Kids Still Playing Pokemon Like It's 1999

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Kids Still Playing Pokemon Like It's 1999

Posted by timothy on Saturday July 21, 2012 @06:30AM from the wait-it's-not-1999-yet? dept.

theodp writes "In 1999, TIME's cover warned readers to Beware of Pokemon ('For many kids it's now an addiction: cards, video games, toys, a new movie. Is it bad for them?'). But Pokemon wasn't as easily felled as Lehman or Bear Stearns. Thirteen years later, 16-year-old Manoj Sunny has his eye on a Pokemon world title, having earned the chance to travel to The Big Island with 35 fellow Americans for the 2012 Pokemon Video Game World Championships, which will be held Aug. 10-12. Sunny, who also captains his school's chess team, credits his success to a good memory, intuition, daily practice, the use of an online simulator, and a competitive attitude ('I hate losing. Once I lost, I needed to get better.')"

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Get off my lawn. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 06:34 · Score: 2, Funny

REAL men played with homoerotic action figures like He-Man.
1. Re:Get off my lawn. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 06:58 · Score: 0, Troll
  
  it was only homoerotic if you were a homosexual to begin with. Normal (non-homo) kids never got a boner from he-man action figures, it was just a damn toy.
2. Re:Get off my lawn. by ObsessiveMathsFreak · 2012-07-21 07:00 · Score: 1
  
  Well, those men became the "Masters of the Universe" who brought the entire world financial system to its knees, whereas all the geeks who played with transforming toys have managed to give the world is the "App" and the "Occupy" movement.
  Maybe if Optimus Prime had had nipples, the world would be a very different place right about now.
  
  --
  May the Maths Be with you!
3. Re:Get off my lawn. by Quiet_Desperation · 2012-07-21 07:50 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Things are a tad different now.
  *cough*ponies*cough*
4. Re:Get off my lawn. by ultranova · 2012-07-21 10:43 · Score: 1
  
  It's not different at all.
  With everything else from the 80's returning, He-Man must be somewhere in the queue. Then perhaps we could have rule 34 combining the two. Not that that's relevant to my interests. At all.
  
  --
  Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
5. Re:Get off my lawn. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 11:48 · Score: 0
  
  It's not different at all.
  Bummer. Link is 404. From the same artist, will you accept Captain America instead? If we want something nerdy, how about Tron? Hellboy?
  
  With everything else from the 80's returning, He-Man must be somewhere in the queue. Then perhaps we could have rule 34 combining the two. Not that that's relevant to my interests. At all.
  If you're willing to turn off the TV and read a book, there's always the possibility of doing a mashup with He-Man and popular literature.
  (Having seen that, just between you, me, and the rest of the Internet, I'm sticking with the ponies.)
6. Re:Get off my lawn. by stoborrobots · 2012-07-21 20:42 · Score: 1
  
  At a guess, the link was probably supposed to be and accidentally got an extra 6 appended to it...
  
  --
  "Go to CNN [for a] spell-checked, fact-checked summary" -- CmdrTaco
7. Re:Get off my lawn. by CronoCloud · 2012-07-22 03:34 · Score: 1
  
  He-man got a re-boot series a few years back.
8. Re:Get off my lawn. by stoborrobots · 2012-07-23 03:51 · Score: 2
  
  Seriously? I previewed and everything! :-S
  At a guess, the link was probably supposed to be http://csimadmax.deviantart.com/art/she-rarity-199414368 and accidentally got an extra 6 appended to it...
  
  --
  "Go to CNN [for a] spell-checked, fact-checked summary" -- CmdrTaco
Not surprised by vux984 · 2012-07-21 06:36 · Score: 5, Insightful

My kids both like pokemon. I don't blame them... its collectible, and collecting is fun.
What did we collect when I was a kid? Hockey cards? Baseball cards? Same idea but a hell of a lot less fun. Especially if you didn't really care about the sport...
I'm vaguely surprised that Pokemon hasn't been replaced by something newer, but I'm not surprised that its still around. Nintendo has done well with the marketing.
1. Re:Not surprised by Sir_Sri · 2012-07-21 06:40 · Score: 2
  
