The US Patent Office has just revoked a summoning patent used by Pokémon, but it might not be the game changer everyone thinks it is.
First off, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company did not and could not patent the idea of summoning a creature to fight for you. With the way patents work, they have to file a patent for a specific expression of that idea that can be called unique.
As explained by PC Gamer, Nintendo filed such a patent for summoning Pokémon last year, but that was just revoked after reexamination. This decision is not final and Nintendo has two months to respond.
As Nintendo Patents Watch explained on his end, the Japanese patent was also temporarily rejected after a 3rd party submitted prior art to attack both the US and Japanese patent. Nintendo’s Japan patent is effective again after amendment, and that could make the USPTO’s action ineffective.
If Nintendo doesn’t defend their patent in the US, the USPTO will still have to honor Japan patents, based on their membership in the World Intellectual Property Organization, as well as US-Japan IP treaties.
Having said that, we do expect Nintendo will respond shortly.