• Palworld, a game where you capture and then fight with myraid colourful creatures, has launched to massive worldwide success.
• Just days after launch, a new mod is apparently in the works that turns Palword’s creatures into Pokémon.
• Nintendo has caught wind of the mod and is already crashing down its copyright hammer.

Often called “Pokémon with Guns,” Palworld, developed by Japanese firm Pocket Pair sees players traverse a wide-open world, capture small, colourful and interesting creatures and then use them to fight others, usually with weapons. It has no connection to the Pokémon media empire, as the characters and the “Pals” are all visually, and legally distinct.

After launching on Monday in early access, Palworld shocked the gaming industry by leaping to 1.5 million concurrent players on Steam – a record-breaking success – with over five million units sold digitally. The game is still the most-played game on Steam, somehow with more players than Counter Strike 2 and DOTA 2 combined.

Palworld strikes the same feeling that Pokémon instils with the collection of cute critters. It strikes an addictive balance between exploration, combat and crafting, with reviews pointing to similarities with ARK: Survival Evolved as well. Amid its newfound and enormous popularity, a video popped up on X claiming that a new mod was being made that replaced all the non-Pokémon Pals with actual Pokémon from the IP which is owned by Nintendo, Game Freak and Creatures.

Usually, mods are protected by fair-use, but it looks like Nintendo didn’t read that memo as the video trailer of the mod was disabled on X, with the uploader blaming Nintendo. The uploader of the trailer was content created Toasted Shoes. The trailer showed off the gameplay of Palworld, with Pokémon like Torchic and Pikachu engaged in harsh work conditions. Pikachus taking mining picks to rocks.

It also shows the player character wearing an Ash Ketchum skin, and classic Pokémon characters like Misty and Brock now swing about with shotguns.

The mod is expected to get a full reveal on the Toasted Shoes YouTube channel today, but with the X video struck down this may change out of fear of a copyright strike. In fact, the burgeoning Palworld modding community is distancing themselves from Pokémon mods in order to not earn the ire of Nintendo and its lawyers.

“Hey y’all, I’m sure many of you have been seeing all the content regarding the Pokemon mod for Palworld. While the memes and such are hilarious, the mod alone hosts a giant risk to the community and we’ll need to take precautions so that Nintendo’s lawyers don’t nuke all of us with litigious actions. The mod is highly likely using ripped assets and is very illegal in Nintendo’s eyes,” reads a post from Palworld modding Discord server admin Archery 100, h/t Games Radar.

Links to the Pokémon mod itself are rare, with modders hiding links to protect the mod authors from Nintendo. It seems with Nintendo now catching wind of the mod, links are now likely to only exist in clandestine chats and image boards.

[Image – Sportskeeda Gaming on X]