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Nintendo applying for anti-Palworld patents in the US with a whopping 22 out of 23 rejected, but "they are fighting"
(www.windowscentral.com)
this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2025
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How does that work exactly? You can't retroactively sue someone over a patent before it was granted... in fact, once you realize the mechanic was already out there, and patent shouldn't be granted at all.
They're just so used to pissing all over everything that they don't realize when they're pissing in the wind and getting it all over their reputation.
I know you mean it well, but... Nintendo was always like this. Like the jokes about the CEO handing the African kid 300 million dollar lawsuit because he drew their console on paper is very old.
Yet people still buy their shit.
They opened the way for all the gaming handhelds, tons of options
Yes, to spread out their business. It's not a nice thing to do, it's logical and calculated move.
I assume that's why there's a 95% rejection rate, they're just fumbling to find any mechanics that haven't already been used in other games.
And even then, the US patent office often will grant unenforceable patents, that then explode in the patent holder's faces the first time they try to use them.
The granted one in this case is about "the process of aiming and capturing characters", which they either had to make so specific as to not apply to anybody else, or general enough that there are piles of prior art out there.
Except anything they try to patent was already done by the GTA V Pokémon mod several years before any 3D Pokémon game
It would take time in the court for people to figure that out and they would use ill-granted patents like a hammer.
Indie: Release a new game with unique catching mechanic
Nintendo: "REEEEEE! We have valid patent, so give us all of your profit, assets plus penalty or we will sue you to make you die poor like that one Gary Bowser over there."
Indie: "WTF?"
Even if Indie developers try to fight in court, they'll spend multiple years, hundred of thousands of dollars in legal fees and on top of that, because Nintendo have a patent that was stupidly granted by patent office, they can argue on a ground that their lawsuit is not frivolous.
Valve almost died as a company, because of those sort of people before if you watched their documentary, they only won, because the mega-corporation emailed about destroying the evidence.
In Japan, the patents they filed for were "extensions" of existing older patents. The new patents "updated" the old patents and could be used as if they filed when the original patent was. So they were able to file patents after Palworld came out, and then sue as if the patents existed before Palworld. Seems like bullshit to me, but I'm not a lawyer.
I don't know if a similar mechanic can be used in the US patent system or not.
The Japanese patent system is so, so much worse than the US one. Where things like what you just described are possible. Honestly, Palworld is probably hosed over there. Palworld made a system years ago, Nintendo then patented it, and Nintendo is going to beat them over the head with their Japanese patent.
In the US, a solid defense to a patent claim is to show prior art. In this case, Palworld's dev can point to Palworld as the prior art if Nintendo sues them; Nintendo's patent existed after Palworld did. Palworld's dev can also point to a giant mountain of prior art of other games that allow one to throw an object to capture a monster.
Like throwing a net to catch a fish?