New Pokémon and Zelda Hybrid Poised to Infuriate Nintendo’s Legal Team More Than Palworld

If there was ever an opportune moment to launch a bargain-bin fusion of Nintendo’s most iconic franchises, it might be right now. As the Japanese gaming titan prepares for a high-stakes legal confrontation with the U.S. government over trade tariffs, some developers are clearly hoping that Nintendo’s counsel is too preoccupied with federal briefs to notice a Pokémon-inspired survival title featuring a Breath of the Wild-style protagonist surfacing on Steam.

Enter Pickmon, a recently unveiled “multiplayer open-world survival crafter” developed by PocketGame and published by NETWORKGO, the team behind the obscure fantasy project Hainya World. Despite the game’s brazen similarities to Nintendo’s intellectual property, PocketGame has already debuted a trailer ahead of its yet-to-be-announced launch date. It is a bold move, to say the least.

According to the game’s Steam page, players will navigate a sprawling, prehistoric continent littered with the ruins of ancient civilizations and inhabited by “Pickmon.” Much like the Palworld formula, players collaborate with these creatures to engage in combat, harvest resources, manage farms, and establish what the developers describe as “industrial empires.”

In a likely attempt to circumvent the inevitable legal scrutiny, the game employs a card-based mechanic for taming its monsters. While Nintendo is famously litigious, they don’t hold a monopoly on card-based taming systems. However, Blizzard Entertainment might have a bone to pick, as a character bearing an uncanny resemblance to Overwatch’s Roadhog makes a baffling appearance in the reveal trailer.

Nintendo is historically intolerant of projects that tread too heavily upon its creative territory. The company is currently embroiled in a high-profile lawsuit against Pocketpair, the creators of Palworld, alleging patent infringement related to the core mechanics of monster-taming. However, Nintendo’s legal shield has shown some vulnerabilities recently. In late 2025, after Japanese regulators rejected Nintendo’s efforts to patent specific creature-capture mechanics, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office took the rare step of re-evaluating an existing Nintendo patent.

Simultaneously, Nintendo is battling the U.S. executive branch in the Court of International Trade. The company is challenging the legality of tariffs imposed under the Trump administration, arguing that the duties were applied unlawfully via the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Nintendo is currently seeking full refunds, with interest, for the tariffs it paid as an importer.

While the gaming giant is a formidable legal opponent, it isn’t undefeated. Earlier this year, a local grocery store in Costa Rica named “Super Mario” successfully defended its trademark against Nintendo’s corporate lawyers. Nevertheless, given the company’s aggressive history and its current focus on monster-taming clones, the long-term viability of Pickmon remains questionable. View the trailer while it’s still online.

Source: Polygon