  Agreed. I think 'Pokemon' is more of a franchise than a single product anyway, so it has largely replaced itself with newer versions. Kids will always find things to collect and entertain themselves with, marbles, cards, electronic versions of the above etc. That Nintendo and Pokemon have clung on for 13 years is a testament to how well they've been able to understand and adapt to that market.
2. Re:Not surprised by ShanghaiBill · 2012-07-21 06:54 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  ... its collectible, and collecting is fun.
  Collecting was never fun for me. I never saw the point. When I was a kid, my dad tried to get me interested in coin collecting. He saw it as good "father and son time", but I hated it. We could have gone hiking or fishing, he could have taught me something useful. He was an electrical engineer, but he never taught me anything about electronics (I learned it all on my own). But instead of any of that, we spend our time going through bags of pennies looking for a rare 1939D. Bleh.
  Now that I have kids of my own, we do active outdoor stuff, we build things, we do science experiments. My daughter has a great collection of Barbie shoes, but I was not involved in that (other than as a source of funding).
3. Re:Not surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:16 · Score: 1
  
  I never had those days, but sadly one of my friends did. My dad and I would go mountain climbing (more like I'd climb, he'd spot and belay), go boating, hiking, etc. (but never fishing because I HATE fishing for so many reasons), while his dad would go to the bank and make a withdrawal of some insane amount of money in different denominations, they would then spend forever looking for rare coins and bills with the radio on (and according to my friend, they were not allowed to talk as that would distract his dad, who would then bitch about it) and then deposit them back at the bank when they were done.
  Sad thing is, when his father died, his father left him his coin collection, radio and a rather emotional note about how it is all the memories he has with his son. My friend turned around and had it auctioned off in less than six months because he hates coin collecting now. His family was rather nonplussed that he could do that. But, he did keep the old radio because, he told me, he has more memories of all the history they heard on that radio, then he does of his father.
  In fact, now that I think of it. The one time we talked his dad on going on a trip with us on a climb and hike in Colorado, his dad spent the whole time with his metal detector out and watching the trails, rather than the beautiful sights around. I just checked my scanned pictures and only two photos from that trip even have his dad in them, and both of them have the metal detector in his hand and headphones on his head.
4. Re:Not surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:26 · Score: 0
  
  ... its collectible, and collecting is fun.
  Collecting was never fun for me. I never saw the point. When I was a kid, my dad tried to get me interested in coin collecting. He saw it as good "father and son time", but I hated it. We could have gone hiking or fishing, he could have taught me something useful. He was an electrical engineer, but he never taught me anything about electronics (I learned it all on my own). But instead of any of that, we spend our time going through bags of pennies looking for a rare 1939D. Bleh.
  Now that I have kids of my own, we do active outdoor stuff, we build things, we do science experiments. My daughter has a great collection of Barbie shoes, but I was not involved in that (other than as a source of funding).
  WTF, has Slashdot turned into a fucking Agony Aunt?
5. Re:Not surprised by Mabhatter · 2012-07-21 07:43 · Score: 1
  
  They keep making new 10 year-olds. That's the key to its success.
  The more interesting research would be how many STILL play the game versus how many new kids join. Of course at this point the original KIDS that started playing the game in 1995 now have THEIR OWN kids and got those kids hooked.
6. Re:Not surprised by Dogtanian · 2012-07-21 08:41 · Score: 2
  
  Agreed. I think 'Pokemon' is more of a franchise than a single product anyway, so it has largely replaced itself with newer versions. Kids will always find things to collect and entertain themselves with, marbles, cards, electronic versions of the above etc. That Nintendo and Pokemon have clung on for 13 years is a testament to how well they've been able to understand and adapt to that market.
  Though I was never into Pokemon myself (*) I did notice that this was one major difference between Pokemon and other "fad" toys, cartoons etc. Normally once their heyday is passed, such toys, etc. die the death and disappear almost completely (or at least shrink to a tiny proportion of their former popularity). For example, Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles in the UK after about 1990. Or who's playing Tamagotchi today?
  
  While it's undoubtedly subsided a bit since its late 90s peak, Pokemon never really seemed to go away, enjoying a steady level of continued popularity that seemed to get attention for new releases and the like. And that is somewhat unusual...
  
  That said, are they still showing that epilepsy-inducing cartoon or any modern replacement for it? My gut reaction is that they probably couldn't get away with showing it- or at least the ones I vaguely remember seeing- to today's kids. (Actually, it looked pretty crappily made to me even then, but as noted elsewhere I was at least a decade older than the target audience even then, so I can't really judge it. But I still suspect that today's kids would expect more).
  
