developers are from.
Only time will tell what they’re actually accusing Pocket Pair of doing though.
Only thing I can think of are maybe the catching mechanics (which are straight out of Legends: Arceus). No idea if these would be considered unique enough to be patentable, guess we’ll find out.
They literally tried to patent the loading screen and mechanically locking a player object to a moving object ingame just after the release of TotK. Nintendo is the absolute king of frivolous gaming patents. Here’s hoping it’s their downfall. For an example of how seriously vague some of the patents they’ve been granted are, check out some of their current ones after pokemon sleep’s initial success (basically trying to keep everyone without 9 digit money out of the sleep app game space).
In a case where a second camera operation through a third input unit using an inertial sensor is performed while a pointer operation process based on a pointer operation through a first input unit or a camera operation process based on a first camera operation through a second input unit is performed, an absolute value of a quantity of change in a position or an image capturing direction of a virtual camera based on the second camera operation is reduced as compared with a case where the second camera operation is performed when neither of the pointer operation process based on the pointer operation and the camera operation process based on the first camera operation are performed.
What exactly is infringed here? I don’t see Palworld infringing anything Nintendo does (no its not sarcasm).
I’m not sure how the term “patent” is to be interpreted here. It could be used like back in the days when Apple sued Samsung because their phone had rounded edges too…
Like a “design patent” (sorry, I’m not a native English speaker, so I’m unsure if this is the correct translation).
A lot of the pals in the game look quite close to Pokémon. Not identical, of course, but so similar that one just has to wonder if the design has been “inspired” by Pokémon…
Pokemon design isn’t patented, they are secured by copyright. As long as they do not copy a Pokemon design directly, they are safe. Being inspired is not a copyright infringement. Patents usually are about hardware and other mechanical solutions, in example a certain dialog system. And it needs to be patented and all patents are open to see, I think.
Gameplay can be patented. Namco patented the mechanics of Katamari Damacy, for example.
You could almost say… Parodied 😯
Right, legally speaking that would be covered in the US.
But Japanese law is completely different and IIRC parodies are not covered which is why anime always censors their parody references to other anime. It’s stupid, but it’s the society that both developers are from.
Only time will tell what they’re actually accusing Pocket Pair of doing though.
edit: censors, not sensors. 🤣
Good to know, I had not realized it wasn’t covered in Japanese law
Only thing I can think of are maybe the catching mechanics (which are straight out of Legends: Arceus). No idea if these would be considered unique enough to be patentable, guess we’ll find out.
They literally tried to patent the loading screen and mechanically locking a player object to a moving object ingame just after the release of TotK. Nintendo is the absolute king of frivolous gaming patents. Here’s hoping it’s their downfall. For an example of how seriously vague some of the patents they’ve been granted are, check out some of their current ones after pokemon sleep’s initial success (basically trying to keep everyone without 9 digit money out of the sleep app game space).
https://patents.justia.com/assignee/the-pokemon-company
Holy mother of long sentences
Those patent abstracts are wild.
Eh, that’s pretty normal for a patent.