On Oct. 30, the Pokémon Company International released the mobile game Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket globally.   

As someone who has been collecting the Pokémon TCG since I was 5 years old, I was intrigued when this game first got announced. I was curious on how this game was going to differ from their already existing online version of the card game Pokémon TCG Live.    

After playing the game constantly for two weeks, I find it safe to say that Pokémon TCG Pocket is just a quick way for the Pokémon Company to keep pushing more brand interaction down their consumers throats.   

At first glance, this game is what I would consider to be a paint by numbers mobile game with a user interface that is pretty uncluttered and has plenty of different buttons to click on.

An appeal many have to this game is the opportunity to collect Pokémon cards by opening packs digitally. I feel that this is done well, but it is cut down from its in real life counterpart.   

For the English version of the TCG, Pokémon cards come in a pack containing 10 cards with an additional one basic energy card and one code card. In Pocket, it is more similar to the Japanese or even Korean packs which contain fewer cards.  

Pocket packs give you five cards to add to your collection. Overall, it’s a rather good pack opening simulator.   

There is a social hub in this game so friends can collect, battle and trade cards together, which of course is one of my main checklist things that a game like this needs to be able to function.   

A feature Pocket has is a pick’em based randomizer game called wonder pick that has players attempt to gain a card from a pack of cards someone else opened by having them scrambled, face side down.  

Although you are only getting one card at a time in this mode, it can be fun to see what pools of cards you are getting to can choose from.     

Like most mobile games, players could turn this game into who can spend the most money in order to collect all the cards first, but overall Pocket does not incentivize this as much as other mobile games do. But this probably isn’t present mostly because people that like playing these games will just spend money anyway without much coercion.   

This game has been super profitable. It made $12 million in only a couple of days after it being released. The game looks to have a long-life cycle ahead of it, and there looks to be more riches to be gained.   

I do enjoy the music in this game. Pocket has many different tracks that all have a very calm vibe, capturing what only I could describe as a 60-degree day in May. Fresh and cool, not anxious in tone.   

Now the main thing I am here for is the actual card game part of this app. The gameplay is of course going to be simplified but the question is by how much.   

In the simplest terms,  the gameplay is a sliver of the actual card game, having a small everything, from deck size, game board and overall card options. These all help to speed up the gameplay more, but I feel that it misses the actual essence of what card games are for.   

Making one based on quickness makes me feel like out speeding my opponent is the optimal strategy for card games when that isn’t often the case.   

Games are made to entertain those involved, and this game does that, but it does it in the way most mobile games do through incentives to collect and come back daily to the product.

Coming back to the game daily will give you two free packs to open along with updated daily missions to complete.   

Daily rewards are not new, but it makes this game another part of the day that the Pokémon Company wants you to have. As the Pokémon Company takes pride in being part of people’s day through many different means. They provide many products, from Pokémon GO which tracks your walking, to Pokémon Sleep that tracks your sleep, they want users to be always in a Pokémon filled world.   

The Pokémon Company is not exactly the first card game makers to try to create a faster version of their card game. As one of their competitors in the card game market, Konami released their own simplified mobile game version of the card game Yu-Gi-Oh back on Nov. 17, 2016.  

Happy belated seventh birthday to Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Links. This game has a lot of the same simplified format as Pokémon TCG Pocket tries to have. Duel Links has a 20-30 card deck instead of the 40-60 card deck, a smaller game board and less of a goal of points to defeat your opponent.   

Duel Links has the superior card list over TCG Pocket.

With TCG Pocket having a brand new made for just the app card list makes it feel fresh, but it changes what cards that you can find in real life actually do. Along with the presumption that these cards will never be obtainable in real life, it makes the game feel like it’s missing something.   

Duel Links card list is completely made of cards that exist in real life. This means if you find a card that you like to use in the game, you can get a copy of it in real life and play the standard real-life version of Yu-Gi-Oh with it.   

Having this makes me feel like I am playing the game and learning things and strategies from cards that I can both play online and in real life.  

Comparing Pocket to the full-scale Pokémon TCG Live, I think that Pocket is a more user-friendly product that will probably stick around for a while with a player base of people that enjoy a quick game of cards.  

I understand having the options to play a quick game, because people do not always have hours to sink into a game. But I think that not just making this version of the TCG into a format through Live is going to be a detriment to the number of players that are going to be playing Live in the future.   

As a player of Pokémon TCG Live, I hate how smoothly this game runs compared to Live. The online version of the Pokémon TCG has always been buggy, during its couple of indurations, but Live since its June 8, 2023, release continues to be slow and glitchy.  

I do not feel that Live is what the Pokémon Company cares about when trying to make the card game more accessible to the world, and it makes me sad as someone who enjoys playing Live.   

I heavily encourage the Pokémon Company to look at Konami and look at their full online version of Yu-Gi-Oh. This game is called Yu-Gi-Oh Master Duel, and oh is this game great for an online version of the game.   

There are tons of cards to collect, a bunch of different formats to play and my favorite part is a well-done online tournament schedule, having many different worldwide tournaments throughout the year.   

It makes the feeling of playing Yu-Gi-Oh online more similar to playing it in real life than Live does of playing Pokémon online versus real life.   

From a mobile game stance, it is a fine game to play, especially in a mobile game ecosystem where tapping the screen still reigns supreme.  

But to the Pokémon Company, I’m asking please stop trying to simplify a game that is already a worldwide phenomenon when you could be spending time making improvements to the already existing Pokémon TCG Live.   

If that version of the game was better, than there should not be a worry about how to get people to keep engaging with your brand.