As Nintendo and the Pokémon Company’s Patent Lawsuit Rumbles On, Pocketpair Says It’s Heads Down Getting Palworld Ready to Exit Early Access and Officially Release Ver 1.0 in 2026

Pocketpair has said it’s now heads down getting Palworld ready to leave early access and officially release its 1.0 update at some point in 2026.

In a video message, communications director and publishing manager John “Bucky” Buckley said Palworld will officially exit early access and release the Ver 1.0 update in 2026, making a significant milestone for the game. Palworld will launch proper alongside what sounds like a huge update, which Pocketpair is now focusing on.

This, Bucky said, means the rest of this year will be a little quieter for Palworld, although a winter update is still planned.

“It’s no secret that Palworld has a lot of quirks and jank, and we want to take the time to properly address those before releasing the game,” Bucky explained. This “cleanup” starts this year, with 1.0 coming next year.

“We think taking the time now to fix those problems will ultimately lead to a better game,” Bucky continued. “It means things will be a little quiet from us for the rest of this year.” Related, the upcoming winter update won’t be as big as December 2024’s Feybreak update, although Bucky teased “a few surprises.”

1.0 will be a “major milestone,” Bucky continued, “and we have a truly massive amount of content planned for the 1.0 update.”

Meanwhile, Pocketpair is “experimenting with other ideas for games,” although Bucky insisted “most of the company’s focus is on Palworld.” We will hear about these smaller teams and their ideas soon, he said.

Of course, the Palworld news comes as Nintendo and The Pokémon Company’s high-profile patent lawsuit against Pocketpair soldiers on. Nintendo has been busy obtaining patents — some of which IP lawyers said should never have been granted — as it develops its case. Meanwhile, Pocketpair has vowed to defend itself in court, and continue to update Palworld along the way.

The case involves three patents granted by the Japan Patent Office: two related to monster capture and release, and one related to riding characters. All three patents were filed in 2024, after Palworld came out. However, they are actually derived from earlier Nintendo patents dating from 2021. In other words, it seems that once Palworld came on the scene, Nintendo filed divisional patents that were geared to fight specifically against Palworld’s alleged infringement of the original patents.

Since then, Pocketpair has made changes to Palworld’s disputed mechanics. The November 2024 patch removed the ability to summon Pals by throwing Pokéball-like Pal Spheres (now Pals just materialize next to you when summoned). In May this year, another Palworld update changed how you can glide in the game — instead of directly grabbing onto Glider Pals, now you just simply use Pal-buffed Glider equipment. Then, in July, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company reworded one of the patents in the case.

At GDC in March, IGN sat down for an extended conversation with Bucky following his talk at the conference, ‘Community Management Summit: A Palworld Roller Coaster: Surviving the Drop.’ During that talk, Buckley went into candid detail about a number of Palworld’s struggles, especially the accusations of it using generative AI (which Pocketpair has since debunked pretty soundly) and stealing Pokemon’s models for its own Pals. He even commented a bit on Nintendo’s patent infringement lawsuit against the studio, saying it “came as a shock” to the studio and was “something that no one even considered.”

Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.