Pokémon TGC Classic pre-order gets shadow-dropped—and it’s already sold out

A year after it was first revealed at Worlds 2022, the Pokémon TCG Classic set just went live for pre-order today for mere moments on the Pokémon Center Online stores for a costly $400. But it seems like a lot of people have already missed out on it.

The Pokemon TCG Classic set is a premium collection that is filled with old cards at a massive price tag of $399. It comes with special decks featuring a variety of new and classic cards, including some cards that were never released outside of Japan that are being printed in English for the first time.

The collection also features a high-quality gameboard, a briefcase to hold everything, and a bunch of other trinkets to set it apart as a must-have for Pokémon card collectors. But at time of writing, it’s sold out already.

The item was put onto the online store with no warning as a pre-order ahead of a Nov. 17 release and is currently available exclusively for the online Pokemon Center stores in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. Even with the item having a purchase limit of one per person, some lucky buyers appear to have secured the item in mere moments with the premium collection currently unavailable.

Even in some cases where the item shows it can be pre-ordered, those who click on it are usually met with an error message that the item may be sold out or is no longer available. That’s less than ideal for those who got their hopes up that they may have been able to snag one.

It’s not all doom and gloom, though, for those who missed out on the premium collection today as The Pokémon Company has plans to release the unique cards made for this set separately sometime in February 2024. But the details surrounding what those cards are and how they will be released are still up in the air.

Most competitive players likely won’t mind missing this set, however. The cards are not tournament legal and the collection was made purely to be a high-priced, sought-after collectible. It’s only a matter of time now until resellers likely look to make huge profits on the item.