The Last Straw for Pokemon Cards
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Japanese Pokemon Cards have never been harder to find than in 2023. With Booster Boxes and Display being resold for nearly triple their retail price, entering the world of beautiful Special Arts and Special Art Rares most certainly comes with a heavy price tag – and the Pokemon Trading Card Game Classic is no exception.
With a price tag of over $250 dollars, this reinvention of the Pokemon TCG brings new alternate, holographic versions of Base Set Charizard, Blastoise and Venusaur, alongside new ex cards for Lugia, Ho-Oh and Suicune – not to mention long time favourites like Pikachu, Mewtwo and Chansey.
Beyond that, it presents an ultra refined way to play the Pokemon TCG – for those who are just coming back, or want a more controlled and simplified experience. But is the price tag, exclusivity and potentially limited supply going to turn collectors and players away entirely? Or will this open the door to a plethora of new Pokemon TCG Players?
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Pokemon Trading Card Game Classic will release in Late October 2023 for Japan, and Late 2023 Internationally.
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Things being expensive or not being able to afford something shouldn’t motivate someone to leave the hobby. It’s motivated me to try and find more ways to make money with the hobby and with other things. I’m not just gonna give up on collecting lol
Bro, you storing Pokémon cards in your bathroom? Ptcglive has conditioned you to thinking bathroom tiles are a game board.
Look, honestly… I initially thought this was lame, but it's starting to grow on me. The Pikachu looks nice. No way I'm spending 385 on it though
Yes we can say what we say but at the end of the day I must buy this
I just don’t feel like anyone was asking for this. Whether or not it’s a cash grab, it just shows how out of touch the Pokémon Company really is
Three things worth mentioning:
1. The gold border energies should be tournament legal in Japan since all basic energies are. Considering the price of bling / Max rarity basic energies, getting 50+ of these gorgeous energies is a huge perk for players.
2. The deluxe holo treatment will be included with the pre-evolutions as well which is a first and will make for an incredible binder page. Middle stage starter evos rarely get any love so this is a nice touch for species collectors.
3. GOLD BORDER CHANSEY!!! How could you not mention this?! Between Creatures Deck, three new set cards, Lucky Park in Fukushima, and Poke-Lids manhole campaign, Chansey collectors have been eating good. This level of Chansey appreciation in Japan hasn't been seen since the 90s. You love to see it! Chansey back on top where she belongs.
Yup, as a non-player the design initially piqued my interest, basically any simplistic and sleek design strikes my fancy (this actually reminded me a lot of UNO Minimalista, which looked dope too) along with the design changes to the markers that just made perfect sense. Then I saw the price tag, laughed my ass off, and moved on.
Hopefully they introduce these marker designs to the base game at least
I just hope this product isn't a nightmare to get like the charizard premium ETB.
Never seen that Charizard before wow so beautiful must be worth 1000000000usd
This is a super cool product that's confused as to what it wants to be. The base set reprints are and have always been for collectors only, they just have. Putting them in a product designed to allure new players, or existing players to get their friends to try the game, is almost baffling.
The reason why is that even players who have no interest in collecting won't play these cards, they'll resell them on to cover the loss of the product itself. They've made a format for this product alone and put insanely expensive cards in it. The battle stadium thing is really cool but does it justify that amount of money when playing the cards that come with it is an objectively unwise financial choice? For me, pricing it at 35,000yen has put this in the collectors only category.
Can you see Mr Rev or Mr Hart opening this product on their channels and giving the actual board the time of day? No, lmao. Ultimately though I have the same attitude as you, if I get it great if not cool. But the saddest part is that if I do manage to get it, 90% sure I will sell it on because the opportunity is too great not to.
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……
CHATTING
Totally agree with your take on this, personally hoping to get it, but won’t be upset if I don’t. I’m just getting into the tcg and feel like this product (priced more reasonably) is a great way to encourage new players
I would love to see a jungle reprint featuring Celebi E, Zarude EX, and other favorite grass type pokemon.
I am all about this new product, but unfortunately the price tag will likely be too much for me to afford. I would love to see something as even as repetitive as base set 3 because my friends and I think the new cards are too insanely powerful to make for an enjoyable match. Thanks for the nice video.
