Could be legit under the brand but more of a promotional item that looks like a pokemon card. I would imagine they would want the quality closer to that of the product though. This is cool but cheap. Reminds me of those polaroid promotional cards last month that were posted.
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I think we can see other proof this is a counterfeit when looking at the typesetting. The letters are not aligning well when compared to other real samples.
Real Base 1
Real Base 2
Real Base 1999-2000
Minta
“age” is showing different spacing. The “a” before coin is further right on the Minta. The “t” is much more present on the Minta in this framing. The serifs on the “e” and “c” seem more pronounced in the Minta.
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Id like to know if they had the go aheadfrom wotc to print them with this quality and distribute.
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It’s definitely interesting. Wartortle was a promo card at the time with the Wizards stamp. The W stamp card always has incorrect ink for the HP from what I remember.
I don’t think there was good enough technology at the time to automatically cut and crop so this would have been a manual reproduction which is why we see small differences like the HP sitting on the art border. The background of the art definitely looks weird like it was copied.
I think it is probably an unofficial reproduction based on the fonts being slightly off and the overall quality. I’m not super familiar with all the licensing issues at the time, but I think there were regions where people could print whatever they wanted. Maybe this is similar to Funskool which had a license but was unofficial.
It would be interesting to see a size comparison with a known real card.
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Dont have anything to add but thanks @pcrono for posting over here from reddit since its brought up some interesting discussion around it that isnt just dismissing it as 100% fake.
Given the information you have, as a layperson i’d lean more toward it being somewhere between official and unofficial, similar to the funskool cards in india. Id think maybe it was something unique to the magazine to see about overall interest but im glad there are some users with more information than just guesses.
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Gotta be open minded, I’d imagine there could be credibility since that’s an actual advertisement and not just a bunch of pictures of Pokemon. Its also the cover page looks like
The fake card is to draw interest to the real ones. Reasonable marketing in my opinion.
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I agree that something like that is possible. Its why i directed them here from reddit and didnt outright just tell them 100% fake once they gave more of the details. The card itself looks like a low quality fake scan based on color saturation to me and the odd borders but it absolutely could have been some kind of oneoff that was printed inhouse to advertise.
I appreciate learning new things about the odd history in the globalization of pokemon and this was a welcome new example that reminds everyone of what an odd time in marketing it was.
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This is the best I can do with my phone. For a reference I put a new card next to it. (The bottom one is the Minta )
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Thank you for Reccommending this forum! 
I learned a lot here and I’m happy that others also take interest in this unique topic.
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Def looks black core to me
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Thanks, interesting, so the black layer is indeed there.
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Is it the same size as other cards?
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If I lay it on a new card it looks the same size,
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Place it in a stack and verify it isnt very noticably larger
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For sure. This is the thing I find most interesting right now.
AFAIK only modern fakes can be found with black core… or do black core fakes go as far back as 1999/2000?
Can anyone confirm / give examples of old fakes with the black core?
How old is old,
Nothing base-fossil i can think of cept maybe the vintage holos. Sadly dont own this sheet but if anyone does, chime in please.
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Such a cool sheet of fakes. I dont think id seen the ninetales before.
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Popped up on reddit or fb a few days ago. I was hunting the charizard for a while before i got my “discos”
Curious if they were black core, only ones i could possibly guess would be.
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I wanted to ask. Is there something that I can use to clean the card without damaging it? Mainly the back side.