By The Japanese patent authority has raised significant skepticism regarding two of the three patents implicated in Nintendo’s Palworld lawsuit. These patents deal with the creature-capturing mechanics central to the contention with Pocketpair, and it appears officials have observed that these gameplay elements have existed in titles such as Ark, Monster Hunter, and Pocketpair’s own Craftopia long before Nintendo attempted to patent them.
As Florian Mueller elaborates on the gaming industry’s legal blog Games Fray, a patent evaluator at the Japan Patent Office has recently dismissed pending application number 2024-031879, which Mueller states “is a sibling of one of those anti-Palworld ‘creature capture’ patents and the parent of another.” This dismissal is preliminary, indicating that Nintendo will have the option to either relinquish the patent or amend it to resolve the patent office’s apprehensions.
So what prompted the abrupt dismissal? The Japan Patent Office obtained a third-party submission of prior evidence, which highlights that Ark, Monster Hunter 4, Craftopia, a Japanese web-based game called Kantai Collection, and even Pokemon Go all precede – and would therefore nullify – Nintendo’s patent. The identity of the source behind this prior evidence submission remains undisclosed, but Mueller speculates that it may have originated from Pocketpair itself.