Welcome to Inside Games Daily, the only gaming news show brave enough to buy a Switch 2 while Nintendo’s actively smothering PAL World with a pillow. That’s right, everyone. Check your emails. You might have the opportunity to buy a fancy new console from just a company that’s involved in one of the weirder lawsuits I think we’ve seen across video games. Yeah, Nintendo sued PAL World publisher Pocket Pair in Tokyo District Court back in September of 2024. This is weird because it’s a patent suit and not a copyright suit. So, based around patented gameplay mechanics rather than the most striking similarity between the two, the aesthetic of the character designs between Pokémon and Pal World. Yeah, that’s the that’s the lawsuit I think everyone was expecting. Instead, Nintendo suing like, “Oh, the mechanic of throwing a ball.” Yeah, that’s been around, so it didn’t make sense right on the surface. Uh, Pocket Payer posted a public statement on May 8th today, just very, very recently, acknowledging that its ongoing legal proceedings with Nintendo are linked to gameplay features that they have and are removing from the game. Uh, they acknowledge, quote, how difficult it is to be fully transparent while litigation is ongoing before explaining that they quote have had to make certain compromises in order to avoid disruptions to the development and distribution of POW World. Yeah. First, this is in the past. The 0.3.11 patch released on November 30th, 2024, removed the ability to summon pals by throwing pal spheres. Instead, they just kind of pop up right next to you. Okay. At the time, people guessed it might be because of that. Uh, even the statement itself was like, “Yeah, you thought this was why, it was why.” Ah, okay. All right. And now, patch 0.5.5 removes the ability to glide with a PAL. This is a really weird one. and instead replacing it with a glider item. Yeah, like another Nintendo game that apparently is not a problem. Apparently, you keep all your PAL buffs, so like mechanics wise, it’s the same. It’s just visually you’re not hanging on to a giant fuzzy bear flying around the place. So, weird situation. Yeah. Yeah. Here’s another statement from uh Pocket Pair about this. We understand that this will be disappointing for many just as it is for us, but we hope our fans understand these changes are necessary in order to prevent further disruptions to the development of POW World. Yeah, this this whole situation is curious cuz I’m always I feel like uh maybe this is the American mindset, but usually when you’re involved in a lawsuit, you say nothing at all cuz you don’t want anything to be you don’t want any record to be used against you or any admission of anything to be twisted and contorted by a good lawyer to mean something that you didn’t intend or that you accidentally did intend. Yeah, the fact that they would say it and disclose it publicly like this pretty interesting to me. We also have some information about the case itself thanks to some preparatory briefs that were filed in February and reported on in April. Yeah, this is fun because it’s it’s the most logical thing in the world. Pocket Pair’s defense is straightforward given that Nintendo is suing on patent, like we said, and not copyright. The two biggest defenses are this. The patents Nintendo claims to own and is suing over existed before Nintendo claims to have invented them. This is I mean on record and has been for years and years and years and everybody’s been saying it. So, it’s kind of an interesting thing that Nintendo’s still suing on the basis of that. The other part of their defense, or the biggest part, there are there are even more that just go back and back, but the other big part is that there are numerous other and very high-profile games on the market now that openly use all the mechanics Nintendo is suing PAL World over. So, they’re saying, I guess, you don’t even own the patents that you’re suing us over, and even if you did, we’re not actually violating them anyway. Okay, and here’s the weirdest part because this whole thing is so weird. Nintendo and the Pokémon Company are seeking 5 million yen damages each, plus late payment damages. Now, that sounds like a lot, but Lawrence, what actually is it? Yeah, my eyes went over that and I was like, “Oh, wow.” And then I was like, “Wait a minute.” No. 10 million yen is 68.5,000. $68,500 for for one of the world’s maybe the world’s largest brand ever. It is. Yeah, it is. Uh, this doesn’t make any sense. Uh, Pal World’s official X account posted that the game had reached 32 million players in February, which is great. I think a lot of people wanted Pal World to succeed because it’s an indie company and indie published the whole deal, you know. So, uh, this is kind of thrown a wrench in that whole thing. They’re they’re a verifiable success and yet Nintendo’s going after them for 68 grand. I I’m not a lawyer, you know. Uh, I’m a video gamesman. Um, but as as far as I can tell, like this is this is one of those cases where winning or losing is not about 68K. There’s so much more money tied to all of this that establishing precedent is the more important thing, which is, and again, not a lawyer, but I can see the logic a bit about why Nintendo did not sue over the grounds of copyright. Because if they lost and a court said, “No, like those little cute monsters belong to the world.” Boom. Like Nintendo bet the farm on this little thing. If they sue on copyright or if they sue on patent, excuse me, they sue on game mechanic. Who cares if they lose because it’s not a real case in the first place. Oh, I also saw this is super interesting. I saw there’s a legal website uh Games Fray posted a number of very interesting breakdowns of this case. One of the things they noticed is that Nintendo is snapping up US patents on the same kinds of things. They’re going around and grabbing them all, anything connected to Pokémon. So they might be gearing up for a US case. So that to me the narrative is okay, they’ll do this bunk case in Japan with no real stakes just to throw a wrench in their gears and see how they react. If they lose the case in Japan, they’ll just sue in US court again for the same thing. They lose that one, who cares cuz it’s all just punitive. And if they lose, they’re not losing anything. Uh and they’re just kind of dragging they’re for they’re like attaching some uh some weights to a competitor that they want to slap down a little bit. This is a You’re right on, Lawrence. I I think the like you said, establishing precedent is the right way to do this because it’s not about money, obviously. I am not also not a lawyer. It’s very important to note that we’re all