I look it as a nostalgia bait premium collector item. I'll never see this as an item meant for players, because if it truly was, it wouldn't have cards that can't be used in the game nor would it have a premium price. It's an item for those older collectors who will buy this because these were the cards they played with, but that also means most of these will most likely never be used for the purpose of actually playing.
The biggest positive is it could lead to some vintage collectors possibly becoming players again if that actually use this to play, which would benefit Pokemon. All those people who collect vintage don't benefit Pokemon if they aren't buying modern.
I get what they were trying to do. Do something for people in their 30s getting back into Pokémon that used to play the TCG. Focus on key cards from base set but they have to make this ridiculously expensive or it would be scalped to oblivion. most will probably stay sealed and won’t be played with 🫤
Everything you're saying makes sense, but I think it could still be £100 cheaper and they'd still probably make a profit and it would reach more people. Pokemon know more than me though, I trust them
Put my application into the pot, wish me luck!
I just don’t understand why we as players can’t let Pokémon create a FEW premium items.
This is NOTHING like magic. Magic was making more and more expensive premium collections and making 2000 products a week. I think if you have 1-2 premium products a year at $150-300 is completely fine.
Lastly, it’s GOOD these aren’t legal. You wouldn’t want any exclusive cards cards that become scalped to be 1-200 by themselves.
If it's going to be a very limited print then it's going to sell out like hotcakes and blow up on a secondary market. If it is a very large print run then at that point I'm not sure.
Great great video love the amount of detail and quality that went in!
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Great piece on this product mate. I totally agree 👍🏻 Apart from the nostalgia, my first impression of this was like a sleek-looking glass chess set for the living room that I could engage with my mates over dinner.
But yeah, that they reprinted charizard again is a little tiresome. 😅
This is such a good take! Props
Informative video! Didn't know you were also an Australian YouTuber 🤩🤩🤩.
Good luck with the Perth regionalz
I think that while the price is certainly steep, it is justified considering all the products you get. Personally, I'm hoping to get one to play with friends. It really does feel more like a board game. I have a few friends that I often play board games with but who'd never touch the regular Pokemon TCG. I'm sure they'd be up for trying this out. One of my board game friends I know since elementary school. We use to battle each other with base set decks back in 19999/2000. He's not at all interested in Pokemon anymore but I bet he'd love to play this with me a couple times. For the memories haha. He's also passionately learning Japanese. With me speaking the language and collecting the Japanese cards, this product would be perfect.
I am a little disappointed that it is a lottery. Already feel like I am not going to get it. Would have been nice if it was handled the same way as the Precious Collector box. Pre-order with some sort of cap in the background for them to make sure they can actually print enough. Oh well.
There is a value gap between base set charizard,
and recently released reprints of base charizrd.
This will be a mid priced charizard reprint,
with the company looking to capture some value from this
price level.
thanks for making me understand the meaning behind this product. A++ video
honestly love the idea of this product. Was kind of hopeful they would of fully reprinted some vintage decks just so people could play the old format.
Buying regardless of the cash grab vibe.
I'm really waiting until next year when the base set Platinum Charizard is released. I'm going to buy and flip as many of these lame gold Charizards as I can so hopefully I can afford the diamond-dust base set Charizard expected to release in 2025.
Seeing this product was very exciting, but as the details came trickling in I got more and more confused about the purpose of this product.
It's titled as a "Classic" game and features iconic early-game cards stretching from Base Set to early ex-era, but includes new ex Pokémon that clearly aren't on the same power scale as the older cards? This won't be ideal for older fans nostalgic for the beginnings of the game because brand new, modern-era cards are going to be there to break the feeling of being back on the playground in the 90's playing the game with friends.
They showcased those Tool cards that boost the original starter trio's attacks by 100 just so that they come close to the level of power that current cards have, and STILL fall short of the HP these Basic ex cards have. So how balanced are these decks going to be? Especially with the Water types being weak to Lightning, which breaks the Rock-Paper-Scissors relationship that the Grass-Fire-Water type trio is supposed to mimic (this isn't a problem in the Standard game of course, since all types are present and each have unique weaknesses).
