Gotta Watch 'Em All!
Jan 31 '00
The Pokémon phenomenon started with the Red/Blue gameboy games in Japan in 1995. In these games, you travel from city to city, capturing, raising and battling the pokémon you find along the way. In these two games, there are 151 pokémon to capture, and you need to trade pokémon you caught on one colored game with pokémon your friends have caught on the other color game in order to catch 'em all. From this highly addictive, yet simple to play game, an animated series was developed. I'm not sure which came to the US first, the game or the series... but the series is what prompted Pokémania to break out amongst the many people here. I myself was hooked on the series (still am) and only played the related games as a result of it. The popularity of the series sparked the new games: Pokémon Yellow and Snap are both derived from the show. Which brings us to the Pokémon Trading Card Game. If you've ever played Magic, you have a good idea how this game works. The cards are equally as fun to play, much more fun to collect, and whatever your opinion of Magic the Gathering... you will most likely have the same opinion about the Pokémon Card game. I am not an 'avid' collector of the cards, but I have a few sparkling gems in my collection... that I will admit have cost a pretty penny.
Pokémon itself is a harmless fad. From my experience, 99% of all people I've asked who don't like pokémon have never played a single game, watched a single show, or even bothered to learn a single fact about it. All they see is a cute yellow mouse-like thing, and they automatically think it's the next Barney. Or on a similar but opposite side of the spectrum, the expect the show to be as cute and adorable as barney, and are upset that it's not. I find it amazing the number of people who complain about the violence in pokémon, yet make no mention of the TV shows immediately following it in it's Weekday and Saturday Morning Lineup. Batman, the Animated series airs right after Pokémon does on Weekday afternoons... and Pokémon is the show that is given a bad rap on violence? There is honestly more violence in Looney Tunes than there is in Pokémon. Take Sylvester and Tweety for example... The cat wants to eat the bird. The dog beats up the cat. That's not considered violent? There are also many other people who consider spending money on pokémon cards and prodcuts a waste of money. Well, I can think of many other things $5 can buy a little kid; and a lot of them aren't very good. The cards are a great way of teaching kids how to read among other things. to get a good playable set is not that expensive; and there's always the power of trading cards with other people rather than purchasing more.
However, there is a bad side to everything. Most of the bad points you read in the news. Parents fighting about how they felt their kids got a bad trade, kids fighting over cards, and this is where your job as a responsible parent comes to play. When it comes to collecting, keep 2 binders of cards. 1 for collecting that remains untouched and unseen by anyone. And a second for trading and playing. That's my main startegy and it works out fine. I keep one of every card in my collectable binder, which I then hide away from viewing eyes, and I use all of my doubles to trade and play with. You can use this time to sit down with your kids and sort through which are worth keeping, and worth trading so that you or your kids are never put in a situation where they get in a fight about a bad trade.
All in all, Pokémon collecting is no worse of a hobby than Beanie Babies, stamp collecting, coin collecting, video collecting, Star Wars, etc... As long as your children know what is healthy and what is obsessive ($10.00 for a booster pack is WAY too much) a hobby is a hobby. Why not make it an enjoyable one for everyone?
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CeruleanSister
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