Dude I completely agree. Before I came to Japan I had just started collecting but I stuck mostly to WOTC stuff since that’s what I grew up with. When I got to Japan I discovered a world of these beautiful old school japanese promos that never came to English. The art style gave me nostalgia because it was from that WOTC era of my childhood but I had never seen these cards before and there was so much to choose from. Then I noticed that Japan was still cranking out quality promos to this day. Then when I took a long hard look at the new English stuff it simply couldn’t compare. Not even close.
As a player and want-to-be collector, I feel really torn about the way the English TCG is handling things. I like having the cards we need for tournaments cheap and I like the greater attendance, but I hate the idea that some of the rare cards I'm getting to experience as new now will never retain any real value. I feel like that's the price you have to pay in the United States when you make anything popular and less exclusive, but it still feels pretty bad. Hopefully we'll have some more exclusive releases again someday.
I really enjoy going back and listening to the older Pratte rants! Keep doing what you’re doing man and don’t let the worms get to you. Your public videos are a funnel to your Patreon
Completely agree with Japanese nailing the promos. That team rocket case is toward the top of my "to own" list. The English side needs to be careful with their player base because they don't have that collector side to fall back on. It would take minimal effort, literally a 1st edition stamp or promos with exclusive art and release would bring a large amount of people back toward new product. Evolutions was nice for a bit of nostalgia but became lackluster for me very quickly.
Completely agree with you. I love the Japanese exclusive promos. The full art poncho Pikachu are one of my favourite for the new stuff. I also like the Pokémon Center exclusive cards. I hope TPCi will listen to this and bring the collecting aspect back by bring back 1st ed stamp, reducing the amount of products and quantities, and bring us some exclusive promos where japan does not have. Please share if there is a way for us to give our feedback to the TPCi about the English TCG.
Living in Brazil, all I do is struggle to be a player, and get satisfied collecting the english set cards. Looking from the bottom high up, where you are!
I agree with a lot of this, especially how cool Japanese promos are. But I don’t think we should be disappointed that cards are better quality now - even if that does mean more PSA 10 graded cards are easier to get. I don’t get how wanting cards to become harder to grade due to quality control is a good thing. That would be a shady move on any company to make cards of lesser quality just for collectors to buy more and more of their stuff.
Javin M NOOOOO JAVIN I don't want the price of first edition cards to go down EEEEWWWWW. 1st edition should be untouched but that's my opinion :) XY Evolutions was the reprint for me
Its a bit lengthy bit I hope you guys give this a read, let me know your opinions The collector issue is not that we aren't getting promos, it's just that now they're pulling SET cards out of Japanese sets and marketing them to us as collection box promos to milk the cash cows that we are seen as. (This is not to confuse this with tin reprints either though as those are for the purpose of highly playable cards that are reprinted with an alternate art). The problem with this is that they are hitting 2 birds with one stone as at the same time our exclusive promo slots are getting replaced by standard junk AND our standard sets are devalued as collector cards are getting redistributed everywhere as if overprinting wasn't enough of a problem already. When you take a set card out of a set and re purpose it as a promo, you are in essence taking away from the set. Simply put, we are getting neg -1's every time these promos are being done.
Woah I'm so early and yeah you hit the nail on the head, collectors are being shunned these days haha. I'm not complaining though it just shows more attention to gold stars and vintage cards to increase their value via supply and demand!
I wanted to ask you where you buy your japanese products from, i know a middle man service is needed for exclusive stuff but i am having a hard time picking one based off the reviews. Loving the content so far, watched the more recent videos but just going back to re watch this one. thank you for taking the time to read this.
I feel like the Japanese just care more about pokemon in general, and they work harder to make it better. After all, it is their child and they need to keep it healthy. Even the cheap preconstructed decks in japan are way better than the American ones. If America had created pokemon, I'm not sure if we would try to do better or not. As a player, I have to say that I enjoy looking at the Japanese cards a lot more than the English ones while I play. They just seem to be a bit better. As a collector, I think they are beautiful. Even the cards that have the same art as the English just seem to be more attractive. They put in the extra effort, like on Japanese holofoils the line the border of the entire card in foil. Not just the picture. That makes it look 10 times better.
