According to a YouTuber, The Pokémon Company requested that YouTube remove a seven-year-old video showcasing modded Pokémon monsters in a Call of Duty: Zombies match. On March 19, as first spotted by IGN, NoahJ456, a popular Call of Duty content creator who has over 5 million subscribers on YouTube, tweeted an image of a copyright removal strike email.
One creator, ToastedShoes, blamed himself and his Palworld x Pokemon mod video for causing the company to start cracking down. In January 2024, ToastedShoes uploaded a teaser of a mod that added Pokémon monsters to Palworld—a survival game commonly referred to as “Pokémon with guns.” That video was soon taken down via a DMCA claim from Nintendo and The Pokémon Company.