Though it is worthing that Nintendo is alleging patent infringement, not copyright infringement. IANAL (I Am Not A Lawyer), but that doesn't sound like they're going after the models used in Palworld, but more overall mechanics?

Possibly this patent Nintendo has for what seems to be "a thing the player throws at another thing to initiate a fight with it" (IANAL): https://patents.justia.com/patent/20240278129

Also, it was filed on May 2, 2024. Seems to me like there's millions of instances of prior art in that case.

Patents in gaming are weird and suck hard. They stifle innovation and growth. Games have evolved and grown on the backs of previous games forever.

That means that as long as you can sneak prior art past the patent examiner (fairly easy), you still get an effective business weapon.

-------- My old comment below. --------

Yuck. They may have just hired yakuzas lawyers (yakuzas use a lawyers a lot, and are experts in exploiting legal loopholes (and sometimes participating in the creation of them)).

That's a shame to put money into this disgusting mafia.

It'll be interesting to see which patents Nintendo is trying to assert. Given that Palworld is purely a game, it seems likely to be Nintendo's patents related to game mechanics (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37062820), which I think most people here are justifiably against.

you might decide that its not worth violating as the value you get from it isn't much (i.e. mini game while loading might be cute, but might not move the needle at all for sales), and the patent holder might decide not to sue you as they don't view their prospects of winning to be high.

and then you're left in the middle where the patent might prevent novel new ways of doing things because initial violations wont move the needle, but those initial experimentation could open explorations that could eventually move the needle, but since we don't see any moving the needle up front, never get to that point.

aka, patents no longer "promote the progress of science and useful arts".

I think it's high time patents are reformed in the digital world. Things like game mechanics patents, design patents etc, ought to all be abolished.

Look at the fashion industry - there are no patents in clothing design. And they haven't collapsed; in fact, i think fashion florished more because of the lack of patents!

Truly innovative things are often not patented at all anymore, and instead kept as closely guarded business secrets. Patents are mainly used for when the company doesn't have a way to keep it secret, and for random things to bolster IP value.

Ah that depends on your viewpoint. Shein and similar outlets are making bank on stealing stuff from designers and rapid-manufacturing absolute dog quality shit [1].

Had fashion something like design protections, designers would at least have some recourse against these exploiters.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/sep/02/details-i-m...

To be clearer: Patents that are invalid can get issued because the reason for it being invalid is not known, and I'd argue that nowadays this is likely a vast majority of patents. Patents are filed in huge numbers, with many companies just bolstering the number of patents they own as it inflates the value of their intellectual property, rather than caring too much about the value or even validity of each of them.

Figuring out if a patent actually has any value is unfortunately up to those deciding to challenge it.

Actually Ridge Racer on the original PlayStation did similar but with Galaga and decidedly shorter load times!

FIFA/EAFC, one of the highest grossing console games (possibly #1).

Some patents of interest:

Method of conducting simultaneous gameplay using stackable game pieces https://patents.google.com/patent/US6352262B1/en https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/225/icehouse

Trading card game method of play https://patents.google.com/patent/US5662332A/en https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/463/magic-the-gathering

Light-reflecting board game https://patents.google.com/patent/US7264242B2/en https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/16991/khet-the-laser-gam... (and the patent win https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/west/2012/11/26/271633... )

You will note that http://www.gamecabinet.com (of old) has a link to searching US Patents on board games - http://www.gamecabinet.com/info/PatentSearch.html

From A Gamut of Games by Sid Sackson:

    THE FILES OF PATENTS that have been granted are a fruitful hunting ground for forgotten games, although going through these files, as anyone who has ever been involved in a patent search well knows, is a time consuming job. Often the patented games are downright silly, such as a set of dominos made of rubber so that they can double as ink erasers (No. 729,489) or a sliding block puzzle with edible pieces so that a player who despairs of a solution can find consolation in gratifying his stomach (No. 1,274,294). Often the patents are repetitious: There are over a hundred variations of the well-known checkerboard and over a thousand different baseball games.

    ...

    Preceding THE LANDLORD'S GAME by just under a year, on April 21, 1903, Patent No. 726,023 was granted to Henry Busch and Arthur Jaeger, also for a game board. Their game, called BLUE AND GRAY, made no lasting impression in the world of games which, I suppose, is understandable since it didn't have the innovative qualities of THE LANDLORD's GAME. Yet it was, and is, a delightful pastime, which should particularly appeal to the ChEckers fan who is looking for something different.

    The name Blue and Gray, of course, refers to the uniforms of the South and the North in the Civil War and in the original game the playing pieces of the contestants were of those colors.

