Pokémon TCG Online

It's hard not to accidentally review the Pokémon Trading Card Game itself when taking a look at PTCGO since it manages such a perfect virtualization of the official game. It even includes the main competitive formats sanctioned by The Pokémon Company, which is the major draw to the title. However, I think that PTCGO is worthy of recognition for all of the choices it made to improve the overall gameplay experience. The steps they took to make the card game itself more convenient, like highlighting playable cards or sorting the discard pile, are fantastic, but I'm more impressed by the decisions made outside of the actual gameplay.

One of the biggest surprises is the complete lack of microtransactions. Because every real-world TCG product comes with a code to redeem it in PTCGO, the physical products are treated as microtransactions, and digital-only products can only be earned, never bought. That way, if you never buy real cards (and if you stay away from the second-hand code market), you can still build up a good collection. Unfortunately, any digital-only cards you get outside of tournaments are locked to your account, so you can't trade them if you have extras or need a specific card. However, trading is still open to any cards redeemed from physical products or won in digital tournaments, and is a really neat feature of PTCGO. The trade market requires you to make a security deposit of tokens, the in-game currency earned from winning matches, in order to make an offer, and the deposit is only returned if your trade is accepted. This way, the system isn't flooded with bogus requests, making for a healthy and active trade market.

While that's awesome for people like me who are always building new competitive decks, newer players may be overwhelmed by the prospect, and PTCGO has them covered too! Until recently, every major set was released alongside two or three "theme decks," built using single-prize Pokémon instead of the über double/triple-prize Pokémon that tend to dominate the competitive scene. These decks are fantastic for learning the ropes of the game but are essentially unplayable in the standard format. In order to help new players get into the game, PTCGO introduces a format called "Theme" that exclusively uses these decks. That way, new players can jump right into the game with up-to-date pre-made decks and play on a level field before they start trying to build their own decks. I took advantage of this option a lot when I first got into the game, and I had a lot of fun getting to understand the way cards could interact with one another in a synergistic deck before I considered playing standard.

Honestly, without PTCGO to teach me the ropes and give me limitless opponents to practice against, I don't think I would still be interested in the Pokémon Trading Card Game. This game provides the full-fledged TCG experience with deck-building, trading, and legal competitive formats, but also adds in a whole format that seems designed to give newer players a chance to learn the game and its nuances better than they could with any tutorial. The game's decade-long run is a testament to how effectively it brings the tabletop game to the digital space, and even though its retirement is on the horizon, I will always have fond memories of my first real introduction to the competitive Pokémon TCG scene.

The game is available for PC and Mac here (as of 2/15/22): https://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-tcg/play-online/download/
The game is available for Android here (as of 2/15/22): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pokemon.pokemontcg
The game is available for iOS here (as of 2/15/22): https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pokemon-tcg-online/id841098932

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