> There's already several copycat franchises that are obvious knock-offs of Pokemon, the biggest of which is probably Digimon.

Yeah no. The only thing similar about them is the name and that they are monster-based games. Art is HEAVILY distinct, gameplay is distinct (original V-Pets were LED toy monster care simulators while Pokémon was rip-off Shin Megami Tensei with Dragon Quest designs), and the animes cannot even be compared (Pokémon is episodic with very little plot, Digimon Adventure is a monster-of-the-week with dedicated character growth episodes and an overarching plot that features the pains of divorce, adoption, child abuse, and finally growing up from the eyes of children.)

So to wrap this all back to Palworld, it’s different than Digimon because Palworld is mimicking Pokémon while Digimon did its own thing.