Pokémon TCG Pocket is arising on its second anniversary in a few months, however developer DeNA’s newest monetary filings present a sport in quick decline. The re-imagined model of the tabletop card sport was instantly stunningly common, not least due to the way in which the cell sport so satisfyingly simulated tearing open packs of playing cards to construct collections and create battle decks. However with the corporate’s gross sales down a 3rd, and participant numbers for Pocket down over 41 % in comparison with this time final yr, the shiny is definitely carrying off. And as a each day participant since launch, I’m not in in the least stunned. Clearly when Pocket first launched it gathered an enormous quantity of consideration. Pokémon is the most important leisure IP on the earth by a big margin, and the cell sport launched proper as curiosity within the bodily card sport was rising unsustainably giant. Right here was a method to rip open digital packs, battle buddies, and really feel the fixed trickle of rewards and extras {that a} satisfying gatcha sport gives. Besides, on the identical time, it launched with an enormous array of very apparent shortcomings and irritations, lots of which nonetheless haven’t been addressed, and it was carrying the stink of a cheerful, cartoonish sport that was overtly selling playing to kids. However, it had these animated playing cards! It’s laborious to over-emphasize the importance of those collectibles (known as “Immersive Playing cards”), playing cards that, when collected, would spring to life with an animation revealing total worlds of Pokémon past the cardboard’s preliminary artwork. They had been, and nonetheless are, utterly magical, and stay my main focus for nonetheless taking part in the sport day-after-day: I’ve misplaced curiosity in on-line battles, in ending units, even in my digital binders for Yuka Morii and Asako Ito playing cards; I simply wish to gather the animated playing cards from each single set. And on this single-minded focus, the problems with Pocket are all of the extra starkly revealed. Standard Pokémon information account @UniteVids on X posted the information about DeNA’s Q1 financials, and the replies say all of it.
DeNA introduced that its Q1 monetary outcomes for the sport enterprise skilled a big lower in each income and revenue The corporate said that the primary issue behind these fluctuations is Pokémon TCG Pocket.Whereas the common Month-to-month Energetic Customers throughout the identical interval… pic.twitter.com/3vMC3soPAW — MAGIKARP🦈💦 (@UniteVids) August 6, 2026 “Make the pull charges higher,” says one. “Make the pull charges higher,” says the subsequent. A 3rd chimes in, “higher pull charges.” And on and on and on. And god, sure, this. Pokémon TCG pull charges in the actual world are a contentious subject, however have pretty persistently caught to one-in-four packs providing an ultra-rare or higher card for the previous couple of years. Pocket, in the meantime, makes this appear to be Santa-esque generosity. You possibly can open ten packs directly and never see a single full-art, nor even a primary ex. The pull charges are disgraceful, and over the past two years have solely gotten worse. In my pursuit of these Immersive playing cards, I’ve realized the diploma to which the sport mindlessly restricts entry to far much less fascinating alt-arts, whereas drowning you in the identical few bulk playing cards, fully by design. I’ve units for which I’ve actually collected 40 or extra of the identical bulk playing cards, and perhaps two of different equally unimportant regulars. And no Immersive card in any respect. However that’s hardly the one incessantly repeated criticism. The opposite remark that comes up in nearly all discussions is an enchantment for “common pack factors.” Pack factors are a approach the sport—in concept a minimum of—helps you to “purchase” playing cards which are lacking from a specific set. Open a pack (and the sport helps you to open two a day at no cost) and also you’ll earn 5 pack factors for that particular set, with common bulk costing 35 factors and the rarest gold playing cards an idiotic 2,500. (A mere 500 packs’ price of factors.) Immersive playing cards, in the meantime, are 1,500 (300 packs’ price), so this methodology is totally out of attain as a method to bypass the sport’s “luck” and snag the playing cards you need, except you’re keen to spend an idiotic amount of cash. If pack factors weren’t set-specific, however fairly common, I’d have sufficient to purchase a few of the 5 Immersive playing cards I’ve but to drag. It’s very comprehensible that folks need this!
So I hear your income is down….. Not stunned….. How about… Develop buying and selling to three stars and crowns, common pack factors, lower shine mud prices to commerce and have duplicate playing cards redeemable for pack factors. Most of all, enhance pull charges! — Rockford (@JF_0357) August 6, 2026 However the rot goes a lot deeper. Of the ten issues that I stated desperately wanted addressing in November 2024, a grand complete of 10 of them stay unchanged nearly two years later. On the finish of July, Pocket put out a colossal 2.7GB replace that it reported would make important adjustments to the model of Unity it was working and add large enhancements, and the consequence was…it’s made the mission display screen a bit extra complicated. I actually can’t see the rest. Buying and selling, a fairly core aspect of a “Buying and selling Card Sport,” arrived a yr late to the app, was atrocious on arrival, and has remained so since. You continue to can’t commerce the playing cards anybody really needs to commerce (together with Immersives, and expensive god I’ve duplicates), for causes which are driving the sport’s remaining viewers ever extra loopy. Then there are the occasions. They’re stale, dreary lists of similar challenges (Marvel Choose thrice, battle 5 instances, open 4 packs…) with incessantly woeful rewards, providing no fascinating problem or motivation. Battle leagues are bland, and require a relentless chasing of the meta that I simply can’t discover the power for (not least when important playing cards are far more durable to drag), and my each day exercise is lowered now to easily opening the free packs and cheesing the missions that offer you Hourglasses to open new packs. (In the event you’re not utilizing the “Thanks” trick to blast by battle-based missions, that you must be.) It’s change into a bizarre, each day obligation earlier than I get to my NYT puzzles. opened 50+ packs n not even a single ex or mega ex card confirmed up pic.twitter.com/uUzuJvymBR — Agan (@NahomAgan) August 1, 2026 And expensive god, the Premium Move. I’m embarrassed to say I’ve let mine roll because the sport launched, and I refuse to let my thoughts do the maths on what that’s value me for what breaks right down to an additional free pack a day, however it’s presumably the worst battle go in all of gaming. Since launch, gamers have been begging for it to supply one thing greater than a handful of ornamental gadgets and the barest variety of Hourglasses possible, but it surely stays as desultory and anticlimactic at the moment because it was then. There’s not a single process on the month-to-month record that you just gained’t full accidentally in the event you open the app each different day, and given the cash it fees, it couldn’t be much less beneficiant. Which is senseless in any respect, till you do not forget that idiots like me preserve paying it anyway.
DeNA isn’t precisely strapped for money, nonetheless. It reviews that it made $46 million in working revenue in its first quarter 2026, from income of $235 million. Nevertheless, that income is down firm broad 11 % year-on-year, and the working revenue has dropped a whopping 46 %. In response, the corporate says it is going to be “executing multi-layered initiatives, together with occasions and promotions to extend login frequency, retention charges and rising actions.” It’s price noting that DeNA, an organization that additionally has automotive and medical companies, is fairly heftily buoyed by Pocket. Maybe this massive drop (which DeNA advised buyers was inside its expectations) can be sufficient to shake the corporate out of its hubris and make it begin listening to Pocket gamers. However truthfully, after two years of the sport sitting stagnant whereas desperately wanted options are by no means thought-about, I’m uncertain. I believe as an alternative it’ll be simply allowed to slip into oblivion, like so many gacha apps earlier than it, and given the sport’s potential (and people animated playing cards!), that’s an actual disgrace.
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