It's interesting to finally see someone talk about the concept, the theme, the coherence of a set. As an artist, that's something that's always frustrated me. But I think the TCG in general, from it's Japanese even, has not many bold visual statements. I think cards always look the same set in set out and don't do anything with the visual template. And I just don't agree about that print thing, making it hard for collectors. That's not a set issue, it's the fact that you are just too wealthy and can afford to get many tries at getting that perfect one. XD We little people don't have that much money to throw around for these packs and would be really unfair to scale the rates up to you guys, IMO.
as a new and relatively serious collector, i completely agree. nothing exciting from the new sets, the prism cards were so easy to pull as well. i really hope they can do something to fix it. it sounds silly but maybe they should start printing shitty centering and edging cards haha.
Keep up the great work smpratte - so refreshing to see someone talk business and philosophy about Pokemon, collecting and TCG as a whole rather than 'lets open 1000 booster packs' - boooring. WOTC era is king in my eyes - i'm hitting those 1st ed. psa 10s hard before they become too pricey for the average collector
I hate to say it, but I think the reason why Japan respects collectors more is because the American market has a major scalping (i.e; gouging the entire supply of current boxes whenever the opportunity arises) problem. Magic tried limited print run with Commander 2016, and it ended up being a disaster; scalpers jacked up the prices 300% in less than 3 months after release. Printing in-demand CCG products in limited quantities is dangerous these days. There are only 2 realistic solutions. Either Pokemon brings back 1st Edition, or TCGPlayer puts a hard limit per customer on each product, and strictly enforces that policy (i.e; IP bans anyone they catch making multiple accounts).
i don't see how that'll improve the situation. it will get to the point where everyone rushes to buy 1st editions and then they're worth basically the same as regular edition, as it was in japanese xy. I think that they should slow down the pace of set releases, and also make them smaller jeez, but anyway, and just bring back a sort of exclusivity. Like having a card that will only only release in a certain shop, or if they make a set like generations or shining legends, make it so that it'll only be on sale for a month or 2, not like 8. The point is that even if you do invest in modern tcg, the returns are kinda crappy, and some cards sell for quite a lot, but only do because they're playable, nothing else, nothing to do with exclusivity. It means no one feels special buying a product, because hundreds of thousands of other people will too, and then to add to that, the cards can be utterly boring and crap, and just a rehash of something from a set.
I think if I ever went to collect master sets I would collect Japanese over English. The English cards have been pretty terrible lately in terms of off-center cards. I've been buying my ultra-rares from Ebay where I can see the exact card I'm getting, rather than ending up with a really off-center copy from a card website.
I swear we get crap for English sets. For instance pikachu promos are just so insane yet we never get any? So now I have to pay extra to get them imported... Honestly besides flashfire and hidden fates everything has been crap.
Hey smpratte I got a question, why are the Japanese Rayquaza gold stars on eBay priced so low and is it worth investing in them? Would really appreciate some advice, thanks!
With the modern English cards becoming less valuable and rare, and the modern Japanese cards still caring about collectors, I wonder if it will end up raising prices for the vintage Japanese cards as more people turn to Japanese for modern cards
Sometimes looking at the print run quantity of pokemon sets, I wonder if tpci even attempt to predict whether if their sets are gonna be popular or a flop. such as tpci over printing crimson invasion was a shit show of a set that is over printed while on the other hand ultra prism having some of the most highest demand in sun and moon sets next to guardians rising having such low print run.
