“I collect them, but I don’t trade them. Some of my cards are not trading cards. Professor Oak is a good one because my sister told me that. My favorite one is Geodude because he can pick up heavy rocks. He can pick up really huge ones. And he can pick up big piles of dirt. My second favorite is Charmander ’cause he can blow fire out of his mouth and there’s fire on his tail so he can touch it on another Pokémon so Ash could win the match. Charmeleon is my third favorite character because Charmander evolves into Charmeleon and he has fire on his tail, too.”
—Emma
Is there anybody out there who doesn’t know about the Pokémon cards? Well, they started out as a card game that you can play pretty much the way you play Pokémon on the Game Boy. But soon something strange began to happen. Kids started collecting the cards just to collect the cards. They started trading the cards the way they would trade their Pokémon electronically via the Game Boys. In fact, they started trading Pokémon cards the same way kids would trade baseball cards. Except you never hear a kid say, “Hey, I got a signed rookie Squirtle!”
Now, I’m not going to get into the card game itself. I don’t have enough room in the book to discuss strategies and rules and all of that. But I would like to talk about the collecting and trading of cards.
“I’ve heard that one kid in my class had about all the cards. That’s pretty wow. He said that a card called Mew that I’m trying to get was worth $30 … he said that Mewtwo was worth $25. I’m not sure if I totally believe him.”
—Kara
Most kids who have cards started out with the basic two-player starter set that includes 60 cards—that is, two decks of 30 cards. This is fine if you want to play the game, since there’s everything you need to play. That means there are lots of duplicates. This is also great if you just want to collect the cards, too. Because duplicates means you can trade a card and still have the same card type. Got it? Good.
“I usually trade cards with friends and people that are nice and that want to trade a good card for a good card. For example, I traded a Vaporeon for a Machop. They were both holographic and then I traded my holographic Machop for a holographic Kangaskhan.”
—Katie
“I’ve made some good trades in my life. The first one was a Meowth for an Exeggutor. My second was a Bulbasaur for an Electrode. My third was Kabutops for a level 92 Flareon.”
—Aaron
Now, here’s the tricky part. There are 102 cards total, so in order to collect all of the cards you have to buy booster sets. Why is this so tricky? It’s tricky because you never know what you’re going to get in a booster pack. And it’s no good looking at the pictures on the pack, because they don’t give you a clue. So you might buy several booster packs and find that you have four or five of the same card. What should you do? You should trade, of course.
In case you didn’t know, cards can either be Rare-Holo (that means it has the shiny 3D foil called “Holographic”); Rare; Uncommon; or Common. I’ve listed the different cards in each variety for you. Now, just in case you don’t want to carry this stupid book around with you every time you trade a card, there’s an easier way to tell if a card is Rare, Uncommon, or Common. If you look down in the right-hand corner of the card—the side with the picture—you’ll see a “Rarity Symbol” in teeny-tiny type.
“Some of my favorite cards are Giovanni’s Nidoqueen, Dragonite Fossil, Wartortle and Blaine’s Charizard. But that’s not all my favorites. If I said all of them, well, I probably wouldn’t be able to fit it on the page. They are my favorites because of their attack and because of their looks.”
—Michael
“I also like Eevee because it looks like a fox only that it has more dog personality and one of my favorite animals is dogs and I love bunnies. And Eevee has sort of the shape of bunny ears and he also has the Japanese Pokémon card and is worth more money and it has more HP.”
—Katie
Hey, Do I Gotta Learn to Play the Game to Enjoy the Cards?
“My favorite cards are Jigglypuff and Poliwrath. Jigglypuff is really cute and he’s pretty good. Poliwrath, he’s a holographic and it looks cool with the background. Those are my two favorites, but I have much more. I like Eevee because I like the way he talks and says his name. He’s very small but he’s very active. He can run fast. He can run a lot. Ninetales also, he is a horse and he has nine tails obviously, and he’s holographic and he’s a really good Pokémon.”
