Australia’s court halts release of Pokémon NFTs amid row over character use
The Pokémon Company International (TPCi) has secured victory in federal court against an Australian firm that claims to be the developer of the game franchise.
According to court documents, Parramatta-based developer KOTIOTA Studio had been parading itself as a Pokémon developer since the beginning of the year. In August, KOTIOTA sent a flurry of legal letters to news outlets seeking acknowledgment in publications that the company should be named as a Pokémon developer.
On its website, KOTIOTA said it is developing several Pokémon games, including Pokémon Violet and Pokémon Scarlet. The firm went on to claim that it was working to release non-fungible tokens (NFTs) related to the Pokémon franchise, forcing TPCi to take legal action.
TCPi was assisted by a cybersecurity firm that identified KOTIOTA’s jurisdiction as Australia, but surveillance of the office building revealed that the company had no employees working from the site. TCPi went to a federal court in Australia to stop KOTIOTA from releasing NFTs similar to Pokémon characters.
In their statement, which was provided by TCPI representative Katherine Fang, the original creators of Pokémon Origins gave details about the history of the brand and the popularity of the characters. Fang reiterated that the company had made the “conscious decision” to stay away from NFTs despite the growing popularity of digital collectibles.
“TPCi is particularly concerned about the harm that TPCi, The Pokémon Company, Nintendo of America, Inc, Nintendo Co. Ltd, and each of their licensees and consumers will suffer if the respondents make the PokeWorld game available and/or issue Pokémon NFTs,” the court documents said.
Although KOTIOTA did not participate in the proceedings, the court ruled that they had been legally served with legal documents. Court costs were not issued against the defendants, and with the court’s decision, TCPi can breathe a sigh of relief that unauthorized Pokémon NFTs would not flood marketplaces.
Staying away from NFTs
It’s unclear why TCPI chooses to stay away from NFTs, but some community members have suggested that the nature of its scarcity is at odds with Pokémon’s ethos. However, others have argued that an official Pokémon NFT release could surpass the leading digital collectibles such as Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC).
Minecraft announced in 2021 that it would ban all NFT technology associated with the game on the grounds that “all players should have access to the same features.”
“To ensure that Minecraft players have a safe and inclusive experience, blockchain technologies are not allowed to be integrated into our client and server applications, nor can Minecraft content such as worlds, skins, personas, or other mods,” Minecraft said in a blog post.
See: BSV Global Blockchain Convention panel, Blockchain: Data Power-Ups and NFTs for eSports & Online Games
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