Why New Pokémon Card Sleeves Have A Different Texture

As many people know, special Pokémon card sleeves come with almost every Elite Trainer Box in the Sword and Shield series. These sleeves are usually very good quality, as they provide great protection to your valuable cards and they are very clear, so your cards still look just as good as they do outside of sleeves. They’re also colorful and feature a VMax Pokémon on the back. Collectors have been using these sleeves for their collections for a long time and some even go out of their way to buy more of these limited edition card sleeves, instead of normal ones, because they like them so much. But something about these collectable items changed this year that hasn’t went unnoticed by many collectors and TCG players.

New Sleeves vs Old Sleeves

The sleeves that come in ETBs were unchanged until the Shining Fates set came out. This set of Pokémon cards featured many shiny Pokémon in it, so naturally everyone wanted them. ETBs were selling out everywhere but the people that got their hands on them noticed the sleeves that came with it looked different from the ones they’re used to. These sleeves had a matte, frosted, or rough finish over the front of the plastic. The old sleeves were smooth and you could see the card very clearly, but with this change shiny cards and rare holographic cards look dull and clouded. They just don’t shine in the light as much as they used to. At first many were confused and thought it could have been a misprint or an error, but this would quickly become the new normal. All sleeves that have been included in ETBs since then have had the same rough texture on the front.

Why The Change?

This change from smooth to textured was purposeful. Even though not everyone likes this new style, it does have it’s benefits. For starters, the most noticeable change is the feeling of the sleeve. This texture you feel allows players of the TCG to shuffle and move their cards around more easily with out them getting stuck to each other. Other people also realized this new material feels more durable and prevents your cards from getting bent, adding even more protection than before. People that play the trading card game generally enjoy this new texture, while people that only buy Pokémon cards for collecting don’t like that they make the cards look weird. Luckily, there are alternatives as a collector.

If you’re someone that doesn’t like the change and you want sleeves that show off the card better while providing the best protection, read about the best products to protect your Pokémon cards with.

Pokémon Unite Basic Attack vs Special Attack

What’s the Difference between Basic and Special Attacks?

A common misconception among new players is that only certain Pokémon have special attacks. This is not true. Every Pokémon has a basic Attack and multiple Special Attacks. The main difference is that one is faster while the other one does more damage and/or has a special effect. It’s important to learn the difference between these attacks before you buy or upgrade items that have buffs related to these attacks.

What is a Basic Attack?

A Basic Attack is your main move in battle, this is preformed by pressing or holding the ‘A’ button. This has no other purpose than to deal quick bursts of damage to your opponent. Basic Attacks don’t have any special effects unless you’re using an item that changes this. It’s available to use right when you start a match at level 1.

What are Special Attacks?

Every Special Attack is different, that’s what makes them special. These Attacks usually do more damage than Basic ones and they sometimes have effects on your opponent, teammates, or yourself. Unlike Basic Attacks, these aren’t immediately available when you start a match. You’ll need to level up and evolve your Pokémon before unlocking these special abilities. Once you unlock one, you’ll be able to use it by pressing R, ZR, or ZL. They also have longer cooldown times than your Basic Attack.

Items That Buff Attack Stats

There are several items that boost your Attack or Special Attack stats. Deciding which one is more useful is up to you, as it’s different for each player and each Pokémon. Here’s a list of items that buff each attack stat.

Items for Basic Atk. buffs
– Muscle Band
– Attack Weight
– Weakness Policy
– Razor Claw

Items for Sp. Atk buffs
– Shell Bell
– Wise Glasses
– Sp. Atk Specs
– Choice Specs

How To Play Pokémon Unite On PC With Mouse and Keyboard

Pokémon Unite being a MOBA type game has attracted players from other MOBA style games, primarily League of Legends. LoL is one of the largest PC games in the world and can only be played on PC. This means all of the players coming from games like this are most likely used to using a keyboard and mouse instead of a controller. This has left many players wondering how they can play Pokémon Unite with a keyboard and mouse.

How To Play On PC

Playing on PC wasn’t previously possible, until now. With Pokemon Unite being released on Android and iOS, this opens the door for players using emulators on the PC to play the mobile version of the game.

An emulator is an application you can use on your computer that allows you to download mobile apps and mobile games. As we all know, Pokémon Unite is now also a mobile game, so in theory you can play it using these emulators. This is exactly what some players have been doing since the mobile version of the game released. It’s also been a huge topic on Reddit with many players saying they prefer playing on mouse and keyboard and some players are even using PS4 and Xbox One controllers to play the game on PC.

