Pokémon Company Considers Using Government ID To Tackle TCG Scalping

We should just go back in time and just delete Jake and Logan Paul, and a lot of things will improve.

And while we're back there, maybe set AI back another 20 years too.

@Haruki_NLI
Number 1 rule of time travel. NEVER attempt to change the past!

Scalpers are the scum of the earth. Recently I felt the pain, too. I was really hoping to get my hands on a Magic: The Gathering Commander deck called Goblinstorm. I was (probably a few minutes) too late in the queue to get it and found them online for triple the price. Way to ruin a hobby for people!

The insanity seems even higher with Pokémon cards, with people literally fighting over booster boxes and whatnot. Despicable!

I just hate how a brand new sub-community has spawned and priced out the actually Pokémon TCG Community. I'm not sure how you really enforce or impose much else to get control of the situation though.

Usually this craze kind of passes, but we're nearly 2 years into this. I don't think it is going away. People are making this their full-time job now.

you need a government id to sell games at gamestop so why not..

But you can just print the card template and keep it just for yourself.

God, all this new Government ID stuff, required by law or not, is just insane and makes everything way more complicated than it needs to be. I accept showing a government ID for things like voting, but not much else.

If I need a government ID just to buy Pokémon cards even in the US, then no more Pokémon cards for me.

The only good thing about scalpers is that we get to see Penguinz0 roast them.
Because they deserve it.

Sod Pokemon cards. Overpriced flimsy bits of paper with no real world application. My new hobby is collecting and trading government-issued ID cards.

The people who want children to gamble now want children to give up their identity.

@Pillowpants Did scalpers physically force you to be late buying the product?

@MTMike87 Speaking for the US, it's because some people are using this as income. I heard one person trying to tell people it was their only way to pay the bills. I'm like 20% sympathetic because I do understand times are hard for a lot of people in the US, but 80% of me is like, if you have the gas money and time to run around all the places and buy up all the stock, I feel like you could also just work a job. They aren't picking up that much at each stop, so they can't be making that much money off of it.

Other people I've heard just rip packs and go sell them at card shows. I'm just shaking my head listening to them rattle off card prices and what they pulled, but I bet they couldn't tell me a single thing about the actual Pokemon series. It really is an unhealthy market here for mixed reasons, but mostly it just boils down to greed I think.

@hypercoyote What kind of stupid arse question is that?

@Anti-Matter i did that and moved to lorcana guess whats going up in price now.

@hypercoyote agree in parts.
Minifig scalping is getting crazy where a dude in my city drives 15 minutes to scalp out the one chase minifig and upsells them from 12+4 postage.
With a car that money dissapears.

@Pillowpants that type of question would generally be considered a sarcastic one. You are saying you were late to buy it and then blaming scalpers for it.

@kfflscnt Yeah, after I typed that, I was thinking it through more. There's actually a group that hits all the major cities around me and I guess they share the profits within the group. One of the people claiming they needed the money was in that group. So maybe with that kind of coverage, they turn a good profit. If the local jobs aren't paying well or just not available at all, then I guess it would truly be their only option, but man would I hate living a life where my income was entirely dependent on snagging product and upselling it to other people.

@hypercoyote I got an email and within one hour the sets were already sold out. So that's why I was late, by probably minutes, but it's kind of insane that things like these are being sold out within an hour, wouldn't you agree? The creator also called out scalpers. I hope you can at least agree that it's not cool for fans who actually like to collect stuff.

I edited my original post to clarify the missing bits of my story.

@hypercoyote being late to buy it shouldn't be a problem. I'm young and have a lot of free time but even last year I found it utterly insane that I had to wait 2 hours outside of GameStop to buy an elite trainer box. I got the last one of one of the SKUs even after waiting that long. I can't begin to imagine how hard it is for someone with a full time job to get their hands on some paper cards for their hobby because of all the scalpers.

TLDR: It shouldn't be a problem that someone is "too late" because a functioning member of our society deserves cards just as much as the unemployed bum (me, last year) does.

Its so bad I just ignore the Pokémon TCG these days. When my partner started collecting, I could pick up the odd booster pack just randomly pretty much anywhere. Now you literally have to know when a store is restocking and be there as they open. It's a full time job keeping on top of it thanks to all the scalping. I feel bad for anyone just trying to get some packs for their kids especially.

I sincerely hope Pokémon can figure it out because I think the card game itself is really good. It's a shame it's not as accessible as it once was.

@Erigen Looking at the world we live in, it might have been changed quite a few times to be this messed up.

Pokémon Company considering taking over the government, offering a full employment program and universal basic income to eliminate the root cause of scalping forever.

Only way out of this I reckon.

CAN we get pkmn TCG streamers and maybe even influencers to promote against scalpers too??!!

They always seem to be quiet about these issues, when they themselves hoard product for views and likes.

Strict, but necessary. Hope more measures are taken in other countries too. There have been cases where people have actually been killed over their Pokémon cards.

A recent case was of a woman in Chile, who was killed by two thieves over her Pokémon TCG cards. At least they were quickly arrested themselves.

"It's difficult to say what kind of impact this might have on scalpers, since those taking part could theoretically just obtain a My Number Card for themselves, right?"