  (*) Er, that'd probably be because I was already well into my twenties when it first came out in the late 90s :-)
  
  --
  "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
7. Re:Not surprised by Omniver · 2012-07-21 12:01 · Score: 2
  
  My kids both like pokemon. I don't blame them... its collectible, and collecting is fun.
  What did we collect when I was a kid? Hockey cards? Baseball cards? Same idea but a hell of a lot less fun. Especially if you didn't really care about the sport...
  I'm vaguely surprised that Pokemon hasn't been replaced by something newer, but I'm not surprised that its still around. Nintendo has done well with the marketing.
  Not just collectible, playable. I'm in my 40s and through my son got into the video games recently and was surprised to find a really well developed and balanced gaming system that was both simple to understand yet nuanced enough to allow for extremely detailed and varied strategies. Online we found in-depth analysis on team and move strategies and a worldwide community of online players. This isn't just cute monsters, that's the marketing aspect, Pokemon is an excellent game. We are now doing the card game as well, recently joining a local league - and getting our asses kicked.
8. Re:Not surprised by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 12:08 · Score: 0
  
  The Pokemon anime that you’re talking about is still running. According to wiki they’ve hit 700+ episodes, and 15 movies.
9. Re:Not surprised by vux984 · 2012-07-21 14:25 · Score: 2
  
  You let your kids be controlled by marketing? What a lousy parent.
  I let my kids live in the real world. Not controlled by marketing, but not hidden from it either.
  And of all the toys kids could want mine latched onto lego & pokemon. I encouraged the lego, they discovered pokemon on their own. The cards are collectible, the game is decent. I couldn't be happier to have kids that chose building things and turn based strategy games as their favorite indoor play activities.
10. Re:Not surprised by Team+Rocket+Elite · 2012-07-21 15:07 · Score: 2
  
  The Pokemon TV Show is still around today. Since the airing of that particular episode, there have been stricter policies on flashing images that are similar to the ones that caused the problem. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denn%C5%8D_Senshi_Porygon#Aftermath
11. Re:Not surprised by AngryDeuce · 2012-07-21 23:51 · Score: 2
  
  I collected comic books myself. Got boxes and boxes of them in the basement boarded and bagged in sealed containers, just waiting for the day for me to pass them off to my unborn son.
  Who will more than likely deem them retarded and sell them off, but hey, I tried.
12. Re:Not surprised by Seumas · 2012-07-22 01:41 · Score: 0
  
  I understand kids playing pokemon (even though it's boring as hell and someone should point them toward a real RPG). What I don't understand are all the *adults* playing pokemon.
13. Re:Not surprised by ratnerstar · 2012-07-22 04:01 · Score: 1
  
  Collecting was never fun for me. I never saw the point. When I was a kid, my dad tried to get me interested in coin collecting. He saw it as good "father and son time", but I hated it. We could have gone hiking or fishing, he could have taught me something useful. He was an electrical engineer, but he never taught me anything about electronics (I learned it all on my own). But instead of any of that, we spend our time going through bags of pennies looking for a rare 1939D. Bleh.
  Now that I have kids of my own, we do active outdoor stuff, we build things, we do science experiments. My daughter has a great collection of Barbie shoes, but I was not involved in that (other than as a source of funding).
  30 years from, your kids will be posting on slashdot (via direct neural interface) about how their father always dragged them out for stupid fishing trips (what was the point? Anyone could have foreseen that trout would extinct by 2017) instead of doing something useful with them like collecting valuable items.
  
  --
  Just because you sold your soul to the devil that needn't make you a teetotaler. --The Devil and Daniel Webster
14. Re:Not surprised by nhat11 · 2012-07-23 00:19 · Score: 0
  
  Not only it's about collecting but the game has a easy to learn but difficult to master system that plays pretty deeply and because of it, people still like playing the game.
Wow the summary contains the recepy for success by JonySuede · 2012-07-21 06:37 · Score: 1

Wow the summary contains useful info like the recipe for success :

I hate losing. Once I lost, I needed to get better.
And the way to get better is to train, and that is also in the summary

--
Jehovah be praised, Oracle was not selected
1. Re:Wow the summary contains the recepy for success by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 08:24 · Score: 0
  
  "recepy"? Wow.
Nothing like 1999 by ShanghaiBill · 2012-07-21 06:38 · Score: 1

A handful of kids may still be playing Pokemon, but it is nothing like the craze of the 1990s. Most kids have moved on to other things. As I type this, my son (eight years old) and three of this friends, are downstairs building and programming Lego Mindstorms robots. There is no way these kids would be interested in non-motorized and non-programmable figurines.
1. Re:Nothing like 1999 by spire3661 · 2012-07-21 06:43 · Score: 1
  
  World of Warcraft is implementing a 'pokemon' style pet battle system in its next expansion due out soon. Its not as dead as you might think. Disclaimer: I have never played Pokemon.
  