Why You Probably Shouldn’t

Even though it is possible, it’s not recommended that you use emulators to play the game, especially on your main account. This is because we’re not sure if Tencent will ban players using emulators in the future. Just acknowledging that it is possible to play Pokémon Unite on PC is interesting and it’s what a lot of players have been wanting from day 1. Maybe if players and fans let the developers know we want the game on PC enough, we may get a PC port in the future.

Where To Buy Pokémon Themed Oreos If They’re Sold Out Everywhere

The Pokémon Company and Oreos have collaborated to make special edition, Pokémon themed Oreos! Each pack of Oreo cookies features one of 16 different Pokémon. Some Pokémon designs are so rare and so wanted by fans that they’re selling on eBay and other websites for hundreds to thousands of dollars. The Pokémon franchise has become a sensation time and time again and this year is no different. Pokémon products of all kinds are flying off the shelves and getting your hands on cards, packs, or Pokémon themed Oreos can be very difficult.

Physical Locations

The main places to check for these limited edition Oreos are Target and Walmart. Even on the official Oreo website, they refer you to check your local Target to see if they’re in stock. You can check this by going to the store’s website and searching a store near your location. Sometimes these stock numbers online can have discrepancies, so you may want to drive to the store if you have the time to check yourself.

Online Websites

Like most people, if you’re having a hard time getting your hands on a pack of the most popular cookies, you’ll have to resort to ordering them online. Before you do this, It’s not recommended that you buy this from a third party source because the price is most likely extremely inflated. The most trusted place to buy these for the retail price is Amazon. The Oreo Store has an official page on Amazon where you can buy these Pokémon cookies for a limited time. Make sure to check the delivery date, this will show you when they’ll be available. You can order them even if they’re not in stock on Amazon, as long as they plan on restocking soon. If it doesn’t say “In stock soon.”, you may have to search elsewhere.

Pokémon Illustration Contest Rules 2022

This month, The Pokémon company announced they’re holding a new Illustration contest that will begin this year, in 2021 and end in 2022. This is one of their biggest official art contests ever for their trading card game. Everyone can agree that Pokémon card illustrations are amazing pieces of art and are inspiring to all. If you’re an artist and you love Pokémon, now is your chance to get your art featured on a Pokémon card and inspire others!

What Do You Get?

The previous illustration contest offered about $2,800 to the first place winner. In 2019 and 2020 they held similar contests but they were only open to Japanese residents. This time around, the contest will be available to people living in Japan and the United States. For winning first place in the new 2022 competition you’ll win $5,000 and have your art featured in a new Pokémon card set. Even if you don’t manage to win first place, the top 15 drawings chosen will all be rewarded in different ways. It’s important that all entries follow the rules. If you fail to follow the rules of the competition, you risk your art not being considered for selection.

You have from Oct 13th, 2021 to January 31st, 2022 to submit your entry. Just make sure you follow the rules below.

Rules for the 2022 Pokemon Illustration Contest

  • The drawing must prominently feature one of the following Pokemon:
    – Bulbasaur
    – Charizard
    – Pikachu
    – Arcanine
    – Galarian Rapidash
    – Scizor
    – Greninja
    – Cramorant
  • Draw one of these Pokemon in their daily life or while their out adventuring.
  • You’re not allowed to include shiny Pokemon in your illustration.
  • Drawing also must include background art
  • No text in background
  • Limited to 3 entries per person (same or different Pokemon)
  • Must be a legal resident, legal adult, and able to work in Japan or United States

Technical Specifications:
Size/Resolution: 1080 pixels wide x 680 pixels high
File Format: JPEG, PNG (RGB)
File Size: 3 MB or smaller

Winners will be announced early June 2022. Good luck to everyone entering!

For more information on the official rules page visit: https://www.ptcgic-cr.com/2022/en/application/

How to link your Pokémon Unite account from switch to mobile

Pokémon Unite recently released on iOS and Android. If you’ve been playing Unite on the Switch, you probably don’t want to start over and lose all of your progress just to play on another platform. Luckily, the developers thought about this and made it possible for players to link their Pokémon Unite accounts so you can keep your progress and level up the same character on both devices.

How to sync your saved data

First you’ll need to transfer access to your saved data. When you first download the Pokemon Unite app on your phone, it will ask if you want to create a new account. Instead of doing this, you should tap the button that says “Transfer Access to Data”. Next you’ll choose which platform you used to login on the Switch. This is usually your Nintendo Account, but you can also use Facebook, Google, or your Pokémon Trainer Club accounts to login. After you sign in and agree to the term and conditions, you should see your character and saved data pop up on the main menu.

