EdDefies 🔮

PokemonCenter's experience today seems to be a bellweather for the Pokemon TCG experience as a whole nowadays. @Pokemon @Nintendo @PokemonCenterUS @NintendoCoLtd As someone who just wants to jump in and collect the PKC ETBs, and even has a standing agreement with friends that we'll split them amongst those who don't get in, PokemonCenter has become a source of negative energy that feels like it could be easily solved if someone chose to do so. The single biggest release of the year (30th celebration) has been an absolute travesty with normal people getting constant resets on the website which completely destroys their queue entry. Even something as simple as being signed into your account and gaining a queue ticket that persists on the account would assumably be better than simply hoping your connection manages to maintain. This is coming from someone that's battled and managed to hit several PokemonCenter drops in the past, but via having it open on my desktop, my phone, basically anything possible with a new IP to see which one manages to hold on. Cryptographic tokens assigned to accounts after they verify themselves (so you can discard the identifying data afterwards) would be an interesting solution to create validated accounts tied to actual people. Right now though, it's turning the entire system away from enjoyment and love of collecting into math equations. When I have to go search the market for the 30th pkc etb amongst the plethora of sellers that purchased via bots, I no longer view that ETB as a treasured possession. It's something I look at attached to a price I had to pay to obtain it. So instead of being happy it's in my collection, it's now a calculation of "If I paid $500 for this, and it suddenly is worth $1500, maybe it makes more sense to trade it for other things I want." Alternatively purchasing it directly, there's a significant sense of enjoyment and goodwill towards the acquisition. I know the President of Nintendo has suggested they will make changes, but Pokemon Center should be sacrosanct amongst the various methods of obtaining what is ostensibly just slips of cardboard that we all attach significant meaning to. I just wish that meaning was reciprocated with a similar level of emotional investment in making sure that something like the 30th Celebration PKC release was better managed. Pokemon Center being the epitome of "no one can buy more than one, we've made this a fortress of individual purchases" would be a great representation of that shared relationship.