The Actual News:
Well, this is the first official Weekly Roundup! As a reminder, I’m trying to maintain a new update regimin where I post some random bit of Pokémon TCG news—or news which I feel my audience would be curious to learn about—over the weekend… at least at some point while it’s still technically “the weekend”. This could be any time between Saturday morning or Sunday night. Even if it’s something small, I hope to post something to share with you, and I hope you visit the site to check it out every weekend. Good times? I hope so!
Today’s news will cover these topics:
- Pokémon Collector May Be Faking PSA 10 Slabs!
- Come See Pokémon Artist Midori Harada!
- Full Art Cards Will Return in new Scarlet/Violet TCG Set
- Neo Gendai Blanks Still Chugging Along….
- And finally: this week’s Safari Zone HD Remastered cards!
Pokémon Collector May Be Faking PSA 10 Slabs!
This is maybe the most significant news for this past week, but word on the street is that a certain high profile Pokémon TCG whale, Xiao, is selling some of his PSA 10 slabs… and apparently they’re turning out to be high profile fakes. The full details can be found in this Elite Four-um post… and while I’m a complete outsider in all this, the evidence is particularly damning.
Stories like this just remind me of the classic adage Buyer Beware. Yeah, you have the right to not be scammed, but the time and effort involved in trying to fix the problem can be easily avoided by simply being careful of what you do. That said, I can’t believe someone thinks they can outwit an entire community by trying to pass off a fake as the real deal. In a way this also reminds me of the whole WATA Games ordeal over the past year, where the folks grading the games are the same ones trying to “buy” them for a couple million in order to trick the public into overvaluing graded games… but enough people saw through the nonsense and the market is in the process of snapping back.
Come See Pokémon Artist Midori Harada!
Another little side update is that Midori Harada, Pokémon TCG artist who has been drawing cards since Aquapolis, will be on the East Coast of the US at two separate events, one official and one unofficial. If you ever wanted to get some of your favorite cards drawn by Midori autographed—and you have the ability to head to the East Coast—then now’s your chance!
Specifically, according to this EliteFour-um post, Midori Harada will be at these events:
- FEBRUARY 3-5, 2023 (Fri-Sun) — Orlando Regionals; Orlando, FL
- FEBRUARY 11-12, 2023 (Sat-Sun) — Times Square, New York City, NY
For both events, you’ll need to pre-register. Click on the relevant location for more information about the event.
If anyone is going there, if you can get me an autographed Ferrothorn cards, I’d greatly appreciate it! 
… But then again I think the names being signed must match the ticket. Drat, but as an artist, I completely understand. Either way, if you go, I hope you have fun!
Full Art Cards Will Return in new Scarlet/Violet TCG Set
Speaking of Pokémon TCG art… PokéBeach revealed some really awesome news: full art rares are returning to the TCG! Specifically, seven cards were revealed on PokéBeach along with their translations. They are:
- Slowpoke
- Pachirisu
- Ralts
- Kirlia
- Gardevoir
- Greavard
- Riolu
If you’re out of the loop like I am, full art rares is a new rarity type. That is to say, while full art cards have always existed, they were always either Rares or Ultra Rares or some such. The most recent set in Japan (ZStar Universe, which will be the upcoming Crown Zenith in English) introduced a new rarity: AR (“Art Rare”) and SAR (“Special Art Rare”). Looks like they’re keeping this rarity going for the upcoming Scarlet/Violet set.
Yeesh, I’m getting confused with all these new rarities! Back in my day, there was only Common, Uncommon and Rare, and we liked it! (OK boomer)
Anyways, I should point out that co-Fake Card Master, aschefield, is working on Scarlet/Violet TCG blanks and will be releasing them soon. Included in the release will be Full Art card blanks, same as with the Sword/Shield blanks… so you can make your own full art rares! Keep an eye out for more news in due time.
COMING SOON TO PA!: #PokemonScarletViolet #PokemonTCG custom blanks by aschefield (@Kadael )… exclusively available at https://t.co/jMIejILk2l! Here's a quick first look of the blanks.