just, you know, sort of grasping in the dark here, but Nintendo’s got a lot of lawyers on retainer. So, they’re paying these people to do nothing generally speaking. So, when they can, you know, mobilize them and go do something, then hey, maybe they could do it. Like it’s it’s like cuz I think people maybe would would think to themselves why is why does Nintendo want to spend millions of dollars? Ah they’ve already got these people ready to go. It’s like they just you fire them up and then they go out and you know spend an extra million or two. Totally worth it to establish the precedent for their trillion dollar Pokemon brand. Uh so I don’t know that’s I this is a kind of an interesting outlier in the sense that this doesn’t really feel I know it seems like it’s not about money but it truly is about money in the future. This is it’s it’s about like they’re thinking in the in the in the you know grand scheme of things in the billions of dollars range, not in the millions of dollars range. They’re not trying to sue Pocket Pair into the ground or anything like that. They don’t care. I’m sure Pocket Pair made them upset because Pow World popped off, but like Lawrence said, they’re making sure that no other company can do this, which I don’t even know if they can really do that. I don’t know if they can really say nobody can have monsters in balls. Like I don’t know if that’s a thing. They can make it an unviable business prospect to try to make a ball monster game. Uh and I think that’s what they’re trying to do. Something else occurred to me and I don’t know if this is just me seeing patterns where there are none, but I feel like Nintendo only gets this sensitive when they have a product like this that’s about to come around. Um and I’m linking that to a couple things. They went after emulators pretty hard right before like pretty close to before they announced that like Switch One games would run way better on a Switch 2. Uh this is a bit of a stretch, but they did go after a lot of like Nintendo music YouTube channels a little bit before they announced their own music app. So I feel like they have a way of sort of legally going out into the world and locking down territory before they move into it. Now, I wonder then, does that mean that uh Game Freak is working on a Pokemon game that’s very similar to Pal World? And Nintendo was like, “Shit, they like they they they have that out there. It’s like 5 years before.” Well, not that Game Freak works on any game for 5 years. Let’s say more like uh jeez, two years. Uh maybe they do have a Switch 2 game, Pokemon game that is kind of like Pow World and uh it was in it was in the works and Nintendo knew the the functional scope of that game and they saw the similarities and they were like, “Uh-oh, we have to make sure that this this Pokemon game is the best game like this on the market.” And if Pal World’s already there and maybe as good or even a little bit better, then Nintendo has a reason to want to go out there and like lock that territory down cuz yeah, it’s uh that’s all I can figure. And that doesn’t, you know, it doesn’t make it right or wrong. I’m just like you said, Bruce, you know, there’s very smart people that are just sitting around all day studying law and waiting for the chance to put these things into practice. Uh they’re not dumb. So to me, the the question is always like, why now? You know, why what what’s the version of events that makes sense and fits a pattern? That’s a that’s an excellent thought. I had not even thought of that. Uh because it’s funny because Game Freak released that openw world Pokemon game. I mean, Arus, what was that a year, two years ago? It was trash. Uh, but people bought it in droves. They sold, you know, whatever, 10 million copies or something. It went crazy. So, maybe they’re upgrading Arus and making a better one for Switch 2, which which that’s a a fantastic supposition. I really think so. Lawrence, I think you’re right on. I think they’re going to do it uh probably sooner rather than later. Um, and this sounds ridiculous. I can’t I don’t even want to say this out loud to Nintendo, but Nintendo, I promise Pal World’s not going to take a bite out of your open world Pokemon game. Like, they might maybe take away like a 100,000 sales or something. Like, it’s like nothing compared to what they’re actually going to sell for an open world Pokemon game on a Nintendo system. So, I know that that sounds ridiculous to a, you know, billion-dollar company that literally is squeezing every single penny out of every single person, but there is room in the market for PAL World and for also your open world Pokemon game that’s uh made by Game Freak that’s trash. So, but we’ll sell a million. Totally agree. Um, for some reason I can imagine with perfect clarity in my head, a a Japanese executive that with absolute certainty needs Nintendo to be the only game in town where you can hold on to a Pokemon and fly. I don’t want that’s ours. And yeah, so that it’s a weird world out there, man. I don’t know. But Pal World on Switch 2, that’d be cool. Do you think it’s ever going to happen? Well, Pal World on Switch 2. No, I mean, maybe not for a few years. That might be a little bit before they figure that one out. Um, but I think a safe bet is is another open world Pokemon game on Switch 2. That’s that’s a very safe bet. Uh, and then I think Lawrence is correct. I think they’re going out there to uh I guess to glass the glass the sand before they release this game. Um, which is too bad cuz I mean Powerorld really did a good job of of making these mechanics actually work versus Arus. So yeah. Uh gosh. Well, let’s throw back to everyone’s favorite Pokemon. Uh, Gex the Gecko. Yes, he’s cool. He’s hot. He’s in a new trailer. It’s today’s Inside Games trailer select. It’s a minute long, and all it does is tell you that Gex Trilogy will be widescreen and have analog controls. But we we love any chance we have to celebrate gaming’s favorite platforming mascot, Gex. There’s a very important uh disclosure I want to make here, Lawrence, is that I uh am reporting on this trailer, but I did not watch it. And I want everybody to know that I didn’t watch it. I’m very embarrassed. I actually haven’t played a Gex video game in my life, so it works out. Um, we’d like to shout out a special patron uh for the Inside Games Patreon that just so happens to be the Inside Games community number one Gex enthusiast. That’s E Compton. Uh E Compton, I know this for a fact because I see them in my streams. I see them in Lawrence’s streams. They are the number one Gex enthusiast. always talking about Gex. Um, and they are just always posting about it.