I have always like the Japanese side, but originally started in 99 with wotc thought it wasn't going to last my brother said charizard 1st edition base will be over 100k 30 years from now I told him he was crazy.... I Started again 9 and a half months ago with my daughter and have a few hundred Japanese. I started her with evolution and base set now she has near 6,000 English cards and most of the wotc era sets are complete. We only buy locally so it has been a challenge to get this far but it has been fun. 😏
chris journee it's taken alot of hard work, a little hint I've had to buy a lot of bulk lots to get this far. Probably bought 30,000 cards this past year. I'm also not made of money. I'm just good at finding deals and always looking.
Well, the generations pricing didnt age well BUT the japanese shining legends absolutely did. super interesting that people are so into generations nowadays, I genuinely find it odd. maybe just "anniversary set = money" mindset
This is why I don't touch English new releases. On the bright side, such great availability means that cards in general are cheaper. People that actually play the TCG tend to benefit more than collectors.
New to the grading side of cards. Why is it harder to get a PSA 10 for a card from a booster box in the older days than now? When you said it took you like 25 send offs for the charizard, why?
Just really the quality of the cards made, although cards from packs now aren't perfect they're much better than before. you could open pack fresh cards from the older sets and they cards would already have nicks on them and not be in good condition, that's why it was harder to get a PSA 10.
Yes there are quite a few FAs from bw and level x cards from platinum that there are no psa 10 because they were that bad of print quality. Many 9s but nothing better yet.
I know giratina lv x from platinum (the non promo) does not have 10. I was wrong about BW. The numbers though of graded bw is still really low for many cards.
Modern product just isn't special at all due to the print runs and availability these days, so it's 1st edition wotc all the way for me, I don't care for anything else. I appreciate Japanese cards but they're just not for me personally outside of potentially trophy cards.
You, sir, spoke nothing but the truth. Japanese products just hit you differently. The Japanese know how to conceptualize and make unique sets. Do you think that living in a capitalist country (like the US) has something to do with how disappointed so many collectors (like you and I)? I have a much stronger affinity for Japanese cards in general due to the excellent quality control and exclusivity and uniqueness with so many sets (as you mentioned with the poncho Pikachu, and for me it would be Tag Team GX All Stars).
The overall message definitely aged well. The Japanese promos STAY way better. The Nessa Shiny Star V themed set is truly incredible. When will the west ever give us something like that? Sadly, I don't think we will.
@AtticusRh0des Uhh, dude, he said Mt. Fuji Pikachu, it's not the same Surfing Pikachu like Black Star Promo #28 and is Japanese only. The artwork is different; regular Surfing Pikachu doesn't have the mountain in it. Listen and look closely first before commenting, please.
Dude I completely agree. Before I came to Japan I had just started collecting but I stuck mostly to WOTC stuff since that’s what I grew up with. When I got to Japan I discovered a world of these beautiful old school japanese promos that never came to English. The art style gave me nostalgia because it was from that WOTC era of my childhood but I had never seen these cards before and there was so much to choose from. Then I noticed that Japan was still cranking out quality promos to this day. Then when I took a long hard look at the new English stuff it simply couldn’t compare. Not even close.
You deserve so many more subs. Keep up the great videos!
As a player and want-to-be collector, I feel really torn about the way the English TCG is handling things. I like having the cards we need for tournaments cheap and I like the greater attendance, but I hate the idea that some of the rare cards I'm getting to experience as new now will never retain any real value. I feel like that's the price you have to pay in the United States when you make anything popular and less exclusive, but it still feels pretty bad. Hopefully we'll have some more exclusive releases again someday.
I really enjoy going back and listening to the older Pratte rants! Keep doing what you’re doing man and don’t let the worms get to you. Your public videos are a funnel to your Patreon
Completely agree with Japanese nailing the promos. That team rocket case is toward the top of my "to own" list. The English side needs to be careful with their player base because they don't have that collector side to fall back on. It would take minimal effort, literally a 1st edition stamp or promos with exclusive art and release would bring a large amount of people back toward new product. Evolutions was nice for a bit of nostalgia but became lackluster for me very quickly.