Please follow PA! on Twitter and visit our site so you can know when these blanks drop! 😄 pic.twitter.com/J183jEMlHN
— Pokémon Aaah! The Tweeting Account (@AaahPokemon) December 11, 2022
Neo Gendai Blanks Still Chugging Along….
As for upcoming blanks… I’m still due to releasing my Neo Gendai blanks, but there is one slight stop on the way: Light and Dark Pokémon borders! It took me a bit of work, but I finally got the Light Pokémon borders done. Take a look:
I even made myself a Light Baby Pokémon rule box, something that never existed before faking made it happen.
The Light border was a bit of a challenge to make, especially considering that there are only two Stage 2 Light Pokémon cards—Light Dragonite and Light Machamp—and only Light Machamp has the proper Stage 2 “extra bar”. In fact, this was an error that I didn’t even notice until literally just now, but Light Dragonite is missing its “Stage 2 extra bar” that is used on all Neo Stage 2’s.
Thankfully I at least had four Light Machamps, so that helped out. BTW, anyone else thought that the Light Pokémon borders looked a bit like butter? Just me? Oh…
BTW, one small change that I made which people on the PA! Discord did notice right away was: I had to remove the Neo Destiny shadow, which existed on all Light Pokémon cards. This was to maintain consistency with the rest of the card designs, similar to how I removed the “Crown” on the Darkness and Metal blanks, despite them existing on original Neo cards:
Fear not, my Young Padawangrasshopper: I WILL be providing the Neo Destiny shadow (and Crown) as addons for the blank upon their release. It’s just that, for the default version, I will leave them shadowless.
Anyways, next up will be the Dark Pokémon cards! Which… admittedly I have a bit of a dilemma here. Take a look:
On the left is the Dark Pokémon from the Team Rocket set, while the right is the Dark Pokémon from Neo Destiny. Maybe you can see it right away, but the issue is: they look slightly (but significantly) different. I mean I guess I should just use the Neo Destiny one… but the thing is, for some reason Neo Destiny’s templates were changed and only for that set. Every other Neo set uses the style which I’ve been using, of which the Team Rocket Dark Pokémon borders are connected with. Ultimately, no matter what I choose, it won’t be 100% accurate, unless I decide to make specific Neo Destiny blanks… but that ain’t gonna happen. Therefore I’ll be making an executive decision: I’ll use the Neo Destiny Neo-style Evolution and Info Bar, but the Team Rocket frame border. MAYBE I’ll mix the two together and see what it looks like. I’ll also need to color correct everything so that they match better with one another: the Team Rocket colors are more green/cyan-tinted while the Neo Destiny colors are more red/yellow-tinted.
Anyways, hopefully by next weekend I’ll have the Dark blanks done, and then the weekend after next I’ll have the Neo Gendai blanks officially released. Keep an eye out for them as well!
This Week’s Safari Zone HD Remastered Cards
Finally, as a reminder, every week I want to share a couple cards from GC|Linkinboss’ HD Remaster of my classic “Safari Zone” reinterpretation of the original “Vending Machine” set. This started off as just GC|L just remaking the Vending cards and sharing the results on the PA! Discord… but then I had the idea of maybe remaking “Safari Zone”, which GC|L wholeheartedly accepted. Huzzah!
But one thing I’d like to do with every week’s release is to either connect it to last week’s release and/or set up next week’s release. There may be surprises or other cool cards… but like all good HD remasters, there’s still always a surprise or two to come.
Anyways, this week will be the first official release of the cards from the set… I’ve got four cards to help set the stage for the next releases. Sweet!
Neat stuff! But this is only just the start! You can see these cards, and any others I’ve released so far (which… is only the Weezing card) over on the Safari Zone HD Remaster page!
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And that’s it for this weekend roundup! It’s the start of a new year, and so I hope you stick with PA! and we can help make 2023 that much more fun than last year. Good times!