The Pokemon Trading Card Game continues to be a popular and incredibly lucrative venture for the franchise, with plenty of new releases and cards being released every year. This has seen fans of Pokemon spending ludicrous amounts of money for certain cards and sets, either due to popularity or rarity of these collectables. While there have been plenty of cards that have been found and maintained over the years, an incredibly unique and rare card has been unearthed thanks to a Japanese auction.
The card in question is part of a series of ten unique cards that were released in Japan as a cross promotion with Pokemon Snap. This was a contest that asked players of Pokemon Snap to take pictures of their favorite Pokemon in the game, and then submit it as a contest entry. If the fan's picture was a winner, they would then receive 20 copies of a Pokemon card that used the submitted picture as its art. The ten unique promotional cards were based on Gyarados, Pikachu, Bulbasaur, and more. While nine of them would appear for auction and sale in the past 23 years, the Magikarp card had never been discovered until now.
In a video by YouTuber smpratte, he reiterates that instead of the winners receiving a copy of each unique card, the winners of the contest were only given 20 copies of a card of their own design. As a result, this limited the circulation of these Pokemon trading cards to the person who it was solely given to. The first copy of this Magikarp card had recently appeared in a Japanese auction, selling for 5 million yen, or nearly $136,000 USD.
The video by smpratte states that the card was sent to him to a friend and business partner of his specifically for this video, as he goes over every detail present on the card. One of them is the fact that there is a unique camera icon on the side, indicating that the card is a part of the special promotion for Pokemon Snap and the Pokemon TCG. This detail is present on the other nine cards as well. Another is that instead of the usual illustrator credit for the image, it notes that it is an in-game photograph, with the winner's name on the bottom as well.
Much like some of the most expensive Pokemon cards, its elusivity and rarity is due to it being a limited promotional item for the game. The biggest piece of irony of this whole story, pointed out by smpratte, is that Magikarp is one of the most common creatures to find in the original Pokemon Snap. Inversely, this one card of Magikarp from the Pokemon Trading Card Game is one of the rarest to find.