—Zaro
“I trade cards at 9:30 AM Saturdays at Toys ‘R’ Us … it’s tuff to say what my favorites are since I do have 31 holographics. My favorites are Charizard, because he can defeat a Pokémon in one shot, and Mewtwo, because it can use Barrier. My favorite holographic is Mew because it knocks out powerful Pokémon.”
—Aaron
Of course you don’t have to play the game to enjoy the cards! I know a lot of kids who love the game and go to tournaments and play the card game almost as much as the video game. I also know kids who have never even tried to play the card game. These kids just like collecting and trading. The point is to have fun and you can have loads of fun playing the game or collecting the cards.
“My best trade was I traded a Diglett for a Colorless Energy card. This is my best trade because a Colorless Energy is more powerful than a Diglett and they are also rare.”
—Raymond
“I’ve traded Beedrill and Bulbasaur for Scoop Up which is a trainer and Nidorino. I think Scoop Up looks really cool. I think it was an okay trade. It might not have been such a fair trade for me, but I didn’t care because I really wanted Scoop Up and Nidorino. And also, I collect and try to collect Japanese cards. I don’t have that many. I have one Japanese trainer, I don’t know the name of it, because I can’t read Japanese, but it has a picture of Misty from the movie and Horsea. I think that’s a really cool kind of drawing. I got it from one of my friends that didn’t want it that much. I totally forget what I traded for it. I probably traded a circle card for it.”
—Kara
“I like all of my trades. I trade cards to collect rarer ones, or ones I need. When I traded Giovanni’s Pinsir for Giovanni’s Nidoqueen, I liked that trade because I like trading gyms for gyms.”
—Michael
It’s (Unofficially) Official! Girls Prefer Cute Pokémon! Boys Like Strong Pokémon!
“I like Charmander because he never gets dead—because every time something beats him up then he gets really mad and beats them up.”
—Nicholas
“My favorite cards are Blastoise, Pidgeot. I like Blastoise because he’s the best card I have. Because he has 100 HP and he takes away 40 plus in one move. So he’s pretty good and he’s holographic.”
—Brandon
Okay, this is something you probably already knew, but girls seem to like Pokémon cards as much as boys. A lot of the girl kids that were interviewed not only played the video game, but liked the cards. Some of them didn’t play the video game at all, but liked the cards. The boys, of course, liked everything about Pokémon—the cards, the TV show, and the video games.
The favorite cards for the girls were Ponyta, Jigglypuff, Butterfree, Meowth, and Horsea. The boys liked cards that included Geodude, Machamp, and Prime-ape.
And, of course, everybody liked Pikachu!
What does this mean? Does it mean that if you are a guy-type kid that you can’t like Jigglypuff—of course not! Does it mean that if you’re a girl-type kid that you can’t like Geodude—nope, it doesn’t mean that, either.
What it does mean is that somebody has finally invented a game that both girls and boys can like. Hey, there are enough characters to go around, right? And even little kids, who maybe can’t play the video game very well, can still enjoy the cards.
It also means that everyone is entitled—allowed—to have their own opinion on what cards they like best. Nobody is stupid or dumb or has booger-brains if they like a certain card. Yes, of course, a card may be Rare or a Holo or have more HPs, but a kid may like a certain card for reasons that have nothing to do with how rare or how many HPs a card may have. And everyone should respect the opinion of others when it comes to what card they may like best.
“I like Wigglytuff because I just like him. He’s holographic and holographic is shiny.”
—Dylan
“I really like all of them but my favorite is Charizard. He’s pretty cool and he’s like one of the best cards and I really wanted to get him. So everybody is begging me for the card. I gave two holographics and another card for it which was a little bit of a bad trade for me, but I really wanted it so I got it.”
—Adrian
“My favorite cards are Mewtwo and Charizard because Mewtwo’s Barrier is really good and Charizard’s Fire Spin does 100 damage and they’re both holographic!”
—Jason
Is Playing the Card Game Gambling?
