Speculation: Patent At Heart Of ‘Palworld’ Suit Could Be For Capturing Characters With A Ball

As we just talked about the joint lawsuit filed in Japan by Nintendo and The Pokémon Co. against Pocketpair, the company behind the hit game Palworld, we still don’t have all the details. But one of the strange things about the suit is that is not a copyright or trademark suit, which is what everyone expected as soon as the game launched. Instead, this is supposedly a patent infringement suit, with the plaintiffs claiming that Palworld infringes on several of their patents. This led everyone from the folks at Pocketpair itself to the public to ask the obvious question: what patents?

Nintendo and The Pokémon Co. have yet to provide this detail, so we’re in the speculative stage at the moment. That being said, if this really is a patent infringement suit, some commentators out there believe they have found the likely culprits, which are several divisional patents recently filed for with the USPTO.

Kiyoshi Kurihara, a Japanese patent attorney and consultant on intellectual property spoke to Yahoo Japan on the lawsuit (translated by Automaton), and pointed to a “killer patent” that revolves around the mechanic of catching Pokémon itself.

“It seems like it would be hard to avoid if you want to make a Pokémon-like game, and it’s easy to infringe if you’re not careful,” Kurihara is quoted as saying.

The way a divisional patent works is to isolate specific aspects within a parent patent. This tends to happen when a single parent patent contains multiple protected elements, then divided out in the divisional patents. The patent that Kurihara and many others are pointing to in this case is Japanese Patent No. 7545191, which essentially covers the game mechanic of capturing a character with a “capture item”, in this case a Poké Ball.

Aiming a capture item (Poké Ball) at a character placed on the field (Pokémon), releasing the capture item in a direction determined by player input, judgment of whether capturing is successful or not upon contact between the capture item and Pokémon, and changing of the Pokémon’s status to “owned by the player” when capturing is successful. In addition, the patent also covers the mechanic of having capture probability displayed to the player, regardless of whether it uses colors, graphics or numbers.

While the divisional patents were just filed for weeks ago, likely in preparation for this lawsuit, the parent patent has been held since 2021. Because of that, it would still be valid to use against Pocketpair.

Although you have to wonder just how valid this patent is, not to mention why the plaintiffs haven’t wielded it against others. Is throwing a ball to capture a character really patent worthy? Is it really a mechanic invented by Nintendo and The Pokémon Co.? Hell, the Ghostbusters video game came out in 2009 and, as in the movies, involves a capture device you have to toss at ghosts and then guide them into it. That was well before the 2021 patent was granted.

Kurihara hinted at some of this in his comments above. A patent like this would preclude anyone from making a game that is inspired by Pokémon games. It would also be very easy to infringe upon unintentionally, given its real or potential broad use in the gaming industry.

And regardless of how this lawsuit shakes out, this sure looks like Nintendo and The Pokémon Co. scratching and clawing for any excuse to sue the competition. Maybe it would be better to just compete instead.