Pokemon TCG Celebrations Unboxing: Release Day Time Warp!
Today we're taking a peek at a bunch of different boxes of the latest set of cards from the official Pokemon TCG. The card game made by The Pokemon Company is taking part in the Pokemon 25th Anniversary celebration this year with a set called just that: Pokemon TCG: Celebrations. This set is unique in more ways than one.
The Pokemon TCG: Celebrations set will not be sold on a pack-by-pack basis. Instead, this set is contained in larger boxes with multiple packs. This is partially due to the unique nature of each pack. Instead of releasing each pack with the standard 10 cards, these packs have just 4.
Each 4-card booster pack has four cards from the Celebrations series. All four cards will be foil, and all come with the Pokemon 25 logo printed on their face. We've yet to learn the exact rarity of each of the cards in this set – but we DO know that they're awesome.
The complete set of cards is wild – 25 cards in the base set, and a further 25 cards that are effectively reprints of their original selves. Ho-Oh, Reshiram, Kyogre, Palkia – these four first cards in the set you'll find appear fairly frequently if you open more than a couple of packs.
The same goes for Cosmog, Cosmoem, and Lunala. If you're opening as many packs as we have, you'll find yourself with a stack of Cosmoem, without a doubt. Xerneas, Mew, Zekrom – all of these cards are lovely, appearing with art that's among the most gorgeous you'll find in any earlier edition of the Pokemon.
Groudon, Yveltal, Dialga, Solgaleo, and Lugia will quite likely appear in more than one of your packs – they certainly did ours. One of the coolest cards in the set appeared slightly less frequently than some of the previously mentioned Pokemon: Professor's Research.
One version of Professor's Research appears with the Professor leaning out of his rectangular art box, writing on the text area below. That'd be radical enough to want this card for a collection – then there's the other Professor's Research, a full-art card and one of two "Rare Ultra" cards in the set.
Every card in the set is classified as "Rare Holo" except for numbers 24 and 25 from the base set – Professor's Research and Mew. Mew is golden, shiny, and one of the only base set cards we didn't pull from the 20-30 packs we opened.
Beyond the base set, reprints like Blastoise, Charizard, and Venusaur should catch your eye. Imposter Professor Oak and Here Comes Team Rocket trainer cards appear here in holo form for the first time in a standard set.
There's a _"s Pikachu, Rocket's Zapdos, and Dark Gyarados, too. Baby Pokemon Cleffa originally printed for the set Pokemon Neo Genesis is just about the cutest Pokemon in the set. You'll find white-bordered Mew Ex and Gardevoir Ex, Team Magma's Groudon and Rocket's Admin.
The base set contains two full-art cards in the heroes of Sword and Shield: Zacian V and Zamenzenta V. While (oddly) Groudon sits between the two on the official card list, these two Pokemon share an illustration that reveals itself when the two cards are placed one next to the other!
There's a very strange multicolored-border Donphan, a very basic looking Claydol, and Luxray GL lv.X with silver border. There's a silver-boarded breakout art Garchomp C lv.X, and full-art Reshiram and Zekrom.
Some of the most extraordinary artwork can be seen in Xerneas EX, Mewtwo EX, Mega Rayquaza EX, and Tapu Lele GX!
You'll also find MORE cards than those listed in the main set appearing in each of the different sorts of packages available for this set. Look at that Mimikyu!
UPDATE: Packs are organized oddly. Each 4 card pack has one chance for a sub-set card, and at least three will be from the base set. You could get 4 cards from the base set, or 3 cards from the base set and 1 from the sub-set. This should give you SOME idea of the rarity of the cards in the set. See the four cards below (an actual just-opened pack at the time of photo capture) to see a 3x base set, 1x sub-set pack.
In our product release post, we took a peek at a few of the different packages in which booster packs of Pokemon TCG: Celebrations can be obtained.
Above you'll see a few examples of different sorts of packs that appear in the various boxes in which Celebrations boosters can be found. Sword and Shield packs of many sorts! Our favorite so far has been the Pokemon TCG Celebrations Premium Figure Collection Pikachu VMAX box.
That box has a recommended retail price of $49.99 USD and it contains 8x Celebrations booster packs, 3x additional packs from Sword and Shield sets, and 2x promo foil cards (Pikachu V and Pikachu VMAX). And the figure is magnificent – you'll see it at the head of this article in all its hefty glory.
It's important that you keep an eye on eBay to see the MASSIVE amount of Celebrations cards already listed before you go paying mortifying prices for packs on the black market. If you find Celebrations packages at your local store, by all means, go for it!