Does a full set of japanese 1st edition cards exist without rarity symbols or just this pika?
Wow now that is definitely a jumbo card I would love to add to my collection! Iāve never seen that one before.
There is an entire base set like this.
Japanese only?
Yeah. The English 1st edition is stamped as Iām sure youāre aware.
I always looked forward to the release of the Pokemon TCG āstarter sets.ā Whenever weād get a shipment of them at the store and open the boxes for the first time, it felt like we were kids on Christmas Day! What follows are a few of my favorite things.
To me, the Team Rocket Quick Starter gift set is the most attractive of all the starter sets. The striking box art framed in black reminds me a lot of the much-heralded 1971 Topps Major League Baseball card set.
The Red/Green Quick Starter Gift was the third to be released (following the original Gift Pack and the Team Rocket Gift Pack). It also represented the first salvo in the take-no-prisoners return of the Pokemon franchise, which had been in retreat for months following the āDennÅ Senshi Porygonā debacle.
With the introduction of the Neo Starter Pack, we began to see a trend slimmed-down introductory sets. The inclusion of a VHS videotape gave this set a bit of heft, but nowhere near the grandiose size of its predecessors.
The lean-and-mean Neo Starter Pack introduced Pokemon fandom to the red-hot gameās first expansion. Hereās a look at the magnificent artwork on a long-forgotten, factory-sealed 10-pack I found stashed away in the Japanime warehouse.
By the time the short-lived Pokemon VS series was released in August 2001, I was already winding down my personal collection and paying little attention to new releases. I did hang on to one of these VS starter sets, though, which was released about a month before the full series hit the shelves. In my opinion, the blister-pack presentation pales in comparison to the deluxe boxed starter sets of the late 1990s. Still, itās a nice relic of the past.
1 Like
Those are awesome! My favorite has always been the original gift set. I love the old artwork on it!
Nice pictures as always 
Whats the box on the right of the first picture? I donāt think i have seen it beforeā¦
I think that Vs sealed package is very cool.
I like the colors of the Neo starter pack :3
Thanks for posting all of these pictures with information!!
Good catch, Collector1234! 
Itās not a TCG starter set. Rather, itās the Pokemon Board Game Expansion Pack. I love the artwork and the packaging ā another awesome black box!
Iāve never opened it. But the back of the box indicates there are a total numerous āeventā and ārivalā cards inside, along with some Pokemon āchipsā and plastic clips.
I donāt remember selling these in our store. Iām guessing that my wife and I ordered it from one of the wholesalers, but never got around to playing it with our daughter. Maybe weāll give it a try this weekend. 
Iāve finally begun to dig through the boxes of handbills and pamphlets that I saved over the years. These were the things I enjoyed collecting most, though many people (including my wife!) considered them worthless. I imagine most of these things ended up in trash bins. Iām glad I managed to hold on to mine!
Hereās the front the handbill advertising the JR Stamp Rally 2000. The silver and green train on the front is the Yamanote Line, which travels in a loop through central Tokyo. It was along this line that the various āstampā stations were located. Rally participants chose to finish either a āGold Courseā or a āSilver Course,ā stopping at each station to get their rally passports stamped so they could collect a prize.
As everyone knows, the prize for completing the rally was a set of the uninspiring English-language Eevee and Mewtwo cards. It was a curious choice, given the fact that very few of the rallyās young participants knew how to read or write English. Indeed, English-language Pokemon cards in general never became popular in Japan. After all, why mess with knockoffs when youāve already got the real thing 
Iāve always wondered why they released the cards in english over there in Japan, what was the motivation behind that?
I always felt the main reason for the release of the English cards here was to show how the locals how Pokemon had gone from being a Japanese-only product to a worldwide phenomenon.
At the time, the country was still reeling from the burst of its economic bubble and the fallout from the golf-course investment scandals. As odd as it may seem today, a kidsā game ā Pokemon ā helped contribute to the restoration of Japan Inc. as an international brand.
The Entei and Unknownās are absolutely incredible looking. That handbill has some awesome artwork.
interesting thanks for sharing.to this day do japanese players enjoy the english cards or find them very useless kinda
I donāt know of any of my friendsā kids who use the English cards. I would guess there are some out there who do, but they are probably few and far between.
When I was running the Japanime Toys store, I required three things of my employees:
-
Punctuality. Show up late for work? Youāre fired.
-
Kindness: You donāt like kids? Find another job. (Hey, itās a toy store, after all!)
-
Pokemon Card Fan Club membership: Youāre not already a member? No problem! Weāll sign you up!
Over the five-year Pokemon heyday, we purchased Fan Club memberships for at least two dozen employees. And that meant we had a steady stream of club-exclusive promo cards, points giveaways, and other cool Poke-stuff.
Kantaro Oyama was one of our earliest employees, and also one of the most loyal. (Even today, he remains an integral part of our companyās publishing imprint, Manga University). The image above is his Pokemon Card Fan Club membership card ā still affixed to the original āwelcomeā letter ā from 2000.
Here is a close-up of the back of the membership card. A much larger version of the circular Pokemon Card Fan Club logo is on the front of the card (which canāt be seen here because itās still affixed to the letter).
Fan Club members also received a āpassportā to record the local, regional and national tournaments in which they participated. Points were awarded for completion of matchups, and those points could be redeemed for rare promo cards. (Note the āGrand Partyā logo, a harbinger of one of the most beautiful Trainer Card designs to come.)
I still have a few blank passports ā ready for action in 1999, as if frozen in time. These would make a nice addition to any completistās collection, I would think
2 Likes
Whoa these are awesome!!! Thanks for sharing I will have to track these down! I donāt know why but I find everything āOld Pokemonā and Japanese to be so darn cool.
1 Like
thanks for sharing more stuff.very cool to see those things especially the fan club card