  --
  Good-bye
2. Re:Nothing like 1999 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:21 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Pokemon figurines? Collector's item at best. Pokemon isn't centered on cards or figures; it's centered on the video game series, and every major release (read as not a spin-off) has outsold the last. Pokemon is just as popular, if not moreso than it has ever been, regardless of your kids' experience. I myself played the hell out of Pokemon growing up, as well as Lego Mindstorms.
3. Re:Nothing like 1999 by peragrin · 2012-07-21 10:04 · Score: 1
  
  No but the next evolution will use iPads for actual game play in an away enter reality style.
  There already is one card game played that way. In the future there will be more.
  
  --
  i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Pluvius · 2012-07-21 06:39 · Score: 4, Interesting

The only important difference between competitive Pokemon and competitive chess is that chess is old and respected.
Rob
1. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by King+InuYasha · 2012-07-21 06:46 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Perhaps these other games should be respected as well. They offer more complex rules and require far more difficult strategic thinking than classic games like Chess and Checkers.
  Personally, I love the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG battle system. It's very complex and offers a wide range of valid strategies to actually win a match. Pokémon offers a similarly complex system, too. In a way, these games have invigorated the flagging card game genre.
  While I have no proof to back this up, I suspect that games like these that were popular in the 1990s and early 2000s are the reason why casual puzzle and strategy games are far more popular on computer platforms.
  Of course, none of these games get any respect. Most "adults" denigrate these games and believe they are worthless and/or childish. Many of these games are great for mental development in a multitude of areas.
  For example, you may have not really thought of the Pokémon TCG as a way for children to develop a good understanding of economics, but it does[1].
  [1]: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/717948.stm
2. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Hentes · 2012-07-21 06:54 · Score: 1
  
  It's also not a marketing scam to get kids to buy the pieces.
3. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Pluvius · 2012-07-21 07:02 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  You're confusing Pokemon with Magic. Also, if chess was invented in the 90s, I can almost guarantee you'd see similar bullshit marketing tactics.
  Rob
4. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by The+Rizz · 2012-07-21 07:07 · Score: 2
  The only important difference between competitive Pokemon and competitive chess is that chess is old and respected.
  No, there are two major differences between Pokemon (and other CCGs) and chess.
  
  There is a financial disparity between players' chances of winning. (More $$ = better cards; better cards = better chances.)
  
  The game undergoes changes every ~3 months. (New cards are released, changing the shape of the meta-game.)
5. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Pluvius · 2012-07-21 07:08 · Score: 1
  
  You guys did notice we're talking about the video games here, right?
  Rob
6. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by PopeRatzo · 2012-07-21 07:32 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Perhaps these other games should be respected as well. They offer more complex rules and require far more difficult strategic thinking than classic games like Chess and Checkers.
  Personally, I love the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG battle system.
  
  No. The benefit of chess is there is no corporate marketing campaign associated with it, and nobody owns the intellectual property.
  The more I think about it, the fact that chess is public domain makes in infinitely better than any game like Yu-Gi-Oh! that belongs to someone.
  And it's not just because Chess is free and you have to pay, at some level, to play Yu-Gi-Oh!. It's because chess belongs to everyone, to humanity, and I can go back and re-play the games played by chess masters 100 years ago and STILL not have to pay someone royalities. Two men of distinctly different backgrounds can play chess while incarcerated, in separate cells, as long as they can communicate somehow, either by yelling out the moves or by giving the moves to the screw patrolling the cellblock.
  There are volumes and volumes of chess theory and chess strategy and chess philosophy. I can ride my bike over to North Avenue Beach and play chess, right now, with a refugee from sub-Saharan Africa or an immigrant from the Ukraine (and get beaten by both, even though I've got a ~1700 Elo rating). You'll find retired Romance Language professors and backward hat & baggy pants-wearing teenagers playing one another for a buck a game.
  And there is something comforting about playing a game that has changed very little for the better part of a millennium.
  No matter how you look at it, Yu-Gi-Oh! and Pokemon will be an historical footnote when chess is still being played off-planet. They might be great games, but their proprietary nature and cultural framework keep them locked down.
  
  --
  You are welcome on my lawn.
7. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 08:14 · Score: 0
  
  I lost all interest in chess after 1997, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
8. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by mister_playboy · 2012-07-21 08:24 · Score: 1
  
  And there is something comforting about playing a game that has changed very little for the better part of a millennium.
  I don't fully agree with that... computers have done a great deal to expand the realm of chess theory, and I expect to see chess become a "solved" game during my lifetime.
  It's already the case that even a low-powered computer system can play at the Grandmaster level and beyond.
  Chess variants will be able to increase the life of the game, but they are really something other than chess as it was 500 years ago.
  
