Without a doubt, Patents and Software are a bad mix.

But there’s definitely a truth to the idea that Palworld in particular were aiming for a legal battle against Nintendo from the beginning with provocative action. There’s a reason why Nintendo has rarely gone after Pokemon-likes but have decided that this particular company is worth pursuing.

This is kind of a lose-lose situation. Palworld was clearly kit-bashing existing Pokemon models and were engaging in creative bankruptcy, but software/game patents serve only to hurt creatives and developers around the world and Japan in particular is poor around SLAP suits.

So, I agree, grab the popcorn. But I hope that whatever patents they’re choosing to enforce here don’t have a major ripple in game development as a whole. There’s a world with the brazen IP theft of palworld actually does us all a disservice by making it an easier case for Nintendo to enforce Patents that would otherwise be unenforceable or difficult purely out of optics.