Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket is a new way to collect Pokémon cards that feels like a dream come true for collectors. The upcoming app for iOS and Android lets you rip open digital booster packs, organize your ever-growing collection of digital cards, and show off your favorites to your friends. I attended a preview event to play a demo of Pokémon TCG Pocket and chat with the game designers from Creatures and The Pokémon Company. Here’s what I learned about how the game’s collection, customization, and battling systems work.
Pokémon TCG Pocket Is All About Collecting Pokémon Cards
Whereas most Pokémon games tend to focus on battling, Pokémon TCG Pocket emphasizes the fun of collecting Pokémon cards. The app does offer the option to battle with your cards (more on that later), but dedicates a majority of its features to obtaining new cards, organizing them in your collection, and giving you numerous ways to showcase your favorites.
The Game Showcases Pokémon’s History of Iconic Artwork
Pokémon cards are famous for their especially eye-catching artwork. Over the years, Pokémon has only become more creative with their card designs. There are cards with artwork featuring abstract paintings, photographs of clay models, and even crochet dolls. Pokémon fans are truly spoiled with the amount of excellence poured into every card and the sheer variety of art on display. All of that is front and center in Pokémon TCG Pocket. The linework looks sharp and the colors are vibrant on the digital screen. The rarer a card is, the more flair it has, from shiny holofoil to 3D elements that make it pop out of the frame.
The game includes cards that fans will recognize from the physical Pokémon TCG as well as brand new cards created just for Pocket. Then there are new twists on classic cards. For example, the game has a Slowpoke card with its original Base Set artwork, and then a full-art variant that removes the frame to reveal lots of other Slowpoke crawling all over the card in humorous fashion.
You Can ‘Enter’ the Cards to See the World Beyond the Border
Pokémon TCG Pocket’s big showstopper that you won’t find anywhere else is its extremely rare but extremely awesome immersive cards. The first set, called Genetic Apex, has over 200 different cards, but only three of them are special immersive cards. Activating one of these card’s immersive effects takes you into the world of the card. The immersive Pikachu card starts out with art of a Pikachu in a forest. Then you’re taken on a quick, guided tour past the borders of the card and into the forest where various other Pokémon can be seen, from a herd of fiery Ponyta to a pair of Nidoran playing together.
I won’t spoil the surprise of what happens in two particular immersive cards. I will say that I was impressed by how they were completely different from the Pikachu one, with their own unique music and visuals. These immersive cards were exciting to open up and practically begged for multiple viewings in order to catch a glimpse of all the cool Easter eggs inside. It’s nice to see that the game designers are taking full advantage of the digital format by doing cool things with the cards that can only happen in a digital space.
You Can Fully Customize Your Collection
Collecting the cards is only the beginning. When you get a new card, it populates on your Collection Board, which has filters to present your collection in different ways. Then, you’re free to show off your cards however you want. You can upgrade cards to have different kinds of flair. That’s right, now there’s no one to stop you from having the most sparkly Bulbasaur card there ever was. You can fill up one of many decorative binders with different cards you want to show off together. There’s also the option to pick a card to give the art-show treatment where it’s displayed on a fancy pedestal. When finish customizing your collection, you can put these various things on display for those on your friends list to see.
The Battling System Is Pretty Much Pokémon’s Marvel Snap
Pokémon TCG Pocket’s battling system is a simplified version of the physical game. The deck size has been reduced from 60 cards to 20. The Bench went from five Pokémon slots to three. Energy cards have been removed entirely and replaced with an energy-generating system that provides one energy to attach to your Pokémon each turn. Instead of winning the game by taking six Prize cards, players must earn three points to claim victory. Players earn points by knocking out a Pokémon, with two points for defeating the more powerful Pokémon ex.
Pokémon TCG Pocket was designed by Creatures, the same folks who make the physical Pokémon TCG. “We really focused on [Pokémon TCG Pocket] perhaps being [a person’s] first experience and making it more friendly to new players,” Ryo Tsujikawa, Creative Director at Creatures, told us in a group interview. “There are fewer complicated elements in it, and fewer attacks on the cards, compared to the physical TCG.”
