With the recent indie game Palworld that released it has a lot of people in an uproar as it looks so similar to Pokemon, to the point that so many Pals look like Pokemon in recent games that fans have been making videos to show the resemblance. However, a recent interview shares that a past Pokemon lawyer has some information of how The Pokemon Company looks like lawsuits.
Don McGowan, a former chief legal officer for the franchise shared that during his active time at the company, they never seemed out to sue or shut down projects that were made by fans, but would only do so if a certain line was crossed with the project.
“You don’t send a takedown right away,” is what McGowan said. “You wait to see if they get funded, for a Kickstarter or similar. If they get funded then that’s when you engage. No one likes suing fans.”
He went on to share that they only way they normally found out about these fan-made projects is when they would get sent something. “I would be sitting in my office minding my own business when someone from the company would send me a link to a news article, or I would stumble across it myself.”
It is interesting to hear considering other franchises almost seem to sue no matter what the project is, but The Pokemon Company seems laidback to a certain degree until the financial lines are crossed, but this also seems to be because they don’t know the fan-made products exist until then.