Palworld already has a Pokémon mod
UPDATE: "Nintendo has come for me," user says, as footage pulled offline.
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UPDATE 23/1/24: It was inevitable - footage of Palworld's in-progress Pokémon mod is being scrubbed from the internet via copyright strikes.
"Nintendo has come for me, please leave me in your thoughts and prayers," YouTuber Toasted wrote in a post on X today, highlighting the fact that footage of the Palworld Pokémon mod he'd posted yesterday was now no longer visible.
A message replacing the previous post states: "This media has been disabled in response to a report by the copyright owner."
Eurogamer has contacted Nintendo and The Pokémon Company for comment.
ORIGINAL STORY 22/1/24: It was inevitable - someone has already made a Pokémon mod for Palworld on PC.
YouTuber ToastedShoes shared a snippet of the mod in action over on X, showing himself running around as Ash Ketchum while riding, hunting, and setting Pokémon to work.
All of the Pals have been swapped for Pokémon models, and even the other NPCs have been given a makeover. If you ever wanted to see Misty holding a shotgun, or Jessie riding on the head of a gigantic Electabuzz, you're in luck.
ToastedShoes said he'll be releasing a full video of the mod pack on YouTube tomorrow, presumably including information on where to download the mod if possible. If Nintendo didn't already have its eyes on Palworld for its rather similar monster designs, it probably does now.
Developer Pocketpair has responded to allegations of intellectual property infringement, stating it had "no intention" of doing so.
Despite the backlash to the resemblance of Palworld's Pals to existing Pokémon designs, Palworld has had a huge launch weekend. The game has sold 5m copies in three days, not accounting for players who have jumped into the game via Xbox. On Steam, it's joined the likes of Baldur's Gate 3 and Elden Ring as one of the few games to hit a million concurrent players.
The popularity of Palworld has caused the game some problems too. Its servers buckled at launch which Pocketpair put down to "large amounts of concurrent players". Players are now discovering differences between the Steam and Xbox versions of the game, which Pocketpair says is due to waiting on Microsoft for certification.