As a competitive Pokémon TCG player, I was fascinated to see how the game was reinvented for Pocket. Its matches that lasted five-ish minutes reminded me of Marvel Snap and its pared down game mechanics were reminiscent of Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links. After using my beginner deck a few times to beat the computer on easy mode, I borrowed the Pokémon rep’s phone with a fully unlocked collection to use his Mewtwo ex deck. With a more advanced deck in my hands, I tried to win on the hardest difficulty. To my surprise and delight, the computer made strategically sound moves and kicked my butt with an Exeggutor ex deck filled with healing cards such as the Potion item and Erika’s supporter card.
How to Battle Other Players
In addition to fighting the computer, Pocket allows you to battle other players both locally and remote. I used the Auto-Build feature to generate a deck built from my modest collection and challenged another journalist to a battle. In the physical Pokémon TCG, Pokémon do such high damage that they knock out opposing Pokémon in just one or two attacks. Pocket’s Pokémon do smaller chunks of damage, so there was a lot of back-and-forth between my opponent and I as we tried to whittle down each other’s team. It was a nice change of pace. In the end, my opponent’s many Trainer cards made all the difference and he took the dub.
Even though I didn’t have time to explore the battling system more in-depth, I was satisfied knowing that Pocket’s less complex spin on the game would still challenge players. It felt like the designers put a lot of thought into how to keep the game both fun and balanced in this new form. A big change is how Pocket introduces a new rule that says the player who goes first cannot attach an energy. It also reduces the impact of Pokémon weakness. I thought these were smart changes that made the game feel more fair. When we asked if Pokémon TCG Pocket will have a competitive circuit and be part of the annual Pokémon World Championships, a Pokémon rep told us to stay tuned for more info.
Why Did Pokémon Make a Second TCG Video Game?
As it turns out, there’s already a digital Pokémon card game called Pokémon TCG Live. It has similar features to Pocket, allowing you to collect digital cards and use them to battle (with the full rules). It begs the question why the Pokémon Company decided to make a second digital card game when they already have one. Keita Hirobe, Executive Corporate Officer at The Pokémon Company, explained that while Pocket and Live are similar, they serve different purposes.
“We view [Pokémon TCG Live] as more of an extension of the physical trading card game. It’s something for players who want to learn the rules of the physical trading card game. They are able to have this easy-to-use tool to test decks and learn the rules of the game and ultimately have that inform their physical trading card game knowledge,” Hanawa said.
“Pocket is our idea to make [the Pokémon TCG] more approachable and accessible to a wider range of players. I think it’s also different than a lot of digital trading card games. In other trading card games and digital trading card games, the focus is primarily on battle. And while we do have a really rich battle system that’s going to be very fun to play, we equally focus on the card collecting experience. So we wanted to kind of have both of those elements in a digital game application.”
Pokémon TCG Pocket Is ‘Free to Start’
Pokémon TCG Pocket is “free to start,” and we all know what that means: numerous digital currencies, time-gated activities, battle passes, and real-money microtransactions. Pocket gives players two free packs every day. For those who want to fill out their collection faster, you can either fork over real cash or complete missions to earn a currency to exchange for more packs. A mission can be anything from obtaining a certain set of Pokémon cards to completing certain in-game tasks. (While we’re talking about getting more booster packs, I should note that the code cards for a free digital booster pack found in physical Pokémon TCG packs can only work in Live and don’t work in Pocket.)
A single booster pack in Pocket has five cards, and from what we could tell there is no guaranteed rare or holo in each pack like there is with physical packs. There’s also a “Wonder Pick” mode that lets you copy the contents of a friend’s booster pack and pick one card at random to add to your collection.
The developers said they spent a lot of time making the pack-opening experience enjoyable. They did this by creating a pleasing tearing sound when you open a pack, allowing you to pick from a selection of 12 unique packs, and giving you the choice to open the pack from the front or the back. It’s not uncommon for collectors to have their own personal pack opening rituals for good luck, so it seems intentional that the designers offer so many ways you can customize how you open boosters.
Pokémon TCG Pocket launches globally on October 30, 2024.