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After mentioning to a friend that I still have my Pokémon cards, I was challenged to a battle. (Yes, by a college student.) However, there is one major problem: I have never known how to actually play the game. Actually, I didn’t even know there was a game, or a TV show for that matter, until after I bought the cards—in 1998. I didn’t even buy the cards. My mom did. As a first grader, I was on a very tight budget.
What made them so appealing?
A lot of kids I knew had the cards just to look at them and trade them for better-looking ones. They were purely superficial and served their purpose that way. Rhetorically looking at them, the picture is the main thing we see when we look at the cards. It is the biggest, and is centered, taking up about half of the page. Young kids are drawn to the mystical, imaginary creatures they see and think they look cool. When they are holographic cards with sparkly backgrounds, there is an extra desirability because the cards look unique, and for people playing the game, they usually possess more power. The visual appeals are an appeal to pathos on a first impression.
Another part of the Pokémon fad I would like to think about is the phrase, “Gotta Catch ‘Em All: Pokémon!” Though this serves the purpose of helping to establish the brand name, building ethos, it also works as a subtle way to command collectors of all levels to get out there and buy more cards (or, at least, stay engaged with the product through trading). Having some of the Pokémon is okay, but in the end, you’ve gotta catch ‘em all.
As evidenced by my challenger, the fad has not ended. There are still people out there trying to catch ‘em all. But, there are still remnants of Pokémon’s glory days, like myself, who only bought the cards as first-graders trying to be cool.
Man do I remember Pokémon. I spent so much of my allowance on those cards, and I still have them somewhere at home in a forgotten box in the attic I'm sure. I remember my favorite card was the holographic Charizard I got out of a regular pack (instead of buying a pack that contained a higher chance of getting these rarer cards). I remember when I lost that card, I was so devastated. Pokémon definitely did an incredible job rhetorically with making kids feel so very attached to their cards.
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