Give https://patents.google.com/patent/US7264242B2/en a read and see if that describes the computer game. If not, it's something different.

    1. Field of the Invention

    The present invention relates to board type games played on a game board or surface, preferably a substantially orthogonally gridded, planar surface, and more particularly to a game which selectively diverts a beam (e.g. laser beam) by user-placed mirrored game pieces that are moved laterally or rotated during play.

    2. Description of the Related Art

    Many board games have been provided which use paths across their surface as part of the game. An example of such a game is chess. In addition, games exist that depend on the deflection or reflection of objects off of other objects to “score” points.
    The following US Patents are examples of board games, each hereby incorporated herein by reference: U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,516,671; 5,145,182; and 6,702,286.

Is it different? Do they claim different things? Having something similar isn't necessarily legally similar.

Blue and Gray is a checkers game that is played on a checkers board with checkers pieces and is distinct enough to receive a patent.

Trademarks protect names. Copyrights protect that text or music or ... Patents protect that idea - the rules and mechanics of that game.

    The game of the present invention generates a “beam” for each player, which can be a low-powered laser diodes to emit a beam of colored light. These beams are reflected and deflected around the playing field by mirrored surfaces of pieces, or stopped by non-mirrored surfaces of pieces.

    The game is won by a player who strategically maneuvers pieces to reflect a laser beam so as to illuminate a key piece belonging to his opponent, e.g., a “Pharaoh” or “King” piece.

    With each turn, a player may move one of his pieces to one of the potentially eight, unoccupied adjacent squares (front, back, left, right or diagonal) or may rotate (re-orient) one of his pieces.

    After moving or rotating a piece, that player presses a fire button that triggers the emission of a beam above and parallel to the playing surface. If the beam hits a non-mirrored surface of a playing piece, that piece is removed from the board and eliminated from further play, unless it is the key piece, e.g., “King” or “Pharaoh” piece, in which case the game ends.

    The pieces can vary in design and setup, with mirrors being located on multiple (e.g. one, two or more) sides or no sides.

    39. A method of playing a game by opposed players; said game comprising two sets of distinguishable playing pieces, each set having movable pieces with no mirrored surfaces, of which one is a key piece, and pieces with at least one mirrored surface, a game board consisting of a first end, a second end, and a plurality of rows and columns, intersecting to form a plurality of spaces, the method comprising the steps of:

    placing each player's set of playing pieces on the game in a pre-determined starting configuration; and
    alternating turns, each turn comprising moving, either a translation or a rotation, a piece followed by activation of a laser, said alternating moves continuing until one player illuminates the opposing player's key piece;
    wherein moving a piece consists of a movement one space in a horizontal, vertical, or diagonal direction to an unoccupied adjacent space.

Yes. Very much it does. It's been 35 years since I played Laser Chess, so perhaps there are some minor differences in the rules. But it describes a game so close to Laser Chess that it immediately brought the game to mind.

Of course, accusations of public value to society are not libel in Japan. Everything is judged on a case by case basis.

But for companies? The closest thing would be protection under trade secrets if you're an employee or business partner.

However, in recent years, it has become routine in Japan to identify and punish employees who have leaked wrongdoings. In the evening news this evening, a government employee leaked information about a fraud, and the elected governor identified and pressured the employee, and the employee committed suicide. Public opinion is overwhelmingly blaming the governor, but the police and other authorities show no signs of acting. Despite this current situation, anyway, it is legally true that “even the truth can be sued,” and is this different in the US or in the West?

But you're talking about extralegal harassment and intimidation committed my authorities, which happens everywhere unfortunately.

I've always been under assumption that one can avoid patent infringing if the underlying implementation is different enough.

For example, one of more famous patents is Sega's yellow arrow on top of the screen, showing player where is the next objective. In your game you can still use that feature of "showing player in which direction the objective is", you just have to be more creative about it, here are some immediate ideas I got:

  - small red hand pops up from side of screen when you're stuck for a minute and points to objective
  - player character himself points with hand to your goal
  - make sun, moon or other celestial body appear on the sky in the direction where the objective is.

And many of the non-Hasbro -opoly games (that use that as part of their name) actually are licensed. Hasbro's been known to go after unauthorized users of the name for trademark infringement.

It is very common in Japan for large companies like Nintendo to file and hold patents for smaller companies, this is especially prominent in the video game industry. This is a tradition borne out of, ironically, refusal to use the patent system at first.