  --
  Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law ::: Love is the law, love under will
9. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by artor3 · 2012-07-21 08:43 · Score: 1
  
  Chess will never be solved in a meaningful way. Sure, it may be solved for computers, but I don't need to play against computers, and the solution will be too complex for humans to memorize. So while a team of scientists and mathematicians, working diligently for years, may reliably outperform a single person choosing their moves on the fly, that fact shouldn't surprise anyone, and does nothing to diminish the enjoyment of the game.
10. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Dogtanian · 2012-07-21 08:44 · Score: 1
  
  Also, if chess was invented in the 90s, I can almost guarantee you'd see similar bullshit marketing tactics.
  But it wasn't, and fortunately we don't.
  
  --
  "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
11. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 09:59 · Score: 0
  
  Isn't Yu-Gi-Oh! strategy basically, "wait until you get the blue-eyes white dragon, and play it for the win?"
12. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by PopeRatzo · 2012-07-21 10:42 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  I lost all interest in chess after 1997, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
  Princess Diana's death really hit you hard, didn't it?
  
  --
  You are welcome on my lawn.
13. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by PopeRatzo · 2012-07-21 10:50 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  I don't fully agree with that... computers have done a great deal to expand the realm of chess theory, and I expect to see chess become a "solved" game during my lifetime.
  It's already the case that even a low-powered computer system can play at the Grandmaster level and beyond.
  Does the fact that a car can go over 200mph stop people from running the 100 yard dash?
  Just because a machine can perform a particular task better than a human does not make any human competition in that task meaningless. A computer can fly a plane much faster and more perfectly than a man, but people still want to be pilots.
  The idea that computers "solving" chess will destroy the game is ridiculous. I mean, a stick of dynamite has been able to dislodge a castled king more effectively than a two-bishops attack since the 19th century, but people still play chess.
  
  --
  You are welcome on my lawn.
14. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Kam+Solusar · 2012-07-21 11:15 · Score: 1
  
  Chess will never be solved in a meaningful way. Sure, it may be solved for computers, but I don't need to play against computers, and the solution will be too complex for humans to memorize.
  At least with the current state of technology. But wait a few decades and maybe we will all be running around with cyborg enhancements. Won't be quite as much fun if the other player has a more powerful chip in his brain.
  
  --
  The Angels have the Phone Box
15. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by dbIII · 2012-07-21 17:18 · Score: 1
  
  Your Prince that turned into a frog? That's nothing. My Princess turned into a wall.
16. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by ais523 · 2012-07-21 20:21 · Score: 1
  
  Last year, I think I'd have agreed with you. (I came top 8 in the UK in the Pokémon VGC that year; and it was pretty fun. The rules were not that unexpected, but most people didn't have experience with them, and it turned out that there were a huge number of viable options despite the list of legal Pokémon being small enough that you could feasibly consider each one of them individually when designing a strategy.)
  They change the rules every year, though, and the 2012 rules are particularly obnoxious because there's such a huge element of luck in it. (Basically, what happened: shortly after the release of Pokémon Black/White a couple of years ago, they added Pokémon that could change the "weather" with an unprecedented lack of drawbacks for non-legendaries. They only became legal this year due to the way the rules worked. Weather was a viable strategy before, but with the significant buff it got, it ended up dominating everything (particularly rain). The main (and only practical) counter to weather is changing the weather yourself to something else; and the default weather to change to (in battles where the top legendaries are banned, as is usual) is sandstorm, because the Pokémon that set sandstorm are rather more powerful than the Pokémon that set other sorts of weather, and so have uses outside just countering weather. Conclusion: most of the time, battles are going to take place in sandstorm in order to prevent enemy weather teams dominating.
  The obvious effect of battles usually happening in sandstorm is that people switch to Pokémon that are good and get even better in sandstorm. And there's an ability, Sand Veil, that exists on at least one top-of-top-tier-for-VGC Pokémon (Garchomp) that gives a 20% dodge chance against pretty much everything. Conclusion: a lot of people are playing Garchomp, and as a result, a lot of attacks are missing 20% of the time.
  Sadly, Pokémon's a game where luck doesn't get that much of a chance to average out; of course, it all averages eventually, but statistical fluctuations can easily decide the result of a match or a tournament, for instance. Competitive players were annoyed enough about the luck element as it was because it distorted the statistics, but in 2012 it's reached ridiculous and pretty unfun proportions.
  I hope they fix the rules for 2013. (Indications aren't looking good, though.)
  