No, playing the card game is not really gambling. There is some luck involved, but mostly the card game is about strategy—the same as the video game.
However, I know for a fact that some parents don’t like their kids playing any kind of card game. If you have a friend who has parents who don’t allow them to play the game, then you should respect the kid and his or her parents by not forcing or asking them to play. It’s just as simple as that. You can still have a load of fun trading the cards.
Ten Pokémon Legends That Ain’t True
“I heard that ‘Missingno’ evolves into Kangaskhan in the Pokémon game, which is not true. I also heard that if you capture Missingno he will put a virus in your Game Boy. For that reason, if you find him, don’t capture him. I also heard that you can get ‘fake’ cards included in the real Pokémon card packs.”
—Raymond
Believe it or not, kids have always had legends and myths about the games they love to play. Sometimes the stories have a little bit of truth in them and sometimes they are totally made up. One kid will hear something interesting, then tell his friend. The friend will make the story more interesting by changing something in it and tell another kid. That kid will change something else. And on and on and on, with the story changing just a little each time it is told.
So here are some of the stories I’ve heard about Pokémon. Some of them are “almost true” and others are just silly or strange.
1) There’s a kid out there who has parents that bought him a Pokémon card for $10,000.
Nope, this isn’t true. I have seen cards for sales for $40 and even $50 each. That’s still A LOT of money and probably not worth it.
2) Missingno is a virus that will ruin your Game Boy.
Well, kind of, but not really. Missingno and sometimes called “Missing Know” by some kids is a computer programming error. He’s the character you find when surfing off of Cinnabar Island. You can catch him, but he doesn’t show up in your Pokédex. Plus, he could scramble some of the files in the game you are playing if you try to save him. At the very worst, you will lose the game you are playing, but your Game Boy will be okay.
3) Some kids have found counterfeit cards in official packs.
This is not true, though I have known some kids who have found official cards in packs of counterfeits. If you buy a sealed, official pack there will be no counterfeits in it. However, if you buy unofficial, unsealed packs, you will probably get junk.
This rumor might have started by another rumor that is probably true: the first-edition Jungle booster pack had an Electrode non-foil with the wrong picture. A lot of kids who got this card might have thought it was a counterfeit because Electrode looked different than he was supposed to look.
4) Pokémon are really space aliens.
Not true. Pokémon are not space aliens.
5) Pokémon are real.
Don’t laugh—a lot of little kids may believe this. And no, Pokémon are not real, just in case you were wondering.
6) There’s a Pokémon site on the Internet where you can download all of the games for free and play them on your computer.
I don’t know if this is true or not, but I do know that it is dangerous to download unofficial versions of a game off the Internet. Any unofficial game you download from the Internet could contain a virus that will do very bad things to your computer. It is also illegal to make or copy games and put them on the Internet or sell them in stores.
7) A kid somewhere finished the whole game in a half an hour.
Even with a walk-through, I don’t think this is possible. And even if it were possible, what’s the point? The average time it takes to finish the game—if you are playing seriously and without a walk-through—is about 50 to 100 hours. When it takes me a long time to finish a game, I look at that as getting my money’s worth from the game. After all, who wants a game that is too easy to play?
8) One of the actresses from 90210 is going to marry Charmander.
Okay, that’s just weird. And I don’t care if someone you know has a cousin who said they saw pictures of the two of them out on a date in Hollywood. It’s still weird. And it’s not true.
9) Some kids in Japan died watching Pokémon on TV.
This is a rumor that started because one of the original episodes had a flashing light in one of the scenes and it was reported that the light made some kids in Japan sick. I mentioned this before. Nobody died because of it, and they took the flashing light out of the show as soon as they found out what happened.
10) Playing too many video games will make you dumb.
This is actually true. It is true because if you spend all of your time playing video games, even great ones like Pokémon, then you are probably not doing your homework or reading a book on your own or exploring a hobby like science or chess or stamp collecting. So, playing video games won’t make you dumb, but not doing schoolwork certainly will.
