Nintendo’s litigation towards Palworld developer Pocketpair is turning into more and more sophisticated by the day, with one latest patent granted to the Pokemon franchise now beneath evaluation by the US.
In line with a new Games Fray report, the brand new head of the US Patent and Trademark Workplace (USPTO), John A. Squires, has ordered a reexamination of Nintendo’s Patent No. 12,403,397. Filed in January 2023, granted to Nintendo in September 2025, and dubbed the ‘397 patent, the itemizing is oftentimes oversimplified to “summoning characters and making them battle.” It is for that reason that Squires’s workplace is in search of to find out if such a characteristic is even patentable.
“I’ve decided that substantial new questions of patentability have arisen as to claims 1, 13, 25, and 26 of U.S. Patent No. 12,403,397 B2 (the ‘397 patent’),” Squires wrote in his order, citing two older purposes filed by Konami in 2002 (Yabe) and Nintendo in 2019 (Taura) as justification for the patent’s reexamination. “Thus, an affordable examiner would think about every of Yabe and Taura to be vital in deciding whether or not the claims are patentable, and Yabe and Taura every elevate a considerable new query of patentability. I hereby order [the] reexamination of the ‘397 patent.”
Konami’s Yabe patent revolves round a sub-character battling with you both mechanically or manually. Nintendo’s Taura patent refers back to the identical factor.
So, in Squires’s view, Nintendo’s ‘397 patent would not represent the “prior artwork” argument the corporate put forth towards Palworld as a result of video games that got here out earlier than the patent was filed and awarded contradict that. The “summon character and let it battle” mechanic is an oversimplification of the patent’s language, with The Verge describing it as nearer to Pokemon Scarlet and Violet’s “auto-battling” system. Nevertheless, with different video games just like the Digimon franchise, the Persona collection, and even Elden Ring letting you summon characters that battle alongside you, Squires needs to relitigate what precisely is patentable within the first place.
Nintendo has two months to answer the USPTO’s order. Video games Fray believes there will not be any extra authorized developments this 12 months, however choices are anticipated to be made subsequent 12 months, with presiding choose and chief of Tokyo District Courtroom’s patent division, Motoyuki Nakashima, being intently watched for a ruling.