  --
  (1)DOCOMEFROM!2~.2'~#1WHILE:1<-"'?.1$.2'~'"':1/.1$.2'~#0"$#65535'"$"'"'&.1$.2'~'#0$#65535'"$#0'~#32767$#1"
17. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by ais523 · 2012-07-21 20:28 · Score: 1
  
  The video game also undergoes incremental changes; they change the rules every year (normally by using radical changes to banlists that ban reasonably arbitrary subsets of Pokémon just to shake things up), and for a while, they've been releasing one-off event Pokémon over wi-fi or at events. (Props to the tournament organisers for banning all the most egregious examples, like Arceus, but when Pokémon obtainable elsewhere get new moves or abilities, they're allowed.) Some of these Pokémon are very rare indeed, so people end up using ones that have been shared around for months (and typically "cloned" via glitches or cheat devices; I think this is against the rules as written, personally, but it's reasonably obvious that there's no way to detect it and the resulting Pokémon have entirely theoretically-legally-obtainable stats; I don't use cloned Pokémon myself, which puts me at a small handicap, but pretty much everyone else does). If it weren't for the ease of duplication of the things, I'm pretty sure they'd sell for quite a bit of money. (There's probably some connection to open source or software piracy or something in here, but I'll lead it to others to find.) (There's also the secondary issue that many of them are likely to be well-constructed fakes rather than genuine.) You also have to have the latest versions of the cartridge games to compete, although that's a much smaller cost than the cards (a few tens of dollars every year or so).
  
  --
  (1)DOCOMEFROM!2~.2'~#1WHILE:1<-"'?.1$.2'~'"':1/.1$.2'~#0"$#65535'"$"'"'&.1$.2'~'#0$#65535'"$#0'~#32767$#1"
18. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Impeesa · 2012-07-21 22:47 · Score: 2
  
  In a way, these games have invigorated the flagging card game genre.
  Flagging? If I'm not mistaken, Magic has only continued to grow since pioneering the genre 19 years ago.
19. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 23:16 · Score: 0
  
  Without Pokemon, we never would have heard of Christian Weston Chandler or Sonichu, the Electric Hedgehog Pokemon.
20. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by AngryDeuce · 2012-07-22 00:04 · Score: 1
  
  Chess is about to become a whole lot more boring a lot sooner than that, once things like Google's Project Glass hit the scene.
  No more thinking about your next move, now you've got the Chess App tracking the pieces visually suggesting moves in real-time. Of course, so does your opponent, so now you've got two human beings doing little more than manually moving the pieces around while Google plays with itself.
  It won't be about who's the better chess player, it'll be about who has the better chess app. I'd imagine a lot of games with a strategic element are about to become boring when we're all wearing our fancy connected glasses...and once we move on to ocular implants, you won't even know whether or not your opponent is doing this at all and everything will be on the honor system.
21. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Eli+Gottlieb · 2012-07-22 00:34 · Score: 1
  
  You may saaaay I'm a dreeaaameeeerrr....
22. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by rmdingler · 2012-07-22 01:06 · Score: 1
  
  Charizard! Flamethrower Chessboard!
  
  --
  Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
  Ernest Hemingway
23. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by King+InuYasha · 2012-07-22 01:10 · Score: 1
  
  I'm including Magic in that. Card games have existed for hundreds of years, but in the last fifty years, they've lost significant popularity.
24. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by PopeRatzo · 2012-07-22 01:28 · Score: 1
  
  Too soon. And have some respect, the AC above was so deeply affected that he cannot play chess any more.
  
  --
  You are welcome on my lawn.
25. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-22 02:58 · Score: 0
  
  Perfect!
26. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-22 04:36 · Score: 0
  
  I lost all interest in chess after 1997, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
  Princess Diana's death really hit you hard, didn't it?
  It was an example of distracted driving. The driver was having trouble with his knight vision.
27. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-22 05:37 · Score: 0
  
  More difficult strategic thinking? Lol. You've never seen a chess master play if you think that.
28. Re:Aside from the games' rules themselves... by dbIII · 2012-07-22 20:27 · Score: 1
  
  How's this one: The first amendment creates problems when someone shouts "fire" in a crowded theatre, but the second amendment fixes that.
'I hate losing" by ed1park · 2012-07-21 06:41 · Score: 5, Funny

Pokemon championships? You're already lost.
1. Re:'I hate losing" by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:14 · Score: 0
  
  Pokemon championships? You're already lost.
  Well, if you mention the pokemon championships often enough, you'll probably never lose your virginity. So there is that.
2. Re:'I hate losing" by MobileTatsu-NJG · 2012-07-21 07:52 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  ... posted the Slashdotter on a Saturday.
  