“I’ve heard a lot of rumors about the 151st Pokémon, Mew. One of them is that if you buy the Magikarp from the guy in the Poké Center and put it in the Day Care Center until it is Level 50, then grow it another level with fighting, then it will evolve into a Mew. This isn’t true. I tried it. Another rumor I’ve heard also about Mew is that after you get the HM 01 from the captain on the SS Anne, you can faint all your Pokémon and go to the nearest Poké Center. The SS Anne will not move from its spot. Don’t go back on the SS Anne until you have HM 03 and HM 04, you can teach them to a Pokémon to battle Mew. None of these rumors are true. Too bad.”
—Maxwell
Help! My Dodrio Card Fell in the Toilet!!!
First of all, I don’t even want to know how your Pokémon card happened to get close enough to the toilet to fall in.
But stuff—bad stuff—does happen. Hey, you’re a kid and make mistakes. Believe me, getting a Pokémon card wet by falling into the toilet or getting squirted by the garden hose or getting soaked in the rain is not that big a deal. But just in case one of your cards does get wet, here is a good way to deal with it.
First, if your card really did fall into the toilet—call your parents. Don’t scream or yell about it—sheesh, they’ll think you fell into the toilet. They may not want you to retrieve it and that’s their decision. However, if you do fish it out of the bowl, spray it with a good disinfectant, like Lysol.
Then, put the soaked card into a paper towel and fold the towel over so that it completely covers the card. Now get your mom or dad to iron the card with the iron on a low temperature. They don’t have to press too hard, just a couple of swipes with the iron. If they don’t want to iron it, then you can use a rolling pin. If you don’t have a rolling pin, then use a large ball, like a basketball or a football and roll it over the card a couple of times as you press down medium hard on it. Two or three times is enough, don’t get carried away or anything. And be sure you do it on a flat surface, like the floor or a table.
By rolling or ironing the card, you should have squished out most of the water. Check to see if the inside of the paper towel covering the card is wet. If the inside is wet, then change the paper towel for a new piece.
The last step is the hardest. Find the thickest book you have and put the card—still wrapped in the paper towel—in the book. Put it right in the middle of the book and put the book someplace where it will be squeezed tightly. This can be back in the bookshelf or even under your mattress. You want the book to squeeze the card tight. Keep it in the book for at least A WHOLE DAY. Don’t take the card out and fuss with it. Put it in the book and forget about it for a day. But don’t forget where it is!
If the card is still moist or wet when you open the book the next day, then change the paper towel and put the card wrapped in the new towel back in the book and keep it squished for another day. The basic idea is that you want the card to dry as it is being squished. That way it will dry straight.
There are two things you definitely do not want to do to a wet card. The first thing is to dry it off by putting it directly in any paper that has printing on it. That includes newspapers or magazines. The moisture will make the ink rub off on the card. That’s why you wrap it in a paper towel when you put it in a book. The second thing you definitely DO NOT want to do to a wet card is dry it too quickly, like in a microwave oven or a clothes dryer. You want the card to dry slowly, as it is being squished.
How do I know so much about cards getting wet by falling into the toilet or soaked with garden hoses? Believe me, you don’t want to know.
Rare, Common, and Uncommon
“There are these new Jungle booster packs. I got one of them yesterday and I got a Pinsir, he’s one of the rarest. I was really shocked.”
—Max
What does all this stuff mean, anyway? How rare and hard to find is a Rare card? How common and easy to find is a Common card? And what’s up with those Uncommon cards?
The Rare, Common, and Uncommon stuff is all about the game and the video game. A Rare Pokémon card is the same as a Rare Pokémon character in the video game. I know, I know, this sounds like baby stuff, but some kids I know have gotten confused—and not just little kids, either. So I figured I’d put it in.
But are there any really Rare Pokémon cards? This is a question I hear a lot. I also hear a lot of rumors. One rumor was that some kid’s father bought a Rare Holo card for $1,000!
