Pokémon TCG Pocket Has Outsold Pokémon GO at Launch. Is It Better?

The answer may surprise you. Tune in at 11 to find out more.

Oh, so you can have a Pikachu EX card, but not a Rattata EX card? I see how it is.

To help deal with the soul-crushing banality and brokenness of Pokémon GO, I’ve started playing other games alongside PoGO as primary diversions from its decline. In terms of sheer hours clocked, my top alternative over the past year-and-change has been Hades, a game I highly recommend at least as far as the main story is concerned (the postgame Pact of Punishment, aptly named, began to feel tedious and unrewarding as I got into the upper ranks). The hack-and-slash gameplay is satisfyingly tight, and it’s accompanied by a story that’s parts dramatic, funny, and sexy, a mix befitting of the cornucopia of characters in the Greek pantheon. Most recently, my go-to has been Balatro, which, like Hades, has been engrossing despite its tendency to rip my heart out and stomp on it. For the record, I deserve no sympathy for this. I willingly signed up for it in the name of “fun” when I visited the Google Play Store.

Sandwiched in between Hades and Balatro, meanwhile, is the non-roguelike but very Pokémon-centered Pokémon TCG Pocket, The Pokémon Company’s long-awaