Why Palworld sets a GOOD Precedent for Pokemon

Yes plagiarism, but... Palworld ate that boycott up. Palworld shows the worst side of plagiarism thanks to the use of AI stealing Pokemon art but it also might have some net positive effects in the long run for artists and consumers alike. What do you think GameFreak and Nintendo think?
yes plagiarism but palworld,yes plagiarism but palworld ate that boycott up,ye splagiarism but palworld won,yes plagiarism but palworld won,palworld plagiarism,can nintendo sue palworld,is palworld bad,palworld ai controversy,palworld controversy,palworld is it bad ai,palworld was it ai,does palworld use ai,did palworld plagiarize pokemon,palworld vs pokemon,palworld pokemon plagiarism,palworld pokemon ripoff,is palworld a pokemon ripoff,is palworld good
#palworld #palworldgame #palworldboycott #pokemon
***
Please subscribe here: / @johtojonny
***
Support me on Patreon: / jonnytyo
***
Venmo: @ johtojonny
Discord: / discord
TikTok: / johtojonny
Twitch: / johtojonny
Twitter: / jonny_tompkins
Instagram: / johtojonny
***
Johto Jonny is a Media Analyst known for his analysis on the gaming and entertainment industries. Thank you to all who subscribe, comment, and support us on Patreon.

[@johtojonny]

After this, check out my full retrospective for Pokemon on Switch. It was a roller coaster: kzbin.info/www/bejne/j6XJiYp5jbt3adE

[@NinJaguar]

While I do think the design plagarism aspect is an issue that could have nasty consequences in the industry if not handled well, I do strongly feel that consumers should have their choice where they draw the line on their moral issues with a company and people should not be bullying or guilt tripping others into not playing a game they want to play. Palworld may not be entirely original, but the monster collection element mixed with the survival, shooting and darker tones cannot really be found elsewhere mixed all into one, and it's clearly found to have been really fun and desirable for many people. I've found it very fascinating since the first trailer (despite seeing some very obvious design copies like the Cobalion and Wooloo-based creatures) and really looked forward to see how its launch played out. I also see people expressing frustration at Palworld being the monster tamer to become a phenomenon when other alternatives like Digimon, Yokai Watch, Coromon, Temtem, Dragon Quest Monsters, etc exist, but it really can't be understated just how good of a job Palworld did with marketing. I don't think it's people refusing to play these other games or thinking they're bad, but rather that Palworld was really put in people's faces at various showcases and landed with its shock humor and wild concepts. If AI was actually confirmed to play a hand in this game's development, I'd feel more gross about it, but as it stands I'm very much fine with this game's success, they made quite the captivating game.

[@johtojonny]

Exactly. Great points!!!

[@FTChomp9980]

U gotta be the middle man and see both sides and analyze,But I would say the Artists do matter since well I used to trace Pokemon still have some of my designs but art is creatively.

[@echobear1585]

I have played a lot of Palworld and I am a personal AI hater and I haven’t seen any evidence that it used Ai, and it scares me how much more lively the designs of Pals are to the pokemon. I saw a little penguin hopping his way around and he had so much more “soul” than any pokemon I’ve seen. (Also establishing I am an artist and have an obsession with learning about stuff like that so take that as you will)

[@johtojonny]

I'm not surprised tbh. I think most devs actually pay attention to those sorts of details, GF just either doesn't have time to or just... doesn't lol

[@FTChomp9980]

I'm against AI to your not the only one.

[@mane0808]

I personally don't understand the "they fed an AI with pokemon for the designs" twitter statement for one simple reason, just look up the 2021 announce trailer, games take years in development and that's a fact. In that same 2021 announce trailer there were a lot of the most well known Pals designs that are in the final game, same thing with the 2022 trailer, back then when AI was nowhere near the threat that it is today for media and entertainment, in 2021 ai for art wasn't even a thing. I don't think it's that crazy to think they just got artists that could design good Fakemons by ripping off Pokemon's artstyle around 2019 and 2020 This is something that was going to happen eventually, pokemon as a franchise has been so mediocre for over a decade, basically since their transition to 3d, the only good thing they still have are designs for the monsters, it makes sense some indie developer would eventually try to shamelessly rip off the pokemon art style (after all art styles don't have copyright) and just make a way better game by mixing popular concepts, which isn't really an accomplishment really for how low the bar has been with Gamefreak for years.

[@johtojonny]

I agree this was inevitable. It took way longer than I expected though

[@AsecasJavi]

That's why it was dropped as soon as a day passed. It's still copied crap

[@leonex45]

Excellent video Jonny. The term "AI" is right now mainstream, but it is not well understood by the majority of people that does not develop this kind of models. AI is just math, computation and statistics that have thrived in recent times because of technological advancements and computer science. There are previous examples of regulations regarding mathematical and statistical modeling in other industries. In my case, I work in the financial industry, a well-regulated industry. At least in traditional banking and insurance, so I going to let fintech and cryptos out of this. There are regulations to control the way us professionals develop models to solve financial problems, the likes of loan approval and insurance pricing and so on. For example, in the EU you cannot consider sex as a variable to do modeling because it can imply discrimination. Also, strict regulation arises for risk modeling after the financial crisis of 2008.That was because risk modeling was all over the place and people end up doing crazy stuff that caused that bubble burst in markets. I believe in the future AI will be restricted in its applications, techniques and data that can be used for it in the entertainment industry. This industry, in the limit of I could know about it, does not characterize for the intensive use of mathematical and statistical modeling like my previous example, or at least until AI got mainstream. Of course, there is the issue of line of job disappearing from this situation, specially in this sector, but I think it just natural (in an economic standpoint) way of things happening. Just think of jobs from the past before the internet and computers were mainstream and there should be some examples of some of them non-existent.

[@johtojonny]

Oh wow thank you for this deep dive! Super interesting to hear about ai in other context. My partner also has to utilize ui in finance so I know there's overlap. It's crazy how in creative work though it's brought a new aspect of morality to the mix vs the more numbers based fields.

[@GetAwesomeGaming]

Ok there are trailers from well before generative AI showing many of the creatures almost in their exact current form. Why do people who have an issue with Palworld keep floating the AI theory with little to no evidence? It just weakens legitimate gripes about Plagiarism (even though if this was legally plagiarism charges would have already been filed long before the game came out) and when AI eventually does become a problem there is a Boy who cried wolf situation. As far as TPC they will probably look at this and say “this is just a game” we have cards, plushie etc etc. the games are low effort because they are allowed to be low effort just to continue to feed the overall Pokemon beast 🤔🤷‍♂️

[@GravityTheGhost]

This is the right headspace to have. Everyone is right and wrong at the same time. Artistic integrity is important to uphold, but it's also not okay to blatantly copy aspects of other games. Competition is very healthy, and hopefully push TPC to let Game Freak build a game with enough time to make people impressed. To Pocketpair, use this early access to build up this game to be your own. The game has vastly clashing art styles, UI is ripped from ARK, and a select few of those pals are the forefront of this controversy. Also have a damn tutorial instead of making me go to a menu to learn the controls, hate games that do that.

[@johtojonny]

Yes yes yes. All perfect takes on every aspect of this discussion. So glad I'm not the only sane person here

[@naganut9718]

Genuinely really good take. I don't know if Pocket Pair will try to make the game more original tho. Pretty sure they've been working on games like Craftopia (that have similar assets to BOTW) and Never Grave (witch is a Hollow Knight clone (pun intended))

[@tunir3010]

I just found your channel and I'm on a total binge through your videos! Great content, hehe.

[@johtojonny]

Oh this made me really happy 😁 enjoy! More to come as always 😎

[@cwxgames468]

"AI" is a tool that is all it is, it's all in how you use it. You can use it to help bring your ideas to life and help pitch what you envision. same way as taking a design philosophy or elements is not a bad thing. they took something Pokémon used to do really well and added ARK and Breath of the Wild to it. but to act like they did what The Day Before did or worse is a gross misrepresentation of the issues. now, as for the VA deal, that is not them losing; that is them having the power to make up their own mind and to control how the AI is used.

[@kindallnight1615]

I feel that even if regulations were passed to limit AI companies would immediately outsource to other countries which would leave those people without even less hope of jobs unless they also move.

[@kindallnight1615]

I also feel that Pokémon carried pal world success by people who saw pal world as Pokémon with guns even the developers made the game look like Pokémon with guns. Those who feel that Pokémon should create something like pal world or don’t like Pokémon anymore but like pal world are the reason why people are debating the plagiarism and comparing pal world like they are saying “ Pokémon fan are threatening the developers or they are crazy fans” are the same people saying “Pal world has surpassed Pokémon arceus in 5 days, etc.”

[@blackestyang7528]

Palworld drama shows that people ignore the difference between creatures with shared concepts vs creatures with shared designs because Pokemon itself has been in such a shit state that they get too mad to notice. Or don't realize how setting this precedent can and will come back to haunt everyone later, because Foresight wasn't worth ripping off I guess

[@deazee2288]

Like you said, gamefreak step up your game and stop robbing players of their money, an asset flip that's sold for half the price of a pokemon game (two versions, DLC, and HOME ransomware scheme not withstanding) worst case scenario Pokemon stans will retaliate in the worst way possible and keep buying the slop that is switch pokemon games

[@johtojonny]

Yeah I hope it's a wake up call to the Pokemon Company to give some time and resources for quality development within GameFreak

[@naganut9718]

I don't see how this is gonna be a competition for Gamefreak. Tehy're both aren't even in the same genre monster catching aside

[@deazee2288]

@@naganut9718 honey don't tell that to me, tell it to pokemon stans who are freaking out trying to defend a billion dollar company

[@Terranigma23]

​@@naganut9718have you ever heard about GameFreak and TPC ego ? 😅

[@naganut9718]

@@deazee2288 ok and Palworld stans needs to stop acting like the game doesn't plagiarize Pokemon and isn't a pretty creatively bankrupt game

[@friendlyotaku9525]

Honestly the blatant copying Pokemon designs does leave a really sour taste in my mouth BUT death threats are UNACCEPTABLE flat out, it's shocking how some people act... I don't like Palworld but I would never send the people behind it death threats or anything like that, that is not and is NEVER okay. Though I will say even if Palworld didn't have all this blatant copying, I still wouldn't buy it as I just don't like the type of gameplay it offers - I'm not into survival games, including other similar games like ARK, they just don't interest me.

[@naganut9718]

Yeah not gonna lie Death Threat part is gross

[@BigZ971]

Ok you lost me on the whole gun analogy. But I know where you were going with it, but it's one of those things where if you don't know anything about that particular field, the view looking in is drastically different. Open for a discussion on it however.

[@johtojonny]

Oh interesting. Well if you get the a.i side of the analogy then now you know more about the bad gun control in america! (A.k.a we basically have no gun control, which is bad cuz people are dying at the same rates as developing countries here because of that)

[@BigZ971]

@JohtoJonnyYT The analogy doesn't work for me because we do have gun control. And a lot of it. If you've never personally purchased a firearms before you'd never see that side of it. There are a ton of regulations involved. AI doesn't have that at all. It's the wild west for it. And government regulations haven't been able to keep up. The closest we got was the PETA monkey photography case, but they bypass that now by just editing the AI generated picture slightly.

[@johtojonny]

Are you not in america? Here in America there's next to no gun regulations. There are places that are exceptions (usually big cities, but even then the laws are lax) but otherwise they're basically nonexistent

[@CuppaGi]

Ouch, did you just cut Asmon's response early, leaving out the context? That ain't cool, Jonny.

[@johtojonny]

I literally put the context in before his statement idk wym

[@CuppaGi]

@@johtojonny iirc, there was more to the conversation that just "artists opinions don't matter". I'll need to rewatch the video when I get a second.

[@CuppaGi]

@@johtojonny Yeah, double checked. The full context; Artists opinions don't matter - Consumers don't care what the artists think, they just want a good product. The majority of players aren't even on social media, so they have no way of knowing about all this drama going on. Just like with Hogwarts Legacy. All people want is a good game. If a game comes out and its good, it will sell. It doesn't matter what your opinion is, what the artists opinions are, what the opinion of Nintendo is, etc. None of it matters. Ai, Plagiarism, etc. Yeah, they suck. But do consumers care? 7 million say "pokemon with guns goes brakabrakabrakabrakabrakabraka"

[@natethejay]

AAAAYYY I was waiting on you to talk about palworld! WHOA did not expect you to come in swinging but you did and I gotta say I agree! The death threats I've seen are way too much and I do think there is good and bad to both sides of this argument! The ai is completely bad imo and the stealing in general is bad its too bad by laww they didnt cross the line. I cant believe nintendo had to let this game release! It looks fun tho i just dont have a pc so i cant play 😢 I want to tho

[@cutejustice]

I think the argument of ai “using other people’s art to create art” is really bad considering this is how people create art in general. I think the conversation should be focused on giving these artists a pathway to success through other means even with AI. I.e: a company should only have an AI that is trained on art produced by company members and these members should be paid a royalty for every time it’s used.

[@johtojonny]

I'd like to see you have this discussion amongst artists. I'm curious of the outcome

[@cutejustice]

@@johtojonny I’m thinking in the sense that a.i. is at full force that can’t and won’t be stopped considering the people in power right now that don’t even know how to turn on their computers 🤦‍♀️. This is sadly the only way I think working artists could benefit from this. Companies have stolen art before many times and got off scotch free and now A.I. is another way for them to do it. Artists should be paid royalty checks by companies using their talents. I am curious about what their perspectives are though because saying “don’t use A.I” is not going to cut it. We all know they’re going to use it. 😒

[@johtojonny]

@@cutejustice I wish so bad royalties and residuals were more normalized

[@Underground3]

If you understand the full content of what asmon is saying instead of cutting it there, he's got a point. It's sad, but it's true. Gacha mobile phones and companies like EA and Activision that riddle their games with microtransactions keep making tons of money despite "everyone" hating them. You can hate AI, I can hate AI, my neighbour can hate AI... but it doesn't matter, the general population will probably still eat that garbage.

[@Lilitha11]

People have been ripping off other people's work long before AI. I have seen nothing to suggest anything was AI made. I think they just stole designs the old fashion way, and yes you can make designs a lot faster if you are basing them all off pokemon that already exist.

[@riveranton544]

so we on the palworld wave or nah??

[@johtojonny]

Still haven't played it yet but I want to try it out soon

[@warlockwarlord169]

People parroting about use of AI are forgetting thaf currently AI is having issues with 2D art , no way there is AI to make 3D pal designs

[@ozzeroz8512]

Wait...artists copy or recreate other artists styles ALL THE TIME. They do it all the time. So where does the buck stop? Do those artist now owe their money and whatever to the artist they were inspired by? I mean...it just seems like a bad argument for why AI is "bad"

[@richardhernandez4529]

If you think Nintendo is going to sue the AI for the freedom of everyone else, I dont think so, Nintendo are going to do this to protect themselves and only themselves. They're a company, they dont care anyone else but their own.

[@1rkhachatryan]

So I just watched some gameplay and I don't think pokemon has much to worry about tbh. It's not even that similar, sure you catch pals but the game is more survival then anything. You can kind of compare it to legends in that sense as the closest thing. I think once the virality of it dies down, we'll see if it'll hold up cuz so many games blow up and then are kind of old news later. The one thing pokemon has going for it is staying power due to being in so many aspects of your life.

[@niceguy66alain]

they aren't AI generated. if they where you know it would be a huge selling point for them. they would be like ai Generated creatures and world, where each players gets there own custom experience 😮‍💨.

[@naganut9718]

Well obviously IA isn't a thing, but AI is

[@Makoto03]

I'm with Asmongold. My job as a Gamer isn't to worry about whether something is A.I. or not. My only concern is if the product itself is entertaining. And for me, Palworld is. If it was plagarising, thats Nintendo's problem. Not mine. Also Gamefreak has done nothing to warrant my sympathy either, with how lazy they've been lately. This indie game is outshining them in every way.

[@johtojonny]

I don't agree with him, but I do agree the factor we should consider most in this case is how much quality and passion was poured into every other aspect of this game, regardless of it the designs were plagiarized or not

[@naganut9718]

I don't think the last argument is good, like at all. Gamefreak have issues don't get me wrong, but laziness really isn't it. They've been trying to change up and innovate certain formulas in Pokemon, and regardless the questionable quality, saying it's "laziness" seems really disingenuous especially when Palworld have plagiarized design and gameplay from both Pokemon and Ark. Second of all Palworld would never outshine Pokemon, both games are way too different (monster catching aside) to be outshining one another. Third is that I feel like you're forgetting the people who working in the company and made those designs and models are still people. People that may/may not be passionate about their art. So regardless to plagiarize those designs is still very cheap, even ignoring similar models

[@lobete]

Not sure I can get behind this idea that satire/parody is "shameful" and if there was any actual evidence of AI use or plagarism, I would be disappointed. That's just not where we are at though.

[@Just.Arguing]

Nobody is saying artists arent people, theyre saying the reality is that no one cares about moving toward an outcome thats better for artists, that includes everyone from me all the way to the president of the united states. The only people that care about Artists are Artists who are already in a position to financially support themselves. Everyone else is talking cheap

[@toottootsonicwarrior5777]

Imagine the twist if it turns out it was actually pokemon using AI for new generations 🤣

[@johtojonny]

I honestly wouldn't be surprised with many of the gen 9 Pokemon LMFAO but nah fr I don't know if AI is even capable of this sort of stuff yet but regardless we need to regulate this sh*

[@naganut9718]

That would never happen lmao

[@TheRealHelvetica]

I gonna have to disagree on the artist’s take. They literally use references all the time, just like an AI does. There is nothing wrong with using references when making art.

[@AsecasJavi]

Nahhhh

[@johtojonny]

?

[@naganut9718]

Both sides are annoying tbh. But I personally wanna focus on the Palworld side because I really dislike that whenever the designs of Pals is brought into question, many people just jump to the conclusion of "toxic Pokemon fans thinking Pokemon made monster catching and defend multi billion dollar corp". I've seen way too many people that not only misses the point when it is brought up, but straight up uses some of the worst arguments I've seen and uses it as a gotcha moment

[@phantomninja904]

Ok let me ask you a question if you could get a pokemon game that was absolutely amazing, far better than the dribble that nintendo have given us for years, they slashed the price to $30 or free if you have NSO. Would you buy the game or not buy it because it was made by AI? The point being 99% of people would go with the cheaper better game reguardless of how it was made because in the end it is my enjoyment over any negitives it causes on the proffessionals in the industry. If every game dev at nintendo has to loose their job for me to get better games, so be it. Just means they were not good enough. Call it heartless but that is the way a majority of people enjoy games. We dont know devs, we dont care about what happens under the hood at studios, we only care what product is presented to us for consumption.

[@johtojonny]

I agree. We shouldn't have to pay attention to those kinds of behind the scenes stuff. It should just be regulated already so we don't have to bother. So why not change that by speaking up when we do find out about it?

[@swinley5539]

First view goddam

[@johtojonny]

Damn you're quick on your feet

[@HiddenDarkHM]

EVERYTHING people don't like these days is "AI generated" and probably will be for the next year or two. I do think comparing the AI situation to the gun situation is a tad bit disingenuous though. One is something that is threatening livelihoods because of the greed of corporations, the other is literally threatening the lives of children. One is a technology that is, on its own, quite incredible and has so much potential for a lot of people who aren't able to create art through standard means, who love art and creation but don't have the skills and resources to create the way others do or commission those who do as much as they might want to, or just want to explore ideas without having to invest 300+ dollars or 50 hours into it just to see if they like an idea. It's a fascinating advancement of technology with a lot of potential for the future if corporations would just keep their grubby little fingers off of it for FIVE MINUTES. The other is a device with the sole purpose of killing others. Period. Full stop. I see your point, I get what you're trying to say, I just think that really REALLY devalues both arguments. AI does not exist with the intention of putting artists out of business, it exists with the intention of creating, unlike a gun it is not inherently destructive it is inherently creative. I think it really does embody the "AI art doesn't kill artists, corporate greed kills artists" argument a lot better than the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" argument ever could. That's just my two cents on that analogy itself, I don't intend to debate the value or ramifications of AI art with anybody but that is why I would just caution the use of that comparison specifically. I really don't think it does a service to either argument.