  --
  
  "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
3. Re:'I hate losing" by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 08:13 · Score: 0
  
  We know failure because we've been there.
4. Re:'I hate losing" by ed1park · 2012-07-22 13:48 · Score: 1
  
  At the risk of causing bitter jealously while smacking down your comment, I'll have u know that it was posted after a morning surf session in Malpais, Costa Rica from a beach front bungalow. Plenty of sunshine, waves, and bikini clad women. As Charlie Sheen would say, "Winning!" B)
  (no tv or phone. But I get a weak wifi signal fortunately.)
Not the same. by MrQuacker · 2012-07-21 06:43 · Score: 2

My 1st edition Charizard card is never going to be worth anywhere near the $150 it used to be worth...
1. Re:Not the same. by Zomalaja · 2012-07-21 06:55 · Score: 2
  
  Do not even remind me of the time and miles consumed keeping my daughter stockpiled with first edition and Import Pokemon Cards.
2. Re:Not the same. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 08:22 · Score: 1
  
  By any chance do you work at Boeing?
What, Pokemans Card/Video Games? by CanHasDIY · 2012-07-21 06:50 · Score: 3, Funny

Meh.

Wake me when we start genetically engineering the little bastards.

--
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
1. Re:What, Pokemans Card/Video Games? by Archenoth · 2012-07-21 09:00 · Score: 2
  
  It's getting there... Often in the games, you have to breed many Pokemon to get them to pass down desirable traits like higher attack or speed IVs, and moves that a particular species doesn't learn normally to get higher end Pokemon... It's surprisingly elaborate.
  
  --
  The arch foe.
I'm 30 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:06 · Score: 0

And I still play Pokemon TCG and the Nintendo games, as do all of my friends kids. It's good stuff.
Re:They're not kids anymore. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:09 · Score: 0

Pfft some of us who play have our own houses.
Re:They're not kids anymore. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:23 · Score: 0, Insightful

*were
*parent's
That message brought to you by a kid in school that's still learning to spell.
Do try not to be so judgmental when you haven't even gotten past the 10th grade, eh?
Black and White got me back into pokemon by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 07:31 · Score: 0

That was just last year. There will be more colors and more Pokemon to come. Don't be surprised if the total amount of Pokemon reaches over 1000.
Re:They're not kids anymore. by MobileTatsu-NJG · 2012-07-21 07:55 · Score: 0

*who's :)

--

"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Bill Cosby: Pokemon by sesshomaru · 2012-07-21 09:04 · Score: 1

Bill Cosby and a child discuss Pokemon.

--
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
belonging to culture by electrosoccertux · 2012-07-21 09:05 · Score: 1

The more I think about it, the fact that chess is public domain makes in infinitely better than any game like Yu-Gi-Oh! that belongs to someone.
And it's not just because Chess is free and you have to pay, at some level, to play Yu-Gi-Oh!. It's because chess belongs to everyone, to humanity
that's why copyright was set to expire after 15 years (or 10 or 20...it was much shorter than the 75-95 years we have now [thanks Disney]), under the founding fathers' original plans. This meant
1. you must keep creating content in order to keep making money
2. your old content enters "culture" quickly and does not remained locked away forever like Walt Disney's greatest creations or Star Wars to be sold again and again for $$$profit$$$ to every generation.
Misleading, but true to a degree by Archenoth · 2012-07-21 09:11 · Score: 3, Informative

Well... Even to this day Pokemon is the second best selling franchise out there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_Selling_Video_Game_Franchises
The 36 people in this article isn't a very large number... A lot of the people that play Pokemon today are actually in our 20s. Addictive? Perhaps a little. But the games have gotten a lot more elaborate than they have in the past. It's more than just collecting them all now, it's about the literally hundreds of things to do in each of the worlds, the oh-so difficult Battle Frontier which very few have beaten, the Breeding to get Pokemon with higher stats and moves not normally known by a particular species, EV training, the mini games, random quests, all of the post-game quests, harvest-moon style farming, and of course, catching them all... Not to mention all of the new multiplayer aspects, like the launcher battles in Black and White (The newest games) which add a whole new depth to battles.
tl;dr I am a Pokemon nut, this article misleads about the general state of the Pokemon franchise, and the age a majority of us are.

