Former Chief Legal Officer Reveals The Pokémon Company’s Stance on Fan Projects
In a surprising turn of events, a former chief legal officer from The Pokémon Company has opened up about the company’s internal thoughts regarding the takedown of fan projects. Don McGowan, in an interview with Aftermath, shared that, for the time being, the company will not actively go after fan-made games unless they cross a certain threshold.
“We will not immediately request the removal of fan projects. We will instead monitor them and wait to see if they receive any form of crowdfunding, such as Kickstarter. If funding is involved, then we will take action. But ultimately, we do not want to resort to suing fans,” McGowan stated.
McGowan also revealed that the company’s legal team often learns about these fan projects through media reports, sometimes even stumbling upon them on their own. Despite this more lenient approach, there have been numerous instances where Nintendo, the parent company of The Pokémon Company, has intervened in the removal of fan games using their copyrighted properties.
One such case was the fan-developed production tool for creating Pokémon games, which was shut down by Nintendo in 2018. Another notable project that faced the same fate was “Pokémon: Uranium,” a fan game that had been in development for over 9 years before being halted due to Nintendo’s intervention in 2021. Even in 2022, a popular “Pokémon” fan first-person shooter game was forcibly removed from circulation by The Pokémon Company.
Recently, a game titled “Pokémon Pallu” drew attention for its striking similarities to the Pokémon series, garnering significant sales and player numbers. Nintendo issued a statement in response to the game’s success, stating that they would investigate and take action against any potential infringement of their intellectual property rights.
Legal experts interviewed by IGN believe that Nintendo is unlikely to pursue legal action against “Phantom Pallu.” However, when a player created mods to replace characters in the game with Pokémon, Nintendo swiftly issued a copyright warning and demanded their removal.
The evolving landscape of fan projects involving copyrighted properties like Pokémon continues to be a delicate balance between fan creativity and intellectual property rights enforcement. It remains to be seen how companies like The Pokémon Company and Nintendo will navigate this complex issue in the future.