Holy crap those scan colors are deep fried
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From this thread by @Quuador : Protostoise - putting the puzzle pieces together
GodBook, a printout on paper of the pictures of the cards printed by WotC themselves. They use this for their archive for each MTG set, and sometimes also use it for stock magazine images and such
The quote is in reference to this video:
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Look what I purchased. I have several GodBooks now. AMA.
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My question is: Can you scan every page? 
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I second scanning the whole thing and posting it. I love the history of these kinds if things so much.
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It is a large volume of material to carefully review and scan. I should probably buy a scanner first. I think it will take a few months but I will share along the way. I don’t know if releasing the high resolution scans is a good idea or not 
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If you’re worried about fakes, you can watermark it
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I think the most interesting things besides the actual scans are the dates.
August 12th 1999 seems like a weird date for this to be made. Base set was released January 9, 1999.
also to view all the images in the OP, I made it easier to do so here WOTC GodBook - Pre-production images of vintage sets
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The really unusual part is that it has regular unlimited fonts and is shadowed but they are 1st edition cards. I have never seen that other than with fakes. To my knowledge these are 100% legitimate based off the other materials provided. I know Spanish did 2 versions of 1st edition for 1999 and 1999-2000. Maybe they were preparing to do a second 1st edition for USA/UK/Australia also?
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Does it contain a Prerelease Raichu?
Very good question. The promo one is an “Edition 1 GodBook”, dated Oct 1999. It contains what appear to be 6 missing promos where only a card back is displayed. There is no Raichu image but the blank spots are interesting.
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I tried to glean any info I could (ex. print run info) from the ID for each set in the images from the OP.
| Book |
ID structure |
| EN_PMGH (Gym Heroes) Ed1 (v.2) |
0000_XX00PMGH1EN |
| EN_Pokémon Neo1 Edition 1 |
0000_XX00PMN11_EN |
| DE_Pokémon BaseSet Ed1 |
0000_00XXPMB11DE |
| DE_Pokémon Jungle Ed1 |
0000_00XXPMJU1DE |
| DE_Pokémon Fossil Ed1 |
0000_00XXPMFO1DE |
| DE_Pokémon Team Rocket |
0000_XX00PMTRDE |
| DE_Pokémon Neo1 Ed1 |
0000_XX00PMN11DE |
| DE_Pokémon Neo2 Ed1 |
0000_XX00PMN21DE |
Seems like there’s not much there outside the obvious.
{CARDNUMBER}_{XX00 or 00XX}PM{SET ID}{1 IF FIRST ED}{LANGUAGE CODE}
That’s fascinating. As a Wotc promo collector would love to see those pages. I’ll keep an eye on this thread if you ever post them. Thanks
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I am convinced what this GodBook is, is a test print of an alternate version of the OG 1st Edition Base set from Chris Nitz himself. It contains the full set of shadowed 1st edition cards, like the Machamp we all know. Nitz was the one who verified the Blastoise test prints. It does appear to be scans of physical cards. It would be amazing if he has them still. I have never seen a shadowed 1st edition other than Machamp.
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What makes you think they are scanned copies? The title pages mention eps which I assume refers to the file format and also give digital locations
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The black star promo ones definitely are real scans. They look like cards placed in a binder back to back and then scanned. The rest are not, I was mistaken. It is just an artifact of the template they are using.
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There are a few features that further confirm they are indeed authentic and from an unknown variant of 1st Edition English Base set that may have never actually been printed. Very interesting.
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