Nearly 6 months later, Palworld devs confirm Nintendo never drew so much as an inch of its legal sword over bootleg Pokémon allegations

GamesSurvival & CraftingPalworldNearly 6 months later, Palworld devs confirm Nintendo never drew so much as an inch of its legal sword over bootleg Pokémon allegationsWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Pocketpair)

Palworld early access

Palworld’s meteoric popularity has naturally settled from its obscene all-time peak of2 million players, which is only natural for a game released in early access—and for any popular game period. No monarch rules forever.

Which all led to a collective pair of clenched cheeks from the internet at-large, as we all wondered whether our big corporate dad was going to beat up our smaller indie dad over sometoo-similar character models. Certainly, while I think Palworld’s designs were very derivative, I’m not sure you could really make the claim they were direct, 1:1 rips—but then again, Nintendo has a reputation for this sort of thing, and its former legal chiefcalled it “ripoff nonsense”.

This isn’t too surprising—after all, the Pokémon Company only promised it was looking into it, and anything further read into that was a function of reputation rather than concrete fact.

Besides, fair use is an important thing. I think Palworld does absolutely draw heavy, let’s call it,inspirationfrom its predecessor: But imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and you could even make the argument that Pokémon was initially “guilty” of similar tricks. I mean, just look at these first-gen designs when compared to Dragon Quest concept art:

At any rate, even if Palworld occasionally brushes a hair too close to justreinventing Mewtwosometimes, I think it’d be a very boring (pal)world if people were never allowed to iterate, even if said iteration is poorly done. Honestly, Palworld’s been upping its design game post-release, anyway: even as someone who wasquite downon the whole thing, I actually like quite a lot of the designs previewed in itsincoming update.

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