A new game called Pickmon has exploded onto the gaming internet this week, and not for good reasons.
Revealed via a trailer on Steam on March 9, 2026, Pickmon is billed as a multiplayer open-world survival crafter where players explore a world of lost civilisations, fighting, farming, and building industrial empires alongside creatures called Pickmon.
The game is developed by PocketGame and published by NETWORKGO, a Chinese studio whose only prior title is Hainya World, an early access survival game from 2023.
On the surface, it sounds perfectly reasonable.
Dig a little deeper – or just watch the trailer – and it becomes clear that Pickmon is one of the most brazen cases of intellectual property borrowing the gaming world has ever seen.
How Pickmon Copies Pokémon (Very Obviously)
Let’s start with the creatures themselves.
One small orange being in a Steam screenshot looks like a Pikachu and Pawmi hybrid, while a black and red creature transforms into a motorcycle much like Pokémon’s Koraidon.
There’s also a blue creature reminiscent of Lapras, a blue penguin that resembles Piplup, and an orange dragon that hasn’t meaningfully distinguished itself from Charizard.
It doesn’t stop there. A creature in Pickmon’s trailer resembles the Pokémon Ceruledge but with four legs – and allegedly even this minor design change appears to have been lifted from a fan concept posted on Instagram back in February 2025.
Copying from Nintendo is one thing, but allegedly stealing from fan artists who lack the resources to fight back has drawn particular disgust from the gaming community.
The Zelda Connection: Why Is the Main Character Link?
Here’s where things get truly surreal.
Pickmon’s protagonist looks remarkably like Link from Zelda: Breath of the Wild – same hair, same clothes – and players spend a significant amount of time traversing the world via a paraglider.
Around 25 seconds into the trailer, the Link-alike character hitches a ride with a bird-type Pickmon, flying past a large tower blasting a beam of light into the sky – structures that look strikingly similar to the Sheikah Towers from Breath of the Wild.
Even the opening music in the trailer has been widely noted as sounding distinctly Zelda-like.
It appears avatar customisation will be a feature in the final game, so the use of a Link lookalike in the trailer may be a calculated attempt to grab attention.
Whether deliberate or not, it’s a bold move for a studio that presumably knows Nintendo’s legal team exists.
Palworld Did This First – But Pickmon Goes Much Further
The obvious point of comparison here is Palworld, the “Pokémon with guns” game from developer Pocketpair that became a sensation in early 2024.
Palworld’s creatures share similarities with – but aren’t direct copies of – specific Pokémon, and the game itself is quite distinct from Pokémon in many ways.
Despite this, Nintendo still filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Pocketpair in November 2024, a case that remains ongoing.
Pocketpair has sworn off using generative AI in its games and repeatedly made compromises on in-game mechanics – such as gliding – to appease Nintendo.
Pickmon’s developer, PocketGame, does not appear to be taking a similarly cautious approach. The similarities in studio names – Pocketpair vs PocketGame – have not been lost on observers either.
Could Nintendo Sue Pickmon? The Legal Picture
Given Nintendo’s aggressive track record on IP protection, many observers think legal action is essentially inevitable.
Nintendo is currently locked in a legal fight with Pocketpair over Palworld, with the lawsuit hinging partly on patents related to monster-summoning mechanics.
The battle has grown complicated, however – in November 2025, Japanese authorities rejected one of Nintendo’s patent attempts related to monster-capture mechanics, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office began re-examining a previously granted Nintendo patent.
That murky legal backdrop may be one reason PocketGame has moved ahead with a trailer despite having no confirmed release date.
As of March 2026, neither Nintendo, The Pokémon Company, nor Pocketpair has announced any legal action against Pickmon or its developers. That is unlikely to remain the case for long.
What Happens Next for Pickmon?
Pickmon is confirmed for PC via Steam on Windows only, with a release window listed simply as “to be announced.”
Reports of a Nintendo Switch version appear to be based on speculation rather than any official confirmation.
Whether Pickmon ever actually releases in its current form seems doubtful.
The gaming community’s verdict has been swift and near-unanimous – this is a step too far even by the standards of a genre already crowded with Palworld imitators.
Nintendo’s lawyers will almost certainly be watching closely, and given what’s on screen in that trailer, it’s hard to imagine they’ll stay quiet for long.