For those that don't know, a lot of Japanese society operates on the honor system. You are expected to be truthful and honorable in your business dealings and in general. Patents were initially shunned because Japanese people didn't see a need, you don't need a rights protection system if everyone already respects them. That notion went straight out the window once Japan had to compete on the world stage: Suddenly, westerners saw Japanese ideas that weren't protected by patents and patented them and Japanese companies subsequently got sued and lost.

This led to a critical reassessment of how Japanese values are applied, and the result was that larger companies with sufficient financial strength would register and hold patents for smaller companies (not necessarily affiliated, by the way) who don't have the money to pay for all that, and in exchange those patents would be shared as a Japanese industry-wide good.

Nintendo is one such custodian of patents for the wider Japanese video game industry at large.

I am going to presume that Nintendo is suing Palworld for reasons beyond just its own interests in Pokemon. I haven't played Palworld nor have I looked at the details of this lawsuit, so I can't make an in-depth comment; but this probably isn't Nintendo acting like a copyright draconian as they are commonly seen in the west, rather they are likely doing this for the sake of the entire Japanese video game industry at large.

A few years ago, Nintendo sued (and won) a fellow Japanese video game developer, COLOPL, for infringing on mechanics patents that Nintendo was holding as custodian for the industry. Why? Because COLOPL broke the gentlemen's agreement and filed their own patent for the mechanic.

I saw a video about this on YouTube the other day.

About 17 minutes long.

Titled “The Nintendo lawsuit you’ve never heard about”.

It was an interesting video. I recommend watching it. (To people here on HN in general, I mean.)

https://youtu.be/cbH9-lzx4LY

While the primary goal of the game is to get all of the pals, most of your time is spent putting your pals to work building up your base, breeding better pals, and manufacturing the weapons needed in order to get even better pals. This is a stark contrast to Pokemon games, where you just walk around challenging gym leaders. It's an entirely different game.

So if Pocketpair reskinned a few assets sure, pay Nintendo 5% at most. But those skins had nothing to do with the success of the game and Nintendo doesn't deserve anything more than that.

Palworld is really a "survival crafting" game and is closer to a game like "Conan Exiles" which has a similar gameplay mechanic of capturing slaves to put to work in your base.

What made Palworld stand out was the shock factor elements of "Pokemon with guns", "make pokemon work as slaves in a factory" and "grind up pokemon for meat", which streamers were able to convert into clickbait thumbnails and views.

Notably, the Megami Tensei series, which predates Pokemon.

It really highlights that first mover advantage doesn’t count for everything.

Fighting? Not at all similar, unless Psyduck suddenly got Gatling guns.

It's absurd. Pokemon has made bajillions of dollars, surely it's time to acknowledge it belongs to our common culture and we all now have a right to make up our own stories, games, music, whatever around it.

This isn't radical. It's just a question of time. We would call it madness if Disney claimed to own Greek mythology and sued the makers of the game Hades about it.

How is that bad? Why is there this strong wish for a single corporation to own our culture and what we are without allowance to experiment, build upon it and allow market competition for the best evolution?

Edit: and even today. Generate textures for blocky assets? Sure. But full pokémon models that wouldn't need a ton of rework? Nope.

Well, that is the core benefit of using AI - you can save a lot of the groundwork, especially in concept art. Making 20, 30 versions of "fat rat in yellow with lightning bolt symbols in their fur" is cheap with AI, but prohibitively expensive if you're using humans. You're starting running already.

But Palword feels such a rip off of Zelda BOTW (the intro and the items are 1:1 the same of Zelda, even the tablet!) and Pokemon.

For most if not all "pals" I could instantly name their Pokemon counterpart, that is textbook copyright infringement done in the weakest form.

That's not surprising, because for ever Pokemon it's also fairly easy to name their real-world counterpart. There's a finite amount of recognizable real world animals, so you quickly get there even if you've never seen a Pokemon before.

As such, I wonder if this structure makes it harder to sue over IP infringement. I agree with others here that patent infringement is a seemingly odd pick, but perhaps this also has to do with character design patents, since Palworld didn't explicitly use Nintendo's IP?

Should be interesting regardless to see what happens

I stopped buying Nintendo things years ago when they began going after emulators, rom sites, and others actively archiving and distributing these means. I don't support litigious companies and the vermin lawyers.

In most cases, probably yeah. Patent trolls and malicious actors make such easy money off of frivolous patents that the default assumption in cases like these is that it's just a litigious action to make a quick buck. We're at the stage where it's very rare for a patent to actually aid innovation rather than stifle it.