Is this product for existing players? The fact that the cards included in these decks are not tournament legal means they are less incentivized to buy the product. Is the product for collectors? There are so many cool design choices for the actual game mechanics here that will just go unused for someone just buying it for the shiny and exclusive cards that are likely worth a lot less outside of the product and decks than in the product. Is this product for new players? Anyone looking to try the card game for the first time will see the price point of this and walk away laughing, as here are plenty of other fun, contained card games for a fraction of the cost of this one.
These conflicting ideas surrounding this product makes me think that TPC are trying to cast a wide net in the market demographic for this product, but one that is so big that it actually ends up being appealing to nobody. I am not a Magic player in the slightest, but I saw the Magic 30th debacle go down from arms length and thought nothing like that would happen so soon to Pokémon. To me, this Pokémon TCG Classic holds a faint stench akin to the one Magic players got the full force of with their 30th anniversary product, and I can only hope that TPC know what they are doing and not making the same mistake that Wizards did with their game.
Yes. Overcooked it!
Im opening Tag Bolt atm
I could see this being worth it for 49.99 CAD or 39.99 USD but that price is just hilarious. The play surface is nice but the cards look terrible and they can't even be used outside of this board game. I agree with your assessment that's it's a cash grab.
this is for board game players. they made it a board game that can also be used to just play the card game later. board game players love this. i have friends that are into some board games and they spend just as much money as people do who just collect cards
As someone who barely plays in the TCG and mainly collects/sells, I like this product for many of the things you mentioned, I think they were really trying to create something clean and sophisticated. However, I think they may have tried to include or do to much with this product and that may end up hurting its popularity – my main gripe with this product is Pokemon leaning back on the base set trio, I personally like seeing when Pokemon changes things up and generates hype/popularity around other cards.
I don't know if my eyes deceive me, but it looks like the EN version may have non-holos of the base starters, where the JPN has the incredible gold holo? Other than that potential disappointment, this is a product targeted to me. I collect, but am playing casually with friends that I've introduced to the game. The +100 damage tools are reminiscent of the Gamefreak deck card that beefs up 'old' cards, and I really like that addition here.
The minimalist design is all well and good but if you outprice your target audience then it still is a failed product and a bad design because it never gets into the hands of the intended audience. And they cannot be blind to the insane speculation going on and that having Charizard in would guarantee the scalpers come out. Even the lottery is counter intuitive – how is it an accessible product for casuals at that price and that difficulty to obtain?
If there's a Chinese version then I might get it
Ok well I don’t like celebrations because of the stamp and this is the first time base set charizard is being reprinted since I started collecting again – hype
I think a more premium battle academy with vintage decks would be cool but $250 is nuts
How would people in the US even go about buying this? I'm an avid Pokemon card player/collector, but I've never dabbled in buying Japanese cards. Any help would be much appreciated!
Also, really nice video man! Very informative!
They should just reprint old sets and sell as complete sets and sell at a higher price. I'd still buy. Especially if they did 4 copies of each.
Figures. The english price will be way higher.
Ngl you made me wanna try to play the game.
I wonder how much the Pokémon players hate us collectors specially ever since we ruined everything like end of 2020😂😂😂
This strikes me as more a sealed collectable for people already entrenched in PTCG, rather than something that you would get for a new player. I suppose it will depend on the price point and availability. I expect scalpers to be all over this product.
Guys prices are not going down especially for Japanese set. We sell Japanese card from Japan and The Chinese have growing interest in Pokémon card but they don’t like the Chinese set they love to chase for Japanese and English. Easily selling double or triple msrp. And their buying power are strong! Don’t see price going down anytime soon
Great video J, I've seen this product mentioned but didn't really understand what it was or what it was about. I love your editing style, it's so seamless the way you transition between the official Pokémon clips and other things. Have a great time in Perth <3
I was turned off by this set at first but after getting back into Pokémon in sword and shield I now feel comfortable buying this and actually use these cards to play. Something like celebrations if I pulled charizard it was getting stuffed in a sleeve and probably a slab. Refreshing take, Pokémon letting us knows it’s okay to use valuable looking cards to play the game, who would have thought lol