First off, Pokémon cards are not all that hard to find in your local stores or shopping mall. So we have to assume that no Pokémon card is really, really rare. This is something you should remember when trading, especially when trading with older kids who sometimes like to fool little kids.
Another rumor that I have heard is that some kid traded his entire collection—including a complete set of Holo cards—for a single Japanese Chansey Holo because Japanese cards are really, really hard to find.
I don’t know if either of these two rumors are true. Personally, I don’t think the first rumor is true. A thousand dollars is a lot of money. Too much money to spend on Pokémon cards. I know, it could have been some really rich kid or something. Okay, it’s possible that someone spent a lot of money on a card, but I still don’t think it happened.
The other rumor is more possible. I have seen a bunch of the Japanese cards with the Japanese writing on them and they are kind of neat. One kid I know just collects Japanese cards. However, they are not as rare as you may think. There are a lot of the Japanese cards around and they are not that rare. So be careful when you trade for them.
Here is something else you might want to think about. If you like the Japanese cards because they are from someplace far away and interesting, maybe you should check out stamp collecting. It’s a lot like collecting Pokémon cards and you can collect stamps from all over the world. It’s a pretty cool hobby.
A circle means that the card is Common
A diamond shape means that the card is Uncommon
A star means that a card is Rare. Both Holo and non-Holo cards have the Star.
Card Types
If you play the card game, then you obviously know all about these cards. If you just collect and trade, then these cards might have puzzled you. Here’s the way the cards are classified.
Basic Pokémon: These are your average, everyday character cards. There are more of these than any other kind of card.
Evolution Cards: These are evolved Pokémon.
Energy Cards: They have one of the seven Energy Symbols, such as Fire, Lightning, Grass, or Water on them instead of a picture of a Pokémon.
Trainer Cards: These will have a picture of a character you might recognize, like Professor Oak or a Pokédex, but it might also have a character or object you won’t see in the video game, like a Devolution Spray or Switch.
There are 16 Rare Holo Cards and they are:
Alakazam—Rare-Holo
Blastoise—Rare-Holo
Chansey—Rare-Holo
Charizard—Rare-Holo
Clefairy—Rare-Holo
Gyarados—Rare-Holo
Hitmonchan—Rare-Holo
Machamp—Rare-Holo
Magneton—Rare-Holo
Mewtwo—Rare-Holo
Nidoking—Rare-Holo
Ninetales—Rare-Holo
Poliwrath—Rare-Holo
Raichu—Rare-Holo
Venusaur—Rare-Holo
Zapdos—Rare-Holo
There are 16 Rare Cards without the Holo and they are:
Beedrill—Rare
Dragonair—Rare
Dugtrio—Rare
Electabuzz—Rare
Electrode—Rare
Pidgeotto—Rare
Clefairy Doll—Rare
Computer Search—Rare
Devolution Spray—Rare
Impostor Professor Oak—Rare
Item Finder—Rare
Lass—Rare
Pokémon Breeder—Rare
Pokémon Trader—Rare
Scoop Up—Rare
Super Energy Removal—Rare
There are 32 Uncommon cards and they are:
Arcanine—Uncommon
Charmeleon—Uncommon
Dewgong—Uncommon
Dratini—Uncommon
Farfetch’d—Uncommon
Growlithe—Uncommon
Haunter—Uncommon
Ivysaur—Uncommon
Jynx—Uncommon
Kadabra—Uncommon
Kakuna—Uncommon
Machoke—Uncommon
Magikarp—Uncommon
Magmar—Uncommon
Nidorino—Uncommon
Poliwhirl—Uncommon
Porygon—Uncommon
Raticate—Uncommon
Seel—Uncommon
Wartortle—Uncommon
Defender—Uncommon
Energy Retrieval—Uncommon
Full Heal—Uncommon
Maintenance—Uncommon
PlusPower—Uncommon
Pokémon Center—Uncommon
Pokémon Flute—Uncommon
Pokédex—Uncommon
Professor Oak—Uncommon
Revive—Uncommon
Super Potion—Uncommon
Double Colorless Energy—Uncommon
There are 32 Common cards and they are:
Abra—Common
Bulbasaur—Common
Caterpie—Common
Charmander—Common
Diglett—Common
Doduo—Common
Drowzee—Common
Gastly—Common
Koffing—Common
Machop—Common
Magnemite—Common
Metapod—Common
Nidoran—Common
Onix—Common
Pidgey—Common
Pikachu—Common
Poliwag—Common
Ponyta—Common
Rattata—Common