Now with Nintendo in short of revenue and late with a new platform for Christmas with their stock taking a beating, I guess this is how they'll make up some difference and feed their wild herd of lawyers hungry for some action in the mean time.

Rabidly litigious companies still disgust me when outside developers fill a void they cannot or will not. I can buy from Amazon hard drives and entire systems filled with every Nintendo video game from the 80's on, maybe they should sic the lawyers on them instead of the little guys like Pocketpair putting a positive spin on the genre.

Mate, Nintendo aren't worried. They have enough money to operate at a a loss for decades without sweating. They're still selling Nintendo Switches by the millions.

The gameplay is Zelda BOTW glued together to Pokemon (even the initial items and the intro scene is obscenely identical).

Most "pals" are lifted from Pokemon, as I was able to say things like "Pokemon X but green", "Pokemon Y", etc.

Ignorance is not a justification for misconduct.

The game seems like a collage of stolen bits rather than a nice blend of games (which is in what the gaming industry excels).

But it is fun to play. And that's all we ask from games.

The game isn't fun to play only because they slapped BOTW + pokemon copycats with guns. So, why did they decide to go so much on your face when they could have literally tweaked certain elements to keep them similar but not identical?

People got absolutely bananas with Genshin Impact because of the similarities in style while the core loop and business model being more different.

To top it off, the developers of PalWorld are literal neighbours of Nintendo (both from Kyoto). So this does have to be a very open and direct diss at Nintendo as whole.

My young child was convinced it was Pokémon throughout the whole video. Even cited which Pokémon each ‘pal’ was meant to be.

I know this is for the patent, not the trademark, but doesn’t it cross a line when the likeness of a product causes confusion in the market?

Ignoring the guns, as a whole it looks like Pokémon. I wonder if the reason they went after the ‘mechanic’ of Pokémon is because each individual asset is distinct from it?

I figure the biggest thing causing the seeming parallels is the art style, which is pokemon-esque (cute, colorful, fluffy, polished, original). Second to that comes the balls

Nope!

Clearly mimicking Pokemon and even all the headlines are "Pokemon with guns". Is it okay? No idea, this seems extremely muddy.

Given how broad the Pokemon character IP is, I am surprised Nintendo has not been sued themselves. But so different is IP law in Japan that Pokemon itself was altered at inception to avoid being in conflict with an entirely unrelated IP, Ultraman. The game was originally capsule monsters, but Ultraman has capsules, so they changed it, even though the stories and world's mechanics are otherwise entirely different.

valve being so successful with half-life, when it was just a "less alien" version of unreal, or a less "doom" version of "Quake". Yes it was a great game but the mechanics of gameplay existed for ages; prince of persia had the 3d platforming, the ones previously mentioned for FPS, i don't think the gravity gun was unique itself, but perhaps in a first person shooter, it was. Heck borderlands and rage take half life style gameplay to new places. Minecraft wasn't original (also Lego, in there too).

innovation requires "remixing". Wholesale copying of assets and code should be punished. "prior art" needs to be scrutinized, because "did they actually make this, is it actually novel" is an important question.

and don't get me started on movies and TV shows.

And yet no one would confuse the two. It's not a copyright or any other case, its a patent case. And "game mechanic" patents are frankly gross, in my opinion.

Another game company, Konami, is suing Cygames for--in short--having a system where characters compete and can be leveled up.

Plus the concept of "fair use" technically kind of exists legally but not in practice. You sample something and the owner doesn't approve, you're screwed. You don't sample something but simply say something that lowers their reputation, you're screwed (the bar for "libel" is incredibly low--even facts can be successfully tried so long as it can be proven that the intention was to in some way lower a person or particularly a company's reputation). The last one is particularly funny since you'll see the media giving endless praise to a CEO/businessperson and treating them as Jesus 2.0, but the very day they die, the floodgates open and you find out they've committed every crime known to mankind and everyone around them knew it.

Basically, Pocketpair is quite likely heavily screwed. Nintendo can attack them on several fronts and likely will. People saying they made a better Pokemon than Nintendo themselves probably angered a few people within the company and it's easier to take them out legally than to actually compete.

Pocketpair might have difficulties partnering with many businesses even outside of gaming in the future, since I've been led to believe the non-legal effects tend to matter quite a bit in Japan as well, but they have global appeal and can find foreign partners if they need to.

That, and that software is so easy to copy you could argue that not copying it greatly impedes technological advancement of your society. Especially in comparison with adversaries who will violate the patents freely.

I agree with your second point entirely. I can see how closed doors can impede progress. But I thought that's what licensing was for.