Completely agree with you. I love the Japanese exclusive promos. The full art poncho Pikachu are one of my favourite for the new stuff. I also like the Pokémon Center exclusive cards.
I hope TPCi will listen to this and bring the collecting aspect back by bring back 1st ed stamp, reducing the amount of products and quantities, and bring us some exclusive promos where japan does not have.
Please share if there is a way for us to give our feedback to the TPCi about the English TCG.
I would love it
Would love an update on this matter. Japanese cards have gone up in price.
Living in Brazil, all I do is struggle to be a player, and get satisfied collecting the english set cards. Looking from the bottom high up, where you are!
Great video!!! I try to collect a little bit of both; but i like the Japanese cards better
It’s 2022. Do you still agree with your opinion from this video? I’d love to see a video about it. Thanks man! Big fan here!!
I agree with a lot of this, especially how cool Japanese promos are. But I don’t think we should be disappointed that cards are better quality now - even if that does mean more PSA 10 graded cards are easier to get. I don’t get how wanting cards to become harder to grade due to quality control is a good thing. That would be a shady move on any company to make cards of lesser quality just for collectors to buy more and more of their stuff.
You can tell from how you speak that there is no bull, I like it, subbed
BRING BACK FIRST EDITION
please
Javin M NOOOOO JAVIN I don't want the price of first edition cards to go down EEEEWWWWW. 1st edition should be untouched but that's my opinion :) XY Evolutions was the reprint for me
Ultimate Rayquaza Star Shhhhush lol ;)
VOUCH!!!!!!!!!!
I think he just means first editions in general. Like 1st edition and unlimited SM.
Its a bit lengthy bit I hope you guys give this a read, let me know your opinions
The collector issue is not that we aren't getting promos, it's just that now they're pulling SET cards out of Japanese sets and marketing them to us as collection box promos to milk the cash cows that we are seen as. (This is not to confuse this with tin reprints either though as those are for the purpose of highly playable cards that are reprinted with an alternate art).
The problem with this is that they are hitting 2 birds with one stone as at the same time our exclusive promo slots are getting replaced by standard junk AND our standard sets are devalued as collector cards are getting redistributed everywhere as if overprinting wasn't enough of a problem already. When you take a set card out of a set and re purpose it as a promo, you are in essence taking away from the set. Simply put, we are getting neg -1's every time these promos are being done.
Woah I'm so early and yeah you hit the nail on the head, collectors are being shunned these days haha. I'm not complaining though it just shows more attention to gold stars and vintage cards to increase their value via supply and demand!
We need more Pokémon channels like this
I wanted to ask you where you buy your japanese products from, i know a middle man service is needed for exclusive stuff but i am having a hard time picking one based off the reviews. Loving the content so far, watched the more recent videos but just going back to re watch this one. thank you for taking the time to read this.
Great video! Wish we had better English releases (something similar to Southern Islands would be nice).
Japanese promos all the way!!
I feel like the Japanese just care more about pokemon in general, and they work harder to make it better. After all, it is their child and they need to keep it healthy.
Even the cheap preconstructed decks in japan are way better than the American ones.
If America had created pokemon, I'm not sure if we would try to do better or not. As a player, I have to say that I enjoy looking at the Japanese cards a lot more than the English ones while I play. They just seem to be a bit better.
As a collector, I think they are beautiful. Even the cards that have the same art as the English just seem to be more attractive. They put in the extra effort, like on Japanese holofoils the line the border of the entire card in foil. Not just the picture. That makes it look 10 times better.
Agree, They care about the quality control of everything they make , during every step in the process
It's interesting to finally see someone talk about the concept, the theme, the coherence of a set. As an artist, that's something that's always frustrated me. But I think the TCG in general, from it's Japanese even, has not many bold visual statements. I think cards always look the same set in set out and don't do anything with the visual template. And I just don't agree about that print thing, making it hard for collectors. That's not a set issue, it's the fact that you are just too wealthy and can afford to get many tries at getting that perfect one. XD We little people don't have that much money to throw around for these packs and would be really unfair to scale the rates up to you guys, IMO.
as a new and relatively serious collector, i completely agree. nothing exciting from the new sets, the prism cards were so easy to pull as well. i really hope they can do something to fix it. it sounds silly but maybe they should start printing shitty centering and edging cards haha.