About 83% of people in Japan have a My Number Card, so that's not really the point here.

The main point is that it will stop tourists from scalping packs, as they cannot get My Number Cards, of course.

Another point is that it could be used to track purchases. I'm aware that it states in the article that the numbers of each individual card will not be acquired or stored in any way, but I still wouldn't be surprised if there was some kind of data that is retained from having your My Number Card scanned.

If The Pokémon Company cares about curbing scalping, then why not just print cards on demand? Go to a website, pick out the cards you want (priced according to what printing techniques used, like an extra charge for a foil), and they print and ship them to you in a pack. I get that kinda defeats the whole rare cards aspect of a trading card game, but it's really the only way to kill scalping. If anybody can just get whatever cards they want directly from the manufacturer, then there's not much of a point buying up packs in stores.

I'm sure that would also be complicated logistically but you might be able to make it work.

@Pillowpants @solarwolf07
Might as well just answer both in one post.

I have to be real with you and say that waiting 2hrs in-person for such a high-demand product is a laughably small amount of time. I've known some people to camp overnight and still miss out. If you think 2hrs is a long time to wait, you are in for some heartbreak down the road. When you know a product is in high-demand, you have to expect it's not going to be easy to get and if you don't get it, it's not someone else's fault, you were just late to the game.

I've been collecting for YEARS. Back in 2000, I had to camp out in the store for 6hrs when the PS2 came out because stores were only getting a handful of stock and people were upselling the systems even back then. Supply and demand is nothing new to the world. When a product is in high demand and the manufacturer doesn't increase supply to meet it, there will always be people who take advantage of the situation to make money. That's just life and you just have to know what you're getting into. Is it sad that it has to be this way for some cards or whatever? Absolutely. But it's better that it's something we don't need rather than something we do need, like food.

The real problem I see is a two-fold issue, with the use bots to hammer online sites and online sites terribly handling product releases. Most of the time, the people considered "scalpers" aren't causing the problem. The real problem is organized automated systems allowing a small number of people to buy THOUSANDS of a product. A person walking out of the store with 3 ETBs they plan to sell is a drop in the bucket compared to that. I've found that buying in person has been a much smoother and easier experience compared to chasing online alert accounts and fighting broken online checkouts. Investing a few hours of my time to stand outside a store is way better than the FOMO of online buying.

To close the essay, it's most likely a much smaller number of people creating the scalping problems than people realize, but regardless of the number, complaining and hating scalpers isn't going to change anything. People need to be writing real complaints directed at the retailers who don't care how miserable the experience is for their online buyers since they are making the same amount of money whether it goes to bots or real buyers. And those retailers are most likely not reading comments on Twitter or NintendoLife.

@hypercoyote You're assuming a lot about me, there, buddy. But thanks for the essay. And I'm not being sarcastic, by the way.

@Pillowpants There was another person included in my reply, so the part you're referring to was probably addressing their message.

@SteveDaSteve Most people don't want to accept that this situation is good for their business and it's not necessarily in their best interest to fix it right now. A lot of people think printing more cards = making more money, but sometimes the hype that shortages generate drives even more profits in other areas of their business.

@Maxz

“Collecting government IDs” sounds like a euphemism for being a serial killer

Just print more product. Grow, invest, produce - this shouldn't be difficult for Pokémon.

I assume this will help combat scalping if they also place purchase limits of each buyer.

Even if they don't store the number itself they can likely create an account tied to it and track purchases.

If you buy 10 tickets or 100 card boxes, they might flag you.

It's insane we need government issues IDs to come many scalping... But it's clear past solutions were not working.

@brookeobscura there are at least two reasons that I can think of as to why simply increasing production isn't a solution. Or at least that they haven't increased production enough to overwhelm scalpers.

1. If they overwhelm the scalpers until they give up then you suddenly have the reverse issue of too much supply. This can present its own problems that the Pokemon company is just desperate to not have to deal with.

2. Obviously the concept of rare cards is entirely artificial. That special rare card you can only get from special boxes? They could print 10,000 easily if they wanted. But that would ruin the scarcity which is a pretty important selling point. Mass production might counter the scalpers but it would also create a large amount of cards they wanted to use as selling points.

Stuff like the elmo doll didn't have this problem because they were all identical and excess stock was easier to just redistribute since they were all the same and could just be held onto or sent elsewhere.

There is probably other factors I didn't think of. But it's not as simple as you're making it out to be.

P.s. you're also just completely ignoring the fact scalping is dozens of times worse than the examples you gave from the 80s and 90s. Back then you had to actually go to the store to buy them. Which meant the number you could scalp was limited and stored could more easily limit purchases if needed.

With online ordering and bots. A scalpers can buy 1000 stock in seconds. So simply increasing production a little won't stop scalpers since they'll just buy all of that before anyone can too.

Maybe this will work. Regardless, it's interesting to see The Pokemon Company take such measures to deal with a situation they effectively created.

@Nep-Nep-Freak you need a government id when driving when going to court when buying alcohol and many other things

Fight against digital ID and fight against CBDCs. This is how we lose our freedom. You cannot purchase anymore X today as you’ve hit your allowance. I live in the UK and we’re on our way to dystopia.