The only time I ever get to write about Pokémon TCG anymore is whenever there's an issue with scalpers, which is kind of depressing. But at this point, I'm so used to it that watching people scalp thousands of Pokémon products it's just become painfully normal to me now.
This time, the expansion in question is the upcoming Phantasmal Flames. 'But Elie,' I hear you say, 'that set isn't out yet, you can't even pre-order it, how does one manage to scalp it already?' Through the power of cheesing the system, unfortunately.
Yesterday, Phantasmal Flames products were loaded up onto the Pokémon Center, not for pre-orders, but just as a preparation for the launch. But in just under an hour, scalper groups somehow managed to trick the checkout system into selling them all the products they wanted. Leading to one group called Hidden Society purchasing around 42,000 Phantasmal Flames products.
An admin for the Hidden Society Discord group sent a member-only message out yesterday (via pokebeach) confirming that the scalpers managed to score "over 42,000 items checked out (counting multi-count orders)"
"If Pokémon Center wanted to pull stock earlier, they would have well over an hour ago," the admin continues. "Manual users were checking out as well, massive error on their end, we just happened to be more alert than most. This is our holiday season, let the criers cry and whiners whine, they can go tell their moms what happened today and break their monitors while we reap the profits."
That whole message gives off pretty rancid vibes. No one should be impressed by a bunch of adults scalping tens of thousands of products out of the hands of younger fans. If you're waiting up all night to get yourself products, then power to you; I don't care about Pokémon TCG enough to do that. But if you're doing it for the sole purpose of depleting stock and making money off of people's love for a hobby, then that sounds more like a parasite than a profession.
It's currently unclear whether these orders have been cancelled or not, as a few of the admins have since deactivated their accounts due to backlash. But another admin apparently told another member of Hidden Society to tell people the orders "got cancelled so people stop talking about it."
"There isn’t really any proof that these were cancelled unless Pokémon Center puts out a statement saying so," one fan points out on a Reddit thread. "The group very well could’ve faked the screenshots or even put out old screenshots from previous cancellations to take some heat off them for doing such a scummy thing." But at the same time, it wouldn't look good for the Pokémon Center to have been taken for a ride, depleted of almost all its stock and then do nothing to combat it.
It is, unfortunately, quite hard to counter scalpers. Even after the Pokémon Center introduced purchase limits and a virtual queue to deter scalpers earlier this year, most of the recent expansions have fallen victim to scalpers.
I'm lucky enough to have some great retailers close by that keep a keen eye on preventing scalpers from getting any stock, so this isn't something I've had to worry about too much. But it still sucks to see other fans unable to take part in a hobby because some people lack restraint or empathy.
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