"not even up for debate"
Keep up the great work smpratte - so refreshing to see someone talk business and philosophy about Pokemon, collecting and TCG as a whole rather than 'lets open 1000 booster packs' - boooring. WOTC era is king in my eyes - i'm hitting those 1st ed. psa 10s hard before they become too pricey for the average collector
I hate to say it, but I think the reason why Japan respects collectors more is because the American market has a major scalping (i.e; gouging the entire supply of current boxes whenever the opportunity arises) problem. Magic tried limited print run with Commander 2016, and it ended up being a disaster; scalpers jacked up the prices 300% in less than 3 months after release. Printing in-demand CCG products in limited quantities is dangerous these days.
There are only 2 realistic solutions. Either Pokemon brings back 1st Edition, or TCGPlayer puts a hard limit per customer on each product, and strictly enforces that policy (i.e; IP bans anyone they catch making multiple accounts).
I am looking for a video you did in 2017 about Ash vs team rocket boxes, but I can't find it.
Did you delete it ?
what do you think about Alternative Artwork with the A logo on the English side? Would you consider those cards as unique?
I really want to Invest in new age pokemon TCG but its not even worth my time. Bring back 1st edition print runs OR BUST!
i don't see how that'll improve the situation. it will get to the point where everyone rushes to buy 1st editions and then they're worth basically the same as regular edition, as it was in japanese xy. I think that they should slow down the pace of set releases, and also make them smaller jeez, but anyway, and just bring back a sort of exclusivity. Like having a card that will only only release in a certain shop, or if they make a set like generations or shining legends, make it so that it'll only be on sale for a month or 2, not like 8. The point is that even if you do invest in modern tcg, the returns are kinda crappy, and some cards sell for quite a lot, but only do because they're playable, nothing else, nothing to do with exclusivity. It means no one feels special buying a product, because hundreds of thousands of other people will too, and then to add to that, the cards can be utterly boring and crap, and just a rehash of something from a set.
I'M SOO FRESH YA'LL!!!!
I'M FRESHER THEN FRESH !!!!
I'M PACK FRESH YA'LL!!!
I think if I ever went to collect master sets I would collect Japanese over English. The English cards have been pretty terrible lately in terms of off-center cards. I've been buying my ultra-rares from Ebay where I can see the exact card I'm getting, rather than ending up with a really off-center copy from a card website.
6:14 purrrfect :D
Am I the only one that sees those Pikachu cosplay boxes in the background :0
I want one I never got a chance to buy them
;0
I swear we get crap for English sets. For instance pikachu promos are just so insane yet we never get any? So now I have to pay extra to get them imported... Honestly besides flashfire and hidden fates everything has been crap.
It makes the older stuff more desirable for sure.
What are your thoughts on US full arts and these gold full arts like Solgaleo GX?
Hey smpratte I got a question, why are the Japanese Rayquaza gold stars on eBay priced so low and is it worth investing in them? Would really appreciate some advice, thanks!
With the modern English cards becoming less valuable and rare, and the modern Japanese cards still caring about collectors, I wonder if it will end up raising prices for the vintage Japanese cards as more people turn to Japanese for modern cards
I mean this in a positive way Smpratte is like the Tai lopez or Gary Vanyerchuck of the pokemon game ❤️
You are right im starting to collect Japanese cards again but you are right the English pokemon packs are easy to get psa 10s
4yrs later would you say it's gotten better or worse?
I love Japanese cards, always have
Sometimes looking at the print run quantity of pokemon sets, I wonder if tpci even attempt to predict whether if their sets are gonna be popular or a flop. such as tpci over printing crimson invasion was a shit show of a set that is over printed while on the other hand ultra prism having some of the most highest demand in sun and moon sets next to guardians rising having such low print run.
copy and paste conversation into the sports card market. Same exact thing happening.