Also, the argument I'm questioning is that software patents are inherently wrong as a concept. I still don't get that.

If the variability in time-to-patent exceeds the delta between independent inventions you no longer have a fair system.

At best you're randomly rewarding the patent to one lucky inventor. At worst you're rewarding it to the one who is best able to game the patent system, encouraging corruption throughout.

Unless you've got a good chunk of cash or the backing of a decent sized corporation, filing a patent is pretty difficult and burdonsome for an individual. And even then actually enforcing it against infringers takes even more money.

The legal basis for why that doesn't apply to software has always seemed specious at best to me.

It's much easier to compare two screw heads and work out who copied who from the dates they were put on the market than it is to work out who invented the flashing icon first. What's more, it's an endless debate as to whether the flashing icon can be traced back to an ATARI 2600 game from 1988 is a prior art.

Furthermore, patent protection must not have a disproportionate effect on the market. A patent and the licensing conditions for a technology such as the seat belt or ABS brakes should not completely prevent other car manufacturers from implementing them.

Software patents are often at the limit of mathematical demonstration, the absence of prior art is difficult to prove and they have disproportionate effects which are exploited by patent trolls. The market is made up of thousands of small studios and independent developers who don't have the means to search for patents. This is not the same as the aerospace market, with 5-6 major manufacturers all backed by law firms specialising in intellectual property and patents.

This has been tested and even the most fervent capitalist thinks it was a bad idea. The only people who really defend software patents are patent trolls.

I suppose there might have been a flurry of scary lawyer letters being sent back and forth and the lawsuit only happened once negotiations broke down.

> A sighting direction within a virtual space is determined based on second operation input in a first mode, a player character is allowed to release an item affecting a field character disposed on a field within a virtual space toward the sighting direction on the basis of third operation input, a sighting direction is determined based on second operation input in a second mode, and the play character is allowed to release a fighting character who fights toward the sighting direction on the basis of the third operation input.

It's also illustrative of the inherent absurdity of software patents—absolutely ridiculous that something so incredibly general could be patented, but here we are.

The text of the patent actually seems more like its based on throwing out your captured pals to fight, not catching them.

Beautiful. I'm rooting for these guys.

I have no faith in the courts, however, and nintendo usually wins these stupid things.

At worst that would just result in that title not being offered for sale in Japan anymore. Remember, as a Japanese lawsuit, this suit's scope is limited to Japan.

It's entirely possible such a move just isn't survivable for the game.

Working with lawyers in my job they made it very clear software patents are a nightmare to enforce. I think Oracle v Google proves this pretty clearly.

It depends which lawyers and which patents. I've see patent trolls win a few times up close. It sort of sucks.

As patents only last 20 years, it should have expired years ago.

My understanding is that the patent must be filed before public demonstration (aka, the release of the game), or within a 1 year grace period, otherwise it's invalid.

No clue.

Need to wait for them to declare what the patents are.

Some of the patents being shown in this thread went into effect after Palworld was revealed (not launched) so there is a lot of unknowns.

Merits of the case? What would the patent rights be, if anyone has looked

Also, apparently some of the relevant patents were filed by Nintendo after the release of Palworld, which makes it even worse. Unfortunately, since the lawsuit was filed in Japan and both companies are japanese, Nintendo will likely win by default.

Patents are somewhat tolerable monopolies: they tend to last only a quarter of our lifetimes. Once they expire, the information is freed from their "ownership".

Nintendo didn't build their fortunes on patents, though. They built it on copyrights. You and I will likely be long dead before those works enter the public domain. If they ever do.

yesterday I've patented "*", yes asterisk aka everything you write, create, your thoughts everything.

So pay up! You must send me $100 for every word here!

I don't want to live in a world where something like this would be considered copyright infringement, something that even Nintendo doesn't seem to focus on (I guess for a reason).

In my non-lawyer opinion, it's in the same vein as saying that DC should sue Marvel over Captain Marvel being a Superman rip-off.

I see no creature design comparisons in links 2-4.

Article 5, wow it's a cartoon sheep. Wow it's a cartoon fox. This list at the end is trying way too hard.

I think what "most people see" is that they're overall similar to pokemon. Not that palworld is copying specific designs in a way that pokemon itself doesn't do.

The latest set of links was to show that a majority of reviews considered PalWorld to be a ripoff of Pokemon.

Anyhow, top voted comment on this whole hacker news article is a satirical article on how PalWorld copied Pokemon characters but added guns, so yeah, you guys claiming it isn't a ripoff have minority viewpoints but you are pretty insistent on it, so have fun with that!

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41588152