--
The arch foe.
1. Re:Misleading, but true to a degree by Team+Rocket+Elite · 2012-07-21 09:58 · Score: 1
  
  The 36 people mentioned in the article are those who have qualified for the World Championship by ranking highly at the US National Championship. It doesn't even include people who qualified through other means or from other countries. The US TCG Nationals tournament (which allows all players who live in the US) had 1507 participants across 3 different age divisions. The Video Game portion is smaller right now. The US Nationals only had around 300 players in the top age bracket. I'm not sure about the lower are brackets but they probably had around 300 players for a total of 600 video games players at the tournament.
2. Re:Misleading, but true to a degree by Nyder · 2012-07-21 15:17 · Score: 1
  
  Well... Even to this day Pokemon is the second best selling franchise out there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_Selling_Video_Game_Franchises
  The 36 people in this article isn't a very large number... A lot of the people that play Pokemon today are actually in our 20s. Addictive? Perhaps a little. But the games have gotten a lot more elaborate than they have in the past. It's more than just collecting them all now, it's about the literally hundreds of things to do in each of the worlds, the oh-so difficult Battle Frontier which very few have beaten, the Breeding to get Pokemon with higher stats and moves not normally known by a particular species, EV training, the mini games, random quests, all of the post-game quests, harvest-moon style farming, and of course, catching them all... Not to mention all of the new multiplayer aspects, like the launcher battles in Black and White (The newest games) which add a whole new depth to battles.
  tl;dr I am a Pokemon nut, this article misleads about the general state of the Pokemon franchise, and the age a majority of us are.
  I'm in my 40's and I've been playing Pokemon since it came out. Now they got the Trading Card Game Online (http://www.pokemontcg.com), which isn't too bad (always like the Gameboy Color Pokemon Trading Card Game). Got the various Pokemon games for my various consoles that I play on the occasion. All in all, it's not a bad game, could be better, could be a lot worse.
  What I don't understand is, Pokemon would make a very fun MMORPG. Why isn't there one? Seems to me they have missed out big time.
  
  --
  Be seeing you...
3. Re:Misleading, but true to a degree by Eli+Gottlieb · 2012-07-22 00:37 · Score: 1
  
  And, let's face it, the sheer fact that most standard-issue Pokemon video games are fairly decent turn-based party-battle RPGs, completely aside from any Pokemon-specific aspects.
I was an avid collector in the mid 90s by flimflammer · 2012-07-21 11:10 · Score: 2

Man, back in 1996-1997, I collected the hell out of Pokemon. I had doubles/triples of all of the original 102 cards (including 12 Charizards, 8 or so Blastoise, and several misprint cards which were worth a pretty penny), and that was just my spares, not the deck I played with. That game was practically a religion back when we were kids.
It was pretty weird. I do wish I cashed out though, before the bubble burst and they became rather worthless. I sold cards from time to time when they were still big, made a few hundred bucks here or there, but had I sold out completely, I'd have been looking at thousands and thousands of dollars as a middle school kid, as all my extra non-playing deck cards were in mint condition, straight from the booster packs to hard sleeves. The possibilities would have been amazing.
I still have them somewhere, stored away. They very likely won't go up in value ever again, but you know what? It's a healthy reminder of a fun time in my life. It's probably worth more to me now than it was to the world back then.
Actual Player Here by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 11:30 · Score: 0

20 year old Pokemon TCG/VCG player here.
The game is actually played mostly by the 18+ age group, as far as the trading game goes. We just had the US nationals, and we had over 1,000 adults fly in/etc to play. There's major events in most countires, europe has a large player base too.
The game itself is backed by all sorts of scholarship money awarded by The Pokemon Company.
As far as the game itself, Pokémon is very unique in that resources (Energy, think like lands) is attached only to one of your characters in play. You can only play one of these cards per turn, so most of the top tier decks revolve around using card abilities to accelerate energies. The cards really do correspond to the character stats in the game, too.
As far as the videogame goes, most teams arrange themselves around abusing weather conditions to give their team an advantage. This can be rain, sandstorms, hail, drought, etc.
If you're looking for a competitive bout of nostalgia, there's several sites to take a gander at.
Trading Card Game:
http://www.siprizes.com
http://www.pokegym.net
http://www.propokemon.com
Video Game:
http://www.skarmbliss.com
http://www.smogon.com
Aurora Colorado Massacre 2012 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 15:30 · Score: 0

Pokemon was a major influence on the early-mind of Holmes.
LoL
Wow by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-21 23:12 · Score: 0

I thought that fad ended back in 2002 or so. It's amazing to see manchildren keep playing that thing for so long.
Stopwatch by Jetra · 2012-07-22 05:43 · Score: 1

*Click*

Took them slightly over a decade to finally come up with this story. Gee, I thought they would have made this assumption when I was a kid.
But ... it's trash by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-22 20:04 · Score: 0

The game was shit then, it's shit now, and the people who play are missing out on better things to put their time in to.
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24 and still playing by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-31 19:25 · Score: 0

24 and still playing pokemon on the nds. lol. just the last 2 weeks i played 50 hours of pokemon black. why? because i was bored