Nintendo Just Patented A Core Game Mechanic Seen In Dozens Of Games

palworld vs nintendo 1
By Andrés AquinoNight Editor

palworld vs nintendo 1

Nintendo isn’t happy with putting down games like Palworld; they want to put a chokehold on the entire industry. According to GamesFray (via Windows Central), Nintendo was granted a patent that basically gives them ownership over the mechanic of summoning a secondary character to fight an opponent.

Projects like Palworld have had to constantly change features within the game to avoid a never-ending losing battle against the juggernaut that is Nintendo and The Pokémon Company. The most recent controversy involved Pocketpair having to change their flight mechanic, giving players a glider rather than using their monster companions, as that was deemed too similar to what you could do in Pokémon with the Fly move.

Pokemon Legends Z A combat
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Credit: Nintendo
Nintendo owns this concept now

This new patent, number 12,403,397, looks even more egregious. According to documents shared by GamesFray, the ability to summon a character to fight another is a somewhat common mechanic. The patent states the following:

  • You can move your main character in a virtual space
  • You can summon a secondary character (called “sub character”)
  • If there’s an enemy present, the summoned character fights it (automatically or player-controlled)
  • If there isn’t, the summoned character can still move and fight

That sounds incredibly general. Like, does the MegaMan Battle Network series fall under this category, considering you control Lan Hikari, who uses his personal NaVi, MegaMan, to fight other enemies? What about the Like a Dragon franchise? In Infinite Wealth, you can unlock a whole job archetype directly inspired by this summoning mechanic called Sujimancer.

Of course, this should strike fear (sadly) into Palworld developers. It’s no secret that Nintendo doesn’t really want Pocketpair’s game to resemble or remind fans of Pokémon, and with this patent (which was initially filed in 2023 and granted this past September 2) now in the company’s possession, it’ll remain to be seen if they take legal action against the Japanese studio.

And that’s it. Stick with us at Gfinityesports.com: your best source for all things Palworld.