The fact that Nintendo are going for a patent claim rather than a copyright claim makes me think that they don’t think a copyright claim would be successful.
Nor should it be. The standard for copyright violation is pretty high, things don’t have to just look similar, they need to actually match, so there’s no copyright over the idea of cute, Japanese-themed monsters, especially with other Japanese-themed monster games/shows like Digimon. Even if they matched the art style, you can’t copyright art style, you can only copyright the art itself.
The fact that Nintendo are going for a patent claim rather than a copyright claim makes me think that they don’t think a copyright claim would be successful.
Nor should it be. The standard for copyright violation is pretty high, things don’t have to just look similar, they need to actually match, so there’s no copyright over the idea of cute, Japanese-themed monsters, especially with other Japanese-themed monster games/shows like Digimon. Even if they matched the art style, you can’t copyright art style, you can only copyright the art itself.