Konami’s Umamusume Patent Lawsuit: Claims, Settlement, and Cost

The Umamusume Konami patent lawsuit was a March 2023 case in which Konami Digital Entertainment accused Cygames of infringing 18 patents through the mobile hit Umamusume: Pretty Derby, sought more than ¥4 billion (roughly $26 million) in damages, and asked Tokyo District Court to shut the game down. It ended in a confidential settlement announced on November 7, 2025. Cygames maintained it never infringed, and parent company CyberAgent booked an extraordinary loss of about ¥727 million (roughly $4.7 million) tied to the case.¹²

What Konami Claimed Umamusume Copied

Konami’s case centered on patents covering game systems in which players pick characters that then trigger specific in-game events. One publicly identified patent, Japanese Patent No. 5814300 (filed 2013), describes a “setting means” that lets a user select characters from a roster for event generation and an “event management means” that produces events based on those selections.³⁴

That mechanic maps onto the “Success” training mode in Konami’s long-running Jikkyou Powerful Pro Baseball series, where players choose support cards before a training run and those cards determine which story events, bonuses, and skill unlocks appear. Konami alleged that Umamusume‘s support card system, in which players build a deck that triggers random events, exclusive dialogue, and training bonuses, ran on the same patented logic.⁵ The full scope of the 18 patents was never made public.⁶

What Konami Was Asking For

Konami filed on March 31, 2023, after pre-suit negotiations broke down.⁷ The demands were aggressive on two fronts:

More than ¥4 billion in damages (about $26–29 million), plus late-payment interest.⁸
An injunction ordering Cygames to stop producing, using, and distributing Umamusume: Pretty Derby, which would have shut the game down.⁸

The damages figure was small relative to the game’s earnings. By the time Konami filed, Umamusume had already generated over $2 billion in global player spending.⁹ The injunction was the real threat, because Japan’s patent system provides automatic injunctive relief once infringement is proven, making a court-ordered shutdown a credible outcome rather than a theoretical one.¹⁰

How Cygames Fought Back

Cygames denied infringement from the start and said publicly it believed Umamusume did not violate Konami’s patent rights.⁸¹¹⁷

Whether the Japan Patent Office ever ruled on any of those challenges is not publicly known. The invalidation trials were folded into the same confidential resolution that ended the lawsuit.

The Settlement

CyberAgent announced on November 7, 2025 that Cygames and Konami had reached an amicable settlement resolving both the infringement case and the parallel invalidation trials.¹ Terms are confidential, and Cygames said it is restricted from disclosing details about either the patents or the resolution.¹²

Two positions came through clearly. Cygames continued to maintain that no infringement occurred, saying the settlement was reached “to resolve it promptly and ensure that users of Umamusume Pretty Derby can enjoy the service at ease in the long term.” It also stated that it “respects the efforts of creators at companies in the game industry, including Konami Digital Entertainment.”¹¹

Whether the deal involved a licensing arrangement, gameplay changes, or a lump-sum payment has not been confirmed. No public reporting has identified specific alterations to Umamusume made in response to the case, and community commentary at the time of the settlement noted that “nothing changes for the player.”¹

What It Cost CyberAgent

CyberAgent initially described the settlement’s impact on consolidated earnings as “minor.”⁷ A week later, in an annual financial briefing published November 14, 2025, the company disclosed an extraordinary loss of ¥727 million (about $4.7 million) tied to the case. CyberAgent indicated that figure likely included legal expenses accumulated over the two-and-a-half-year proceedings, not solely any payment to Konami.²

For a title that pulled in $368 million in mobile revenue in 2024 alone, the charge was manageable.¹³ CyberAgent’s gaming division reported a 106% year-over-year rise in operating profit and a 3.5-fold increase in overseas sales around the same period, driven in part by Umamusume‘s international expansion.¹⁴

Why the Case Matters

The dispute landed in a Japanese patent environment that has moved in a rights-holder-friendly direction. In May 2025, the IP High Court awarded roughly ¥21.7 billion (about $140 million) in what was reported as the largest patent damages award in Japanese history, and the country’s system continues to attach automatic injunctions to proven infringement.¹⁰ That combination is what made the shutdown request against Umamusume more than a bargaining chip.

Konami has pressed patents elsewhere with mixed results. In the U.S. District of Nevada, its casino division sued slot-machine developer High 5 Games over 52 claims across four “Super Stacks” patents; in 2018, a federal judge invalidated all 52 claims, finding them either indefinite or directed at abstract game-rule concepts that did not qualify for patent protection.¹ The Umamusume case was litigated under Japanese law, on different standards.

Because the resolution is confidential, it sets no public precedent on whether event-triggering character-selection mechanics can be patented in Japanese gaming. What it does show is that publishers with deep patent portfolios are increasingly willing to test them against the industry’s biggest hits.

1
Automaton Media. Konami and Cygames Reach Settlement in Patent Lawsuit Over Umamusume Pretty Derby
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Automaton Media. Cygames Parent Company Sees $4.7 Million Loss Resulting From Konami Patent Infringement Lawsuit
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Aztec. Patent No. 5814300 Analysis
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China Game Law. Pretty Derby Patent Case
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GosuGamers. Umamusume Pretty Derby Developer Cygames Settles 2023 Lawsuit With Konami
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Pocket Gamer. Konami and Cygames Reach Settlement Over Umamusume Patent Dispute
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CyberAgent. Notice Regarding Settlement of Patent Infringement Lawsuit
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Game World Observer. Konami Cygames Lawsuit Uma Musume Pretty Derby
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Shack News. Uma Musume Pretty Derby Mobile $2 Billion Revenue
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IAM. Fresh Litigation Developments Underscore Japan’s Pro-Patent Environment
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GamesIndustry.biz. Cygames Settles Umamusume Pretty Derby Patent Lawsuit With Konami
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IGN. Konami and Cygames Settle Umamusume Pretty Derby Patent Lawsuit
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Pocket Gamer. Uma Musume Pretty Derby Gallops Past $2.5B in Japan Alone
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Automaton Media. CyberAgent’s Game Business Sees 106.3% Rise in Operating Profit