Pickmos (which, until recently, was called Pickmon) has been unceremoniously removed from Steam following an intervention from its publisher, Networkgo (thanks, PC Gamer).
Developed by PocketGame, Pickmos is a blatant rip-off title, copying character designs from the likes of Palworld (which itself is hardly a paragon of originality), Pokémon, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Creature designs in particular look remarkably similar to iconic Pokémon, while the protagonist is the spitting image of Link from BotW.
So it seems Networkgo has had quite enough of the controversy, confirming the removal from Steam over on X with the following message:
"Hello players, this is the publisher, Networkgo. We’ve heard your feedback regarding the removal of our Steam store page and want to clear things up. Networkgo has officially intervened in the development of PocketGame.
"We will be supervising the Pickmos team from a player’s perspective to ensure the game keeps getting better. Thank you for your support."
Naturally, Networkgo doesn't outright state that the reasoning behind the removal is due to the controversy, instead claiming that it's helping to ensure "the game keeps getting better". It seems clear to us, however, that the publisher wants to get ahead of any potential lawsuits from the likes of Nintendo.
To back this up, a second message that's seemingly directly from PocketGame confirms that it's looking to ensure a "controversy-free experience", stating:
"We are revising the game to ensure a controversy-free experience. It will be re-released once our publisher gives the final approval."
So, we'll have to wait and see what happens with this one. Given how shameless some of the imagery is in the game, we'd wager PocketGame will need to make some pretty extensive changes, so we're not expecting to see this one again for quite some time.