The modder who put Pokémon into Palworld has claimed “Nintendo has come for me” after a takedown of a post on X.
Creator ToastedShoes went on the platform to tease a mod for Palworld with a clip of Ash Ketchum in place of the player character, in addition to famous Pokémon like Pikachu substituting Pals.
Pocket Pair, the developer of Palworld, has been under scrutiny for the game’s creatures being eerily similar to Pokémon. The studio has insisted the game is more akin to survival crafting experiences like Valheim and Ark: Survival Evolved rather than Pokémon. However, this has not stopped people from continuing to attack the game, essentially labeling it “Pokémon with guns”.
Within just a day of ToastedShoes’ post going live, it was struck down by an apparent Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown from Nintendo, which publishes the Pokémon video games.
In an interview with IGN, ToastedShoes has refuted he is still planning to publish a full video of the mod, but will comply with Nintendo’s copyright notices. “We would love to complete the mod pack and release it for free to the public, however for now we are playing it by ear as we don’t want any legal trouble”, he said.
There has been significant debate online about legal action being taken on Palworld. Takuro Mizobe, Pocket Pair’s CEO, told Automaton that Palworld has cleared all legal reviews, and there has been no action taken against it by other companies.
Mizobe said, “We make our games very seriously, and we have absolutely no intention of infringing upon the intellectual property of other companies.”
A representative from Nintendo first told Bloomberg it refused to comment on individual cases like Palworld, despite being aware of the game. Less than a week later, The Pokémon Company came out and made an official statement that it intends to investigate.
Don McGowan, ex-head of the legal team for The Pokémon Company for nearly 12 years, told Game File: “This looks like the usual rip off nonsense that I would see a thousand times a year when I was Chief Legal Officer of Pokémon.”
Palworld has been a monumental success, breaking historical records on Steam by landing in the top 5 highest number of concurrent players for a title.