[@johtojonny]

Your statements on the gun analogy make a lot of sense. Looking from that angle, I agree. Cuz unlike AI which is really good in non creative fields guns are never good cuz all they are built to do is cause harm and death

[@Castcoder]

You didn't credit Asmongold (@AsmonTV) for his clip. Nor did you mention his channel's name. Sure, you did something legally, but it's shameful.

[@johtojonny]

I actually love this comment lol

[@syruscoy1244]

Oh shut up you guys, and quit your whining. Pokemon has been around for 30 years? Palworld isn't going to end that now or anytime soon. How much longer did any of you think somebody was going to try to get into the monster capture genre? And Palworld is clearly not a rip off, its a parody of a number of games put together, crossing lines that Nintendo wouldn't have the balls to do. Many people playing it are pokemon fans who thought the idea of pokemon-like creatures wielding guns is hilarious gameplay.

[@evan448]

wahhh your picture looks like mine and you used it in a game thats better designed then mine that people like

[@johtojonny]

💀

[@johtojonny]

Funniest part is Pokemon hasn't said that but so many fans are saying it. Like yall, stop sucking up to this mega corp

[@3rdmillenniumknight]

Calling Palworld Plagiarism against Pokemon is like calling The Punisher Plagiarism of Batman.

[@rusta049]

I was on board until you started comparing AI to guns.

[@johtojonny]

Why? One wipes out livelihoods, the other wipes out lives because they're not regulated by the law. Pretty sound analogy

[@rusta049]

It is not on those who have done nothing wrong with their rights to bear arms have said right curtailed because of the abuse others preform with it. If you see guns as only something to blindly use on others, then I'm sorry you have been misinformed.

[@johtojonny]

@@rusta049 unfortunately with our lax regulations, it allows for people who are ok with blindly using them in an open crowd to get a hold of them far too frequently. The analogy still stands strong

[@rusta049]

Even with having regulations already, those tragedies happen, why would someone breaking the law worry about breaking another law to do so? A free market driven underground becomes black market that no one can track.

[@umbralflow6883]

I dont like how people are throwing around plagarism. What Palworld did isnt plagarism its just heavly inspired by pokemon. Nothing is a 1 for 1 copy. Law dont care about feelings. Where was the uproar from the many souls likes , Fps, kart copies, or even Pokémon's league of legends clone. People are mad someone that wasn't Pokémon succeeded in a market that the fans claimed was Pokémon's. Which is funny because those same fans wanted a company to come along and shake things up in that same market.

[@CminionX32]

how is it shameful? i guess all fps games are shameful compared to the first one? when it comes down to AI generation because it does create something new even if it learns from others pictures, people do to. Before you try to fight me on that look up what is Latent space is. People learn from others and take inspiration from other artist so i guess those artist should get in trouble because they learned or used other artist as inspiration? you are just digging yourself down a rabbit hole. AI is gonna do much better in a Artist hand then someone that is not. AI is just tools for people to make their jobs easier and make things go faster. Ai should fall under the same laws as people doing art so people do not straight rip off someone. people can take other peoples art and make their own so AI can do the same thing. I am sure i will get a lot of hate for my take but i have done a lot of reading and watched a lot on how a lot of this works so i understand both sides of the argument. Most people do not know how AI works and the AI art uses latent space to make something new it does not copy the image exactly. It learns what a banana is like a person does, seeing a picture of it ( holding it in front of someones eyes is the same thing as taking a picture and teaching AI) telling it " this is a banana".

[@johtojonny]

I personally would say that most fps's are shameful, yes 😆

[@CminionX32]

@@johtojonny lol i mean you are not wrong there :P