Sandshrew—Common
Squirtle—Common
Starmie—Common
Staryu—Common
Tangela—Common
Voltorb—Common
Vulpix—Common
Weedle—Common
Bill—Common
Energy Removal—Common
Gust of Wind—Common
Potion—Common
Switch—Common
There are also 6 Energy Cards:
Fighting Energy
Fire Energy
Grass Energy
Lightning Energy
Psychic Energy
Water Energy
Cards, Cards, and More Cards …
Plus, there are also Jungle “expansion” packs available. They have 45 Pokémon in them. The Jungle packs can contain characters such as Eevee, Meowth, and Butterfree. And the company is now offering a Fossil expansion pack.
And if all this wasn’t confusing enough, some kids are finding the Japanese versions of the cards. Although Japanese kids play the same game with the cards as American kids, the Japanese versions are different. For one thing, the Japanese versions are written in Japanese and there are different characters in the packs.
And now, just introduced are Fossil packs that contain even more cards.
I Collected All the Cards—Every One!—Am I Rich Yet?
I can answer that in one word: No. Nope. And not even close. Okay, okay, I know, that’s a lot more than one word. But I wanted to make a point. First off, you shouldn’t be collecting or trading Pokémon cards for money. This is just my opinion, but I think that first and most importantly you should collect the cards for fun. That’s FUN with a capital F-U-N. You should collect because it’s fun and interesting to build your collection and to trade with friends.
If you really want to know why you’re not rich from collecting Pokémon cards, I can tell you. Something becomes very valuable when there are either just a few or even just one of that thing, and a lot of people want it. There are just a few Mark McGwire record-breaking home run baseballs that he hit. There are just a few Mickey Mantle rookie baseball cards. And there are only a few balls that Babe Ruth autographed. All of these things are worth a lot of money because there are very few of them, but there are a lot—I MEAN A LOT—of baseball fans who would like to own them.
There are millions and millions of Pokémon cards being printed. That means that almost everyone that wants and can afford a complete set can probably get a complete set. This is good news for the kids who like to collect and trade, but bad news for those kids who might think their collection is worth a lot of money.
It works like this. If you have the only Nidoking Holo on the playground one day and a lot of kids want to trade for it, then you can make a pretty good deal. But, if four or five other kids have a Nidoking Holo, then you probably won’t be able to trade for as much. As the company prints more cards—including Nidoking Holos—there will eventually be more of them on the playground.
“I had a Rare Holo that I read was worth $40. And when I went to the store they had it in the book for $40. But when I offered to sell it to the guy in the store, he would only give me $5 for it. What a rip-off!”
—Willy
I hear stories like this a lot. I mean a lot! I hear them from parents and from kids. Yeah, what a rip-off. The truth of the matter is, the prices listed in the guides are “retail” prices and store owners will only pay “wholesale” prices for cards. But the real deal is that Pokémon cards—or anything you collect—is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. None of the prices in the card guides are written in stone. As a matter of fact, most of them are written in Jell-O. Nobody can make you a firm promise that cards can be resold for a certain price or that a card will go up in value.
First Edition Cards
There are some very rare cards. These are marked with a first edition symbol. It looks like “1” with “Edition” across the top. What that means is that cards with this symbol were the first cards to be printed. There aren’t very many of these cards around. Are they valuable? Well, you should certainly get more for them in a trade than just a regular card. Are you rich? Sorry, you’re not rich, but you do have a pretty neat card.