Step by step guide:

  1. Tap “Transfer Access to Data”
  2. Chose which platform you use to log in
  3. Agree to Terms and Conditions

Claim Your Bonus!

If you’re one of the millions of players that were able to pre-register for the Pokémon Unite mobile app, you should have rewards waiting to be claimed! These bonuses include 1,000+ Aoes Tickets, the Pikachu Unite License, and a special Pikachu Holowear! Here’s a step by step guide on How To Claim Pre Register Rewards For Pokémon Unite Mobile.

Best Products To Protect Your Pokémon Cards With

How to keep your cards in the best, mint condition.

Best sleeves to buy for collections

Card sleeves are a must have for every Pokémon car collector. Whether you have 1 card or 1,000 cards, sleeves are a very important part of keeping your cards in good shape. The best card sleeves on the market that a lot of collectors buy are the Ultra Pro Standard card sleeves.


Best sleeves to buy for competitive play

If you’re a person that not only likes to collect but also play the Pokémon Trading Card Game (TCG), there are better sleeves for you to play with. These sleeves are smaller and hug the sides of the card so there isn’t excess plastic around the card once their in the sleeve. This snug fit allows you to easily shuffle and play with your cards while they’re being protected from scratches and other elements. The best sleeves for this situation are the Perfect Barrier 64 x 89mm sleeves.


Best top loaders to buy

What are top loaders? Top loaders are like sleeves but more durable. They’re card holders that are made of harder plastic so they don’t bend as easily as regular sleeves. These are highly recommended for cards that you really don’t want to get damaged. Use top loaders on cards that have a high dollar amount value or cards that mean a lot to you, even if they don’t cost a lot. Top loaders are a little more expensive than sleeves because they’re higher quality material and will protect your cards better. Even at this price, their cheap enough that every collector has them.


More Tips on Protecting Pokémon Cards

1 Sleeve = 1 Card

Whether you’re using a binder, normal card sleeves, or top loaders you should only put one card inside of one sleeve. Don’t put two or more cards inside one sleeve. If you do this, you’ll end up with a lot of mini scratches on your cards. Even micro scratches from dust can greatly decrease a cards value so you want to avoid this at all costs. The sleeves that we recommend are cheap enough that you should have plenty to use on each of your cards.

Keep away from moisture

Moisture is one of the main causes for Pokémon cards getting bent. This is another reason why you want your valuable cards sleeved ASAP. The longer your card is exposed to humidity or moisture, the greater chance it will start to bend.

How To Surrender In Pokémon Unite and Should You?

How To Surrender

To surrender in Pokémon Unite, you’ll need to make a poll. If the majority of your team votes to surrender, then the match will end and it will count as a loss for the surrendering team. If you’re losing and want to give up a match, here’s how to surrender in Pokémon Unite.

Step 1: Press the plus (+) button to open the match stats overlay

Step 2: Press the minus (-) button to open the settings menu

Step 3: Press the X button to start a vote to surrender. Your team can only do this 3 times per match.

Should You Surrender?

Surrendering is always better than quitting or leaving a match. This way you’re not abandoning your teammates and making it unfair and unfun for others. If you’re getting beat in a match and the majority of your team is already voting to surrender, it might be a good time to throw in the towel. Not voting ‘Yes’ on a surrender vote when the rest of your team wants to can be frustrating for other players and it’s always good to keep good sportsmanship when playing competitive games. My number one rule is to never initiate the vote. If the vote is already going because other team members want to surrender, then I’ll consider it because I don’t want to anger other players or waste people’s time. But you gain nothing from being the player that starts this vote. This mindset will lead you to giving up more often and not trying to turn the game around. No matter how far behind you are in points, you can always come back and clutch a win. Even if you don’t win in the end, you’ll be able to analyze why you lost that game and try to become better in future matches. Initiating a surrender or quitting a match early is a way of denying yourself the opportunity to learn and grow.

The Alternative

Instead of surrendering a match, keep playing and try your best. It sounds cheesy but it’s always possible to win no matter how far behind you are. The best way to turn around a match in your favor is the legendary boss Pokémon, Zapdos. Near the end of a Pokémon Unite match Zapdos will appear in the middle of the arena. Defeating Zapdos will give you and your team a chance to win the game. This gives you several points and leaves your opponents score zones wide open. Even if you’re hundreds of points behind the opponent, when you take down Zapdos you’ll have an opportunity to turn the entire match around. There have been many matches that I’m so close to losing and at the last minute we win due to taking down Zapdos and scoring hundreds of points on our opponents. It’s always better to try and fail than to not try at all.

