I was reflecting this evening on how challenging it’s been to find certain cards in a mint condition. I searched for anything on the Internet about the worst tcg generation for the card quality but I didn’t find where this has been discussed previously. I know jungle had some bad cuts, but was jungle (so first gen) the worst quality straight out of the pack? Bonus points for worst tcg packaging for promos too if you want to discuss that.
Specifically I can’t seem to find xy promos or generations gen 1 starter promos in a mint condition.
The English BW-XY era, namely from Next Destinies through the first print run of Primal Clash, was horrific.
Pop reports are more popularity reports than accurate measurements of grading difficulty, but just look at the numbers of PSA 10 EX full arts during that period compared to later XY, SM, even older eras like EX.
It is impossible to overstate how terrible Black & White into XY were. When you look at the cards they are so lifeless and sterile. They are dead cards with no charisma. It’s deeply depressing.
i brought it off ebay when i was looking for the card it was listed as Moderately Played then when i got the card in person i noticed the front looks like it was never used or played. so i just chalked it up as QC issues, theres also a bunch of listings with the same QC defect.
Honestly the last few years have been rough in general. I admittedly don’t open a lot of English packs (mostly because of this issue), but I feel like the last few years I’ve seen the most outlandish quality. OC’s, whitening, crimps, destroyed cards. The quality control has been horrid so much to the point that I’m surprised we haven’t seen or heard of “Whitening Edge Errors” being listed yet.