I don’t mean to be a party pooper when it comes to the money value of the cards. Hey, who likes to be a party pooper, right? But the real point of Pokémon cards and the game and all the other stuff is to have fun! Collecting and trading and playing the game is a lot of fun. On the other hand, worrying about money and the value of the cards isn’t much fun at all!
“At school we spend our whole recess time trading cards. Not everyone in our grade trades, only some people who are interested in it. There’s usually all the people who want to trade gather around. You show a card to the other people and they say, ‘I want your such-and-such,’ then you have to look at their cards and see what you want for that card and then you say, ‘Will you give me such-and-such for such-and-such?’ It’s pretty fun trading at school.”
—Kara
“I did a stupid trade. I traded a Venusaur for a Staryu because Venusaur does a 100 damage and Staryu does only 40 damage so Venusaur is better ’cause I realized it was a very bad trade.”
—Matthew
“Well, this one was a really good one for me. I gave away a trainer for a Vileplume. It was a good trade because the trainer card wasn’t that good and the Vileplume was holographic. The other person collects trainers.”
—Travis
I wrote a little bit about what I thought were fair rules for trading Pokémon with the game link in the first book. Now I’m going to go over some good ideas for trading cards.
The idea behind trading isn’t to get an unfair deal with the other person. In the best trades each person gets a card that they need. That means that each person is happy with the trade.
RULE #1: I don’t think it’s a good idea to trade with someone much younger than yourself. A little kid might trade his Rare Holo Alakazam for your Common Voltorb. That’s not a very fair trade at all. And no, you shouldn’t write Voltorb on the card with a pen and tell the little kid that it is a very ultra rare autographed card. It’s very simple; you wouldn’t be very proud of yourself if you beat a little kid in soccer or baseball. So why would you be proud of yourself for getting a better deal on a trade with a little kid? The best trades are done with someone your own age who understands the cards as well as you do.
RULE #2: If you are unsure of a card’s rarity, then check the symbol on the back of the card. Most often a diamond symbol card shouldn’t be traded for a circle symbol card.
RULE #3: If someone doesn’t want to trade, then don’t bully them into it.
RULE #4: If one of the cards in the trade turns out to be a fake, then the trade should be called off immediately.
RULE #5: Both people should exchange the card or cards they want to trade at the same time. This is a very simple rule that can prevent hurt feelings and misunderstandings. If you decide to trade and one person doesn’t have the card with them, then you should wait until both people have the cards to exchange.
RULE #6: I like the idea of two types of trades: Forever and For a Little While. When I was a kid—hundreds and hundreds of years ago—we used to call these Keepsies and Play Trades. I know, I know, that sounds really corny and all that, but think about it. After all, a lot of kids trade characters in the game for just a little while. Why not make the same rules for the cards? It’s just really important that everyone knows and understands the rules of the trade before trading cards.
RULE #7: If you are going to trade cards, then trade cards. That means not trading your new baseball glove for a Poliwrath or trading your parents’ new Buick for a Charizard. Trust me on this, it may seem like a good idea to trade your big brother’s stereo for a Zapdos, but you’ll soon regret it.
RULE #8: Trading is a game and, like any other game, it should be fun. Hurt feelings, bullies, and kids that rip off other kids are no fun. If you are not having fun during a trading group, then stop.
RULE #9: You need rules. Every group of kids has its own set of rules for trading. One group I know only lets a kid touch the card he wants for one minute before he has to decide whether to trade or not trade. Make sure that everyone in the group knows and understands all the rules of a trade before you start swapping cards.
RULE #10: If something is wrong with a card, don’t try to hide it. If you’re trading a Beedrill that your little brother wrote “POOPIE-DOOPIE” on the back in yellow crayon, the kid you are trading with should know that. Nobody likes to find out that the card they just got in a trade is less than perfect.
“I don’t trade that much because I don’t have very good cards and everybody has the cards that I have, except for my Wartortle. In the steel yard sometimes we sneak looking at the cards and trading them. One of the only trades I’ve made is three small pieces of candy for a Dodrio.”
