/>iOn February 21, 2025, Guangdong’s Higher People’s Court announced a settlement of 107 million RMB in favor of The Pokémon Company for copyright infringement and unfair competition. Pokémon had sued Guangzhou Mai Network Technology Co., Ltd., Huo Network Technology Co., Ltd. and others for copyright infringement and unfair competition disputes over the game “Pokémon: Remastered” in December 2021. Pokémon requested 500 million RMB and was awarded 107 million RMB in the first instance at the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court. The Guangdong High People’s Court then mediated an appeal to reach the current settlement.
The Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court held in the first instance that the core elements of the Pokémon characters, game protagonists, maps, etc. in the accused game correspond one-to-one and are similar to the corresponding elements of the Pokémon Company’s games. The multiple element systems formed by the combination of game elements are highly similar or even completely consistent, and many numerical system designs are the same. Therefore, the specific story expressions of the accused game and the Pokémon Company’s games are substantially similar. The accused game infringes the copyright of the Pokémon Company’s games (including the reproduction rights, information network dissemination rights and adaptation rights stipulated in Article 10, paragraph 1, items 5, 12 and 14 of the Copyright Law).
In addition, the Court also determined that the operation and promotion of the game in question violated Article 2 and Article 8, Paragraph 1 of the Anti-Unfair Competition Law, and constituted unfair competition.
The Guangdong Higher People’s Court stated:
Under the current background of various industrial policies to help Chinese games go global and strengthen the export of Chinese culture, equal protection of the intellectual property rights of digital entertainment products of Chinese and foreign parties in accordance with the law is an important aspect of adhering to cultural self-confidence and self-reliance and promoting the construction of a strong country in intellectual property rights. This case involves the rights protection lawsuit of the world’s top game and animation IP “Pokemon”, which has a high level of social attention, a large amount of compensation in the first instance, and an open trial in the second instance, which has educational and guiding significance for the innovation and standardized development of related industries.
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In addition, it is necessary to remind relevant industries and practitioners that copying other people’s game products to gain attraction and influence among relevant player groups, thereby obtaining undeserved commercial benefits, may infringe copyright and other intellectual property rights, and may also constitute unfair competition. Competition in the game product market cannot stop at “copying”, but must innovate and deeply empower elements such as game play, which can truly benefit the healthy and long-term development of the game industry.
The full text of announcement is available here (Chinese only).
