Nintendo and The Pokemon Company's controversial summoning and battling patent is being re-examined by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, in a rare decision one patent expert speculates could have been influenced by public backlash.
While Nintendo and The Pokemon Company's patent infringement lawsuit against Palworld developer Pocketpair is still ongoing in Japan, meanwhile, in the US, the two companies recently fell into the spotlight for a separate controversial patent, 12,403,397. The patent – which is rather broad, and describes the idea of summoning "sub-characters" to fight either manually or automatically in battle – raised concerns regarding the potential impact that might be had on other games should Nintendo choose to enforce it. Now, though, the USPTO's director has ordered that this patent be re-examined, citing examples of prior art that may prove the idea wasn't unique or novel enough to be patented in the first place.
