It only took a few months for the legal battle between Nintendo and Pocketpair to begin to profoundly affect the gameplay of Palworld. Following the announcement of the lawsuit on September 18, 2024, a first major change was implemented on November 30, 2024. The animation for summoning creatures via a throw of Pal Spheres was then replaced by a simple appearance alongside the player character. This sudden and unexpected redesign pointed to a conflict of interest with the famous Pokéballs from the Pokémon franchise, information now confirmed in a new press release from the studio.
This Thursday, May 8, 2025, the teams in charge of Palworld wanted to provide some clarification regarding the progress of their lawsuit against Nintendo. “We would like to express our sincere gratitude and appreciation for the continued support of our fans over the past few months. We apologize for not being able to share as much information as we would like, but we are confident that our fans understand how difficult it is to be fully transparent while litigation is ongoing” can be read in the introduction to the message published on X (formerly Twitter). Unfortunately for Palworld fans, the tone used and the information shared in the rest of the press release suggest that Pocketpair is in trouble with the law.
Palworld will never be the same again
The censorship of Pal Spheres was only the first step in the dismantling of Palworld. “As many have assumed, these changes (those applied to the Spheres last year, editor’s note) are indeed the result of the ongoing litigation,” Pocketpair states in its message to the community. Now, another mechanic has also had to be replaced to avoid any complications. “We regret to inform our players that with the implementation of patch v0.5.5, we have to make another compromise. Starting with this patch, gliding will be performed using a glider rather than Pals,” the developers explain. Some creatures will continue to provide passive boosts to glide more efficiently, but the presence of a glider in the inventory will now be mandatory in order to use this movement ability. “We understand that this will be disappointing to many, as it is to us, but we hope our fans understand that these changes are necessary to avoid further disruption to Palworld’s development,” the studio said. This mechanic is not instinctively associated with the Pokémon franchise, but was indeed introduced in the Scarlet and Purple versions via the Legendary Pokémon Koraidon and Miraidon. Where the conflict of interest with Pal Spheres seems obvious, this new change suggests that any resemblance to Game Freak’s games will be hunted down and removed, until Palworld is a mere shadow of its former self. Depending on how this situation develops, the future of Pocketpair’s title could well be sealed in the coming months. Will we ever see the color of the mobile version of the game, developed in partnership with Krafton, the studio behind PUBG Mobile? To be continued.
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