There’s a bit of controversy going around in the gaming world surrounding Palworld, the newly launched hit from Pocketpair.
Old tweets posted by the company’s CEO resurfaced, and they apparently confirm that the developers used AI to generate Pokemon lookalikes for their game.
This, of course, adds fuel to the fire of using AI for copyright infringement – and we’ve seen quite a bit of drama lately, with The New York Times suing ChatGPT creators, Open AI, over copyright infringement, but also artists suing AI engines on similar claims.
Does Palworld really use AI-generated characters? And why does it matter?
While it is difficult to say whether or not AI was used to create the Pals in Palworld, the company’s CEO claims that all the in-game characters were created by the company and no AI was used.
His comments were published on the company’s blog which is in Japanese, but you can check out the translation here.
Here is the statement that matters:
“I didn’t understand that, so I casually started making a monster collecting game as a 3D action game. I noticed this after I started making it. It took a month to make one Pal … just the 3D model …”
The old tweets that he posted were quoted out of context, made to seem like indeed the CEO claimed that AI is used to create the in-game characters. Here is what the tweets said (it was posted back in 2021):
“The AI has evolved so much that I can no longer tell which one is a Pokemon.”
Another tweet from 2022 read:
“If you pass it through the filter of AI, the image is often not of a specific thing, so maybe the copyright issue will be resolved? In about 30 years, the general public’s perception of copyright may have changed considerably.”
Based on these tweets, some members of the gaming community started to believe that the game’s own characters were also built using AI.
And since AI can’t create unique works of art, but takes “inspiration” from existing works, this can indeed be considered copyright infringement.
But is it the AI that matters?
I believe that the problem is not whether or not AI was used to create the said characters. People seem to be enraged over this.
But what it no AI was used, yet the characters are still very similar to those in Pokemon (or any other game)? Does it make it OK if humans created them from scratch?
Related reading: How to use the Palworld Condenser to infuse Pals.
There is no doubt that Palworld’s Pals are created to at least make you think about Pokemon. You also have “shiny” versions (which are called “lucky Pals” in the game), you have similar mechanics, like capturing them by throwing Pal spheres…
And the list goes on…
AI or not, it’s pretty obvious that the game took inspiration from Pokemon. You can see that on our list of games like Palworld too.
But this is not the only game that did it. There are plenty of less successful copies or clones or games that resemble other successful ones.
It’s just the way our society works nowadays: whenever a successful product is launched, there will be many who will try to milk the same cow.
I can only remember the days of Flappy Bird’s success on mobile. The game took the world by storm when it was released, eventually making its creator pull it off from the mobile stores.
But tons of similar games (some basically identical) popped up afterwards.
The same goes with Minecraft Clones. Fall Guys and Stumble Guys. And there are tons of examples out there.
Sure, AI could make it infinitely easier to create such clones, but it is us, the humas, who choose to do it.
So whether or not AI was used doesn’t really matter. It’s unethical to copy the work of others, no matter how you do it.
But is it OK to get some inspiration from others’ work? Our society lets us believe that it is – after all, most products around us, whether physical or virtual, are inspired by others.
Some are perfecting a concept, some are trying to simply copy for a quick buck… Palworld is certainly not in the latter category – its immense success proves that.
If there are indeed doubts, I am sure that Nintendo and The Pokemon Company have plenty of lawyers who are eagerly waiting to jump in. And while it’s still early days, they haven’t done so at the moment.
Which means that we should enjoy the game instead and let others do their job. While the experts debate on this, I recommend finding out what’s the best location for your Palworld base or the Black Market NPC Location & How to Sell Pals.
What do you think though? Is Palworld unique enough – and would using AI to create some of the experience change it? Share your thoughts below.
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