If Palworld devs were as petty as I am they’d probably make a Pal that looks like an obese and hostile Pikachu with a Mario hat.
- Name: Renjiyu / レンヂユ; after a really shitty Mandarin joke with Nintendo’s name (basically calling it hell’s company).
- It would make a noise that sounds a lot like uttaeru / 訴える “to sue, to complain” with an incredibly whiny voice
- Drop: meat and sulphur (the in-game sulphur looks a lot like fool’s gold)
- “Utility”: when it’s running around your base, Renjiyu makes your pals drop whatever they are doing to listen to its ramblings. As in, negative utility.
Bonus points if the logo in the hat resembles a pokeball from a distance.
This sounds awesome; requesting permission to use it if Palworld doesn’t? It’s for a book.
requesting permission to use it if Palworld doesn’t? It’s for a book.
You’re welcome to use this idea for whatever reason you want, mate.
This game is still in early access so I hope this is only temporary and they will retool this to not be similar to Pokemon. There’s no way this will be final right…?? No summon animation at all??!
Worried what this means for Nexomon 3
How do Japanese patents differ from USA/CAN? My general understanding of patents is that they expire after 20 years - Pokemon is older than that. Do Japanese patents have a longer duration? Did Nintendo patent a game later than the originals?
You wouldn’t patent the “game” you’d patent the various forms of utility or designs within that game. So throwing a sphere at a life form to then capture it could be one patent, but maybe then you’d also file another patent to cover keeping it alive and caring for it inside the ball habitat. You might file the second off of what is called a continuation filling and in combination, as you need both actions to get the full effect, you might get a bit of extended coverage in practice.
But the bigger thing here would probably be trademark law, which is a whole different beast.
I’m not patent savvy - of they are only granted this year (as a point of origin for the patents’ eventually expiry), wouldn’t the years of previous Pokemon games invalidate these patents due to prior art?
If they were related to the original games, yes it would. The patents were about 3d worlds though. I believe the palworld beta was before these patents were filed, so there would be a strong case to invalidate them. It probably won’t happen, because Nintendo’s proposed damages was basically pocket change compared to a legal battle.
What a sad sad outcome. Patenting game mechanics should not be legal.
It’s still somewhat protected in the US. The big one in table top gaming was tap mechanics from Magic. That expired in 2014 though. In video games the Nemesis system from Shadow of Mordor/war is also patented.
Loading screen mini games are also patented. That’s why loading screens never have mini games. Less of an issue now that game devs have begun avoiding loading screens, but they were extremely common in older generations and they never had mini games to pass the time.
Erm, acktchually! I think Nintendo is pretty cringe here, not based!
(Sorry, I couldn’t resist)
