Palworld Accused of Plagiarising Pokémon as Game Sells 6 Million Copies 6a3u1r Pocketpair CEO Responds

A on social media platform X compared in-game 3D models from both Palworld and Pokémon, claiming evidence of plagiarism. 3i5t6c

Written by Manas Mitul | Updated: 23 January 2024 14:52 IST

Palworld Accused of Plagiarising Pokémon as Game Sells 6 Million Copies, Pocketpair CEO Responds

Photo Credit: Pocketpair 7a2a

Gamers allege that Palworld's creature designs are similar to Pokémon

Highlights

Palworld is currently the most played game on Steam
The game features Pokémon-style creatures that can be captured
Palworld director said that the developers had received death threats

ment

mon games. A on social media platform X has gone as far as to compare in-game 3D models from both Palworld and Pokémon, claiming evidence of outright plagiarism.

Palworld features Pokémon-style animals, or Pals, that can be captured and utilised for combat, traversal and base building in the game's open world. Gamers and commentators have even called the new survival title from Pocketpair “Pokémon with Guns.” Some, however, have gone beyond the claims of Palworld's creatures being inspired by or satirising cute pocket monsters from the iconic Game Freak franchise and levelled accusations of plagiarising in-game assets.

On Sunday, X @byofrog posted side-by-side mesh comparisons for character models from both Palworld and Pokémon games, first highlighting the similarities between a creature from the newly released game and the Cinderace model from Pokémon Sword and Shield. The went on to post several other side-by-side comparisons, sparking more copycat accusations against Pocketpair. Since Palworld's January 19 early access release, gamers and game developers have engaged in intense discourse over the game's perceived Pokémon inspirations, with some alleging plagiarism and others defending the developers.

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The #palworld meshes are not node-for-node the same, but they're really close. #pokemon pic.twitter.com/GZGUaSnuNG
— byo (@byofrog) January 21, 2024

A former game designer at Blizzard, Eric Covington, quoted one of @byofrog's comparison posts and claimed that the close similarity seen between character models couldn't be accidental. “To “accidentally” create a complex model mesh with so near-exact proportions is practically impossible. To repeat that improbability throughout your roster… doesn't the sniff test,” he Rust. “As a game designer, I'm baffled that some say this is lazy. Even if you copy an idea from another game you can just copy/paste it. Even doing a sequel to your own game with the same programmer in a new engine, it takes crazy amount of time to develop a viable V2.0 of a mechanic,” Bakaba said in one of his posts.

Yeah, I'm surprised by how quickly this is escalating. I'll try to organize my own hot take-ish thoughts in a thread, separating concept, execution, and dev. First: it's not a Pokemon-like game. Digimon is. And even if it was, so what? (cries in FPS, BRs, Souls, hero shooters...) https://t.co/6jnWkfiANE
— Dinga Bakaba (@DBakaba) January 21, 2024

X @byofrog also went on to qualify his posts comparing Palworld and Pokémon in a later post, saying the 3D models from the two games weren't identical, despite close resemblances. "I want to emphasize that while some elements are similar these meshes are not literally "exact" copies of each other," they said.

Meanwhile, game director and Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe responded to the plagiarism accusations on X Monday, claiming the team had received what appeared to be death threats on the socil media platform. “I have received a variety of opinions regarding Palworld, but all productions related to Palworld are supervised by multiple people, including myself, and I am responsible for the production,” Mizobe said in his post (translated from Japanese). “I would appreciate it if you would refrain from slandering the artists involved in Palworld.”

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What are the most exciting titles that gamers can look forward to in 2023? We discuss some of our favourites on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

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Palworld 5c4q4e

KEY SPECS
NEWS

Genre Action-Adventure

Platform Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X, PC: Windows

Modes Single-player, Multiplayer

More Pocket Pair Games

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Further reading: PC

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In his time as a journalist, Manas Mitul has written on a wide spectrum of beats including politics, culture and sports. He enjoys reading, walking around in museums and rewatching films. Talk to Manas about football and tennis, but maybe don’t bring up his video game backlog. More