Here at Card Gamer, we’re huge fans of alternative treatments of cards – particularly when it comes to one of our favourite games of all time: the Pokemon Trading Card Game!
You may well have seen gold Pokemon cards for sale online or even in some real world, bricks and mortar stores.
What’s the deal with them though? Where do they come from and are they – for want of a better world – real?
Let’s find out, as we find out: are Gold Pokemon cards real?
What Are Gold Pokemon Cards?
We’ve already covered the official metal Pokemon cards in a different article, as well as a small look at Gold Pokemon cards – but to summarise: Burger King and Nintendo teamed up in 1999 to produce six official, gold-plated Pokemon cards.
Though these weren’t playable in the trading card game, they were hugely popular and are still valuable even today – the Pikachu Burger King card is pictured above.
Just four official metal Pokemon cards have been released in recent years – only two of these (Charizard and Pikachu) are gold; pictured above is the official gold Pikachu, from the Celebrations Ultimate Premium Collection.
One more official metal card is currently planned – Mew, which will appear in the Pokemon 151 set, making it one of the most valuable Pokemon 151 cards in the set.
Where Do Gold Pokemon Cards Come From?
So you may be wondering where all of these Gold Pokemon cards come from? Are they in Pokemon God packs, or are they fake?
They’ve become very prevalent on sites such as eBay, Etsy and AliExpress – which answers the question: for the most part, these are produced in and sold from China.
There’s a vast amount of these cards available – naturally, they go way beyond the four official metal cards that were released, covering pretty much any Pokemon that you can think of.
For example, we have a Mewtwo and Mew GX Tag Team card, which is pictured.
Are Gold Pokemon Cards Real?
You’ll likely notice that we’ve answered this question above; as these Gold Pokemon cards are manufactured in China and offered on all sorts of third party websites – as well as some smaller, independent, physical retail stores – then no, they’re not strictly ‘real’, as in officially produced and licensed cards.
If that doesn’t bother you – and you’re looking for a fancy reproduction of your favourite card or Pokemon – then by all means check these cards out.
Despite their unofficial, unsanctioned and slightly illicit origins, we’ve found that these gold cards are pretty well made and very robust.
You won’t be able to use them in your games of the Pokemon TCG – their unique card back is one thing (we took a look at every Pokemon card back design here), but even if you sleeve them, you’ll still be able to tell which of your cards is gold due to its weight.
However, they certainly make for pretty nice display pieces!
