Shouldn't take them long to patent the concept of "game".
this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2025
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They're going for the jugular. They gonna patent electricity
Shouldn't it be trivially easy to demonstrate "prior art" in this case, making the patent invalid? I guess that requires someone to get into a legal battle with Nintendo... but it's not like this is some niche mechanic. Surely there are other entertainment megacorps who are currently in violation of this "patent" and do have the resources to fight it in court.
Patent laws in Japan don't work the same way as they do in most of the world. And they can only enforce their patent on companies operating in Japan.
The whole Palworld situation was based on patents that Nintendo only applied for after Palworld was already released.
This patent was granted in the US.
In the US, yes. In Japan, it would appear such a concept does not exist.
They were granted the patent in the US in this case.
Indeed. The sources I've read seem to lay blame with games not usually patenting mechanics (which apparently is all patent officers look at for prior art, not other games), meaning it needs active challenging to be thrown out.
PocketPair is based in Japan, which is where the previous, more directly problematic patents have been filed mid-litigation. While there is clearly prior art for the US patent, it isn't quite as comically broad as the Japan ones, and since Japan doesn't seem to care about prior art, those remain the most concerning to me.
My first instinct is Activision. They got Hearthstone, World of Warcraft, Skylanders, and to a lesser extent Sekiro
Yeah, Activision was my first thought as well.
They'll ask Nintendo for use and they'll pay for it
I find it doubtful they'll successfully enforce this in court. But you never know.
The fact that this patent was issued is further proof our "intellectual property" laws and such are fucking broken to all hell, in any case.
Final Fantasy VIII, why are you crying?
Fuck Nintendo, and fuck US copyright
copyright
This isn't a copyright, but rather a patent.
Same shit, different spicing.
Arguably copyright is worse.
People literally die of preventable diseases due to patents. I can't find any news regarding the last time some nutjob died because they couldn't torrent Sham'alyan's Avatar movie.
A fair point but I was meaning from a cultural vandalism angle.
I don’t know what went wrong that such a patent was granted. I absolutely loathe IP people.
Someone got paid, guaranteed.
This patent could have a chilling effect, but there's no way it would stand up in court. They can still use it as a bargaining chip. Court cases are expensive. And if you don't have a legal department, they are also a personal drain. But that's small fry. Financially, I don't believe it makes sense for them to resort to criminality to get such a patent. Maybe they hope it will influence their court case in Japan against Palworld?
Sort of the point though. If they take a small creator to court, they can just bankrupt them through expensive legal proceedings, and because they do have the patents the judge is unlikely to throw the case out
Yes, absolutely. And there is money in patent trolling. I just don't see the business case here. Why damage the Nintendo brand with such shenanigans when you could leave the patent trolling to some formally independent company. Maybe I just underestimate how much money can be made by shaking down small devs.
What damage? Its been known for years what a scummy company Nintendo is and people still buy their games and consoles in the millions. The fans will just say that Nintendo is in the right and move on
Someone's about to get chocobo-kicked:
FF3 on the NES had summoning too
Onion Knights, assemble!
Macintosh Chess breaks this patent.