Pokémon Card GB (Pokémon Trading Card Game Japanese Original) - Authentic Nintendo Game Boy Color Cartridge, Tested

The Pokémon TCG game, in the original

This is Pokémon Card GB, December 1998, the game the West got in 2000 as Pokémon Trading Card Game. Travel between clubs, beat the eight Club Masters, then the four Grand Masters, building decks from the first three sets of the real card game. Tsunekazu Ishihara, who designed the card game itself, produced it, and it came out in Japan a month before the tabletop cards launched in English.

The infrared is in the cartridge

This game does not use the Game Boy Color’s infrared port. The infrared transceiver is in the cartridge, and Nintendo Japan’s own page spells out what that means: card trading and Card Pop! work on an original Game Boy, Pocket and Light too. Card Pop! works like this: hold two Game Boys (each with this cart) together and both players get a new random card, but the same pair cannot repeat it right away, so you go find new people. The Gift Center lets you make uneven trades.

It also prints cards on the Game Boy Printer, gets a border on a Super Game Boy, and battles over a link cable. The other cart in the shop with infrared built in is Daikaijuu Monogatari.

About the Japanese

Card text, attack effects, rules and story are Japanese. If you know the cards by their art, or read Japanese, this is the original; the English version is there if you want to read along. It is a black dual-mode cart, so it plays everywhere. The battery save is tested and replaced if it reads under 3.0 V. The Japanese retail box came with a real promo card; a loose cart is just the cart.

Card-game fans should also see Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters II.