Kotaku
How odd. Though video game patents usually seem to vaguely describe some rather obvious technical innovation. This time, though, Nintendo has taken it upon itself to request a patent that vaguely describes some sort of rather obvious gameplay innovation. In this case, in regards to multiplayer Pokemon. Ah, progress!
Nintendo describes the multi-player, portable version of its Pokemon game in this patent. In the pokemon game, each player collects and trains pokemon. When another player is encountered, the pokemon battle each other and the winner captures the loser's pokemon. Capturing a pokemon includes transferring information about its appearance, strength, etc. to the wining player's game machine.
I'm particularly tickled by the patent illustration, which looks like a Pokemon screenshot as illustrated by memory by a patent attorney.
Patent: U.S. Pat. No. 6,764,402 (Pokemon) [Patent Arcade]