How To Claim Pre Register Rewards For Pokemon Unite Mobile

With the newly released Pokemon Unite coming to mobile platforms like IOS and Android, the game is offering bonus rewards to players that pre-register to play on mobile devices.

The Bonus Rewards

The rewards available depend on how many people pre-register to play on mobile. The more people that register, the more rewards players gave access to. Make sure to share this information with other players and friends so we can all unlock these cool bonuses.

1,000,000 pre-registers unlocks the first reward, which is 1,000 Aoes Tickets for every participant.

2,500,000 pre-registerations for Pokemon Unite mobile and all participants will receive the Pikachu Unite license or Aoes Coins if you already own it.

5,000,000 pre-registerations for Pokemon Unite mobile and all participants will receive a festival style holowear for Pikachu.

How To Claim The Bonus

To get these rewards you’ll need to pre-register by following the instructions below. Once you’ve done that, wait for Pokémon Unite to release on your mobile platform and download it. Pokémon Unite mobile edition releases on September 22nd, 2021. Once it’s released, you’ll be able to login to Pokémon Unite on your mobile device, connect your Nintendo Account and complete the login event to claim your rewards. To do this, in the main menu, tap on your avatar at the top left of your screen. Tap “Events”. Then you’ll go to “Preregistration Campaign”. There you’ll be able to claim all of your preregister rewards. You have until October 31st, 2021 to claim this bonus.

How To Pre Register on Android

On both devices the pre registration process is pretty simple. For Android, just go to the Pokemon Unite page on the Google Play Store. Here you’ll see a Pre Register button.

How To Pre Register on iPhone (IOS)

On iPhone or other IOS devices, go to the Pokemon Unite page on the App Store. Here you’ll be able to pre register by tapping the Pre Order button. Even though it says order, it’s actually free.

Before you claim the bonus, you may be wondering how to sync your saved data between your Switch and mobile accounts. Here’s a step by step guide for linking your Pokémon Unite account from Switch to mobile.

How To Rank Up Fast and Reach Master Rank in Pokemon Unite

Pokémon Unite is more than a month old now and more players are moving to Ranked matches instead of playing casually. Everyone starts out as a beginner rank and they’re working their way through Great and _. The real question is how do you get Master Rank in Pokémon Unite? This requires a lot of effort. The bottom line is ranking up in any competitive game takes a lot of skill and a little bit of luck. But at the end of the day, it’s possible for everyone to reach Master Rank. Here’s some tips on getting there.

Keep Playing

Since we’ve established to level and rank up in Pokémon Unite, you need to have some skill, this means you’ll need to get good. To get better at any game, you’ll need practice. This means play as much as you can. The more matches you play, the more you’ll understand how to play. This also means when you’re losing a game, don’t quit. Not only does abandoning a match make you lose fair play points, it also doesn’t give you room to grow. If your entire team wants to surrender then you can vote yes, but don’t be the first one to give up. When you lose you’ll gain information on why you’re losing, and be able to learn from that experience. If you notice you’re being ganked by a specific type of Pokémon, figure out what a good counter to that would be.

Teamwork

This is huge. Even when you’re solo queuing in ranked matches there needs to be teamwork. Help your teammates as much as you can. If your team is getting ambushed, instead of fighting wild Pokémon go help your team out. If your teammate has 50 points and they’re trying to score, protect them while they do so. These small things can make a huge difference, especially in ranked matches. It’s recommended that you play with friends that you’re able to communicate with so you can make call-outs and help each other out. If you run into an enemy team with good communication, you could be in trouble, so just make sure there is some communication between teammates.

Setup

Setup
Again, cooperation is key. At the start of each match each player picks a Pokémon to play. Believe it or not this small decision can determine the outcome of a game. Not just the Pokémon you pick, but the composition of your entire team. For example, if you have a team of 5 speedsters against a team that has attackers, defenders, and supporters, you’ll find it hard to get ahead. A speedster is mainly supposed to focus on jungling and scoring. Every class has its own purpose and its important to know what that is before you start. Know where each player is going before the game starts is a huge advantage. You can do this by _. Usually you’ll want to follow a 2-1-2 setup as it seems the most effective in Pokémon Unite. This means you should have two players in the top lane, one player in the middle that can focus on defeating wild Pokémon, and two players on the bottom lane. At the start of a match this is a strong setup. Keep in mind that players may rotate or change this 2-1-2 setup later in the match. If the bottom lane needs more support, its okay for a 1-1-3 or 2-0-3 configuration.