—Nina
“The best trade I made was a Dugtrio for a first edition holographic Raichu. Because they’re both rare, but a first edition is good and holographic is good, so I did it the second my friend offered. I always ask him why he wanted the Dugtrio and he told me he was dumb that day. He was thinking about how much Dugtrio could take away, but once he realized, he was like, ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’”
—Dennis
Fakes, Forgeries, and Bootlegs
“Counterfeit cards are stupid and a rip-off because you can get about 30 cards for $2. Someone gave me counterfeit cards twice and I threw them away.”
—Nina
“If you hold up the card and you can see right through it, then it’s a counterfeit.”
—Travis
This really weird thing started happening just after Pokémon got really big: a lot of fake cards started showing up. I don’t know where they came from or who was making them, but suddenly they were everywhere. Kids I know started calling the cards “bootlegs,” which means fake, then they started calling them just “boots.” Some of these cards, I know for a fact, where bought in real stores. Some of them were packaged in unofficial plastic wrappers and some of them were in paper wrappers.
Also, a lot of these cards were bought by parents who wanted to make their kids happy. Hey, what do parents know about Pokémon, right? They bought the fakes without knowing about them. It’s not their fault, they were doing the best they could. So if your parents do bring home fakes, don’t be mad at them. They didn’t know any better.
Here are a few rules I’ve found helpful in telling the fake goods from the real deal. Remember, these are just some very basic rules.
A) Get a card that you know is genuine and hold it up to the light and then hold the card you think might be a fake up to the light. Both of them should let the same amount of light through—that is to say, the paper the card is made of should be the same quality. Hint: usually the real cards are made of thicker paper than the fakes.
B) The real cards will have the “Nintendo Seal of Quality” on the package. And look for the teeny-tiny print that reads: “© 1995, 1996, 1998 Nintendo, CREATURES, GAME FREAK, WIZARDS” at the bottom of each card.
C) Check out the holo on Holo cards. Again, get a card you know is real and compare it against one you think might be a fake. The holo should be the same type. It should reflect light in the same way.
D) Examine cards you buy that are not sealed in official Nintendo packs. If the store owner won’t let you take a really close look at the card, then come back with a parent and have them look at it closely.
E) Get a bunch of real cards and insert the card you are not sure about into the deck. The fake cards are sometimes smaller or larger than the real cards.
F) Another cool thing to do is to examine a fake and a real card very closely and compare them. That means getting out a magnifying glass or microscope if you have one and examining everything about the card, such as the tiny patterns in the holo or the printing of the letters. You may see a lot of little differences between the two cards.
The True Story about Pokémon Cards
Some kids asked me a little while ago about who made the Pokémon cards and if there was anything special about them. I told the kids that Pokémon cards were made on a secret island that was surrounded by a huge high fence and guarded by guys in gray uniforms with giant pictures of Poliwag on their chests.
Yeah, yeah, I know, it’s not nice to lie to little kids. But then I got to thinking about who did make Pokémon cards. Maybe they were made on a secret island and all that. So I started asking around. And surprise, surprise, there is no secret island and no Poliwag guards. The cards are made by a company in Washington state called Wizards of the Coast.
Wizards of the Coast started out making another trading-card game called Magic: The Gathering, which is mostly for older kids and adults. And they sold millions and millions of those games, too. They also publish a lot of science fiction and fantasy books for older kids.
The company hasn’t been around very long, only since 1990, but it’s done a lot! They organized tournaments for their card games, opened up stores, and published books. That’s pretty cool.
Then the company got bought by another company called Hasbro. You probably already know Hasbro because they make a lot of toys already.
“Charizard is my favorite card because he’s a great fighting Pokémon and he’s very rare. I do have one. Blastoise is another of my favorites because he’s valuable and you only have a one or two percent chance of getting him. I got him in April and was really happy when I got him.”
—Greg