I have always like the Japanese side, but originally started in 99 with wotc thought it wasn't going to last my brother said charizard 1st edition base will be over 100k 30 years from now I told him he was crazy.... I Started again 9 and a half months ago with my daughter and have a few hundred Japanese. I started her with evolution and base set now she has near 6,000 English cards and most of the wotc era sets are complete. We only buy locally so it has been a challenge to get this far but it has been fun. 😏
Also I agree the Japanese cards have always been more based towards the collector. English cards need to get their shit into gear !!
jinjarob you only buy locally and in just 9 months you have almost been able to complete all the wotc sets?? That’s insane
chris journee it's taken alot of hard work, a little hint I've had to buy a lot of bulk lots to get this far. Probably bought 30,000 cards this past year. I'm also not made of money. I'm just good at finding deals and always looking.
A buddy traded me the first 151 all look like 9's for my old motorcycle gear.
Well, the generations pricing didnt age well BUT the japanese shining legends absolutely did. super interesting that people are so into generations nowadays, I genuinely find it odd. maybe just "anniversary set = money" mindset
Funny how now in 2021 it's exciting just to find product at retail price lol
and then hidden fates came out for collectors. Japanese still by far my favorite.
This is why I don't touch English new releases. On the bright side, such great availability means that cards in general are cheaper. People that actually play the TCG tend to benefit more than collectors.
This aged well
I'm a tcg player, but I agree with you.
New to the grading side of cards. Why is it harder to get a PSA 10 for a card from a booster box in the older days than now? When you said it took you like 25 send offs for the charizard, why?
Just really the quality of the cards made, although cards from packs now aren't perfect they're much better than before. you could open pack fresh cards from the older sets and they cards would already have nicks on them and not be in good condition, that's why it was harder to get a PSA 10.
philip evans Oh ok thanks I get you. Didn't really realise cards could be that bad even from fresh packs
Yes there are quite a few FAs from bw and level x cards from platinum that there are no psa 10 because they were that bad of print quality. Many 9s but nothing better yet.
Ayra Simmons like which ones? Just wanna search em up :D
I know giratina lv x from platinum (the non promo) does not have 10. I was wrong about BW. The numbers though of graded bw is still really low for many cards.
Hit the nail on the head! Amazing video.
Modern product just isn't special at all due to the print runs and availability these days, so it's 1st edition wotc all the way for me, I don't care for anything else. I appreciate Japanese cards but they're just not for me personally outside of potentially trophy cards.
I never thought I'd be watching a video about a guy complaining about print quality being too good. Lul
You, sir, spoke nothing but the truth. Japanese products just hit you differently. The Japanese know how to conceptualize and make unique sets. Do you think that living in a capitalist country (like the US) has something to do with how disappointed so many collectors (like you and I)? I have a much stronger affinity for Japanese cards in general due to the excellent quality control and exclusivity and uniqueness with so many sets (as you mentioned with the poncho Pikachu, and for me it would be Tag Team GX All Stars).
Sorry, I don't think this aged well
The overall message definitely aged well. The Japanese promos STAY way better. The Nessa Shiny Star V themed set is truly incredible. When will the west ever give us something like that? Sadly, I don't think we will.
Generations was such a mess of a set XD
Do you still have the same feelings today ?
Wooo!
WOTC all the way
Japanese all day.
More videos
"cards never released like Surfing Pikachu." Clearly a well researched video....Surfing Pikachu has been re released at least 4 times in the US.
@AtticusRh0des Uhh, dude, he said Mt. Fuji Pikachu, it's not the same Surfing Pikachu like Black Star Promo #28 and is Japanese only. The artwork is different; regular Surfing Pikachu doesn't have the mountain in it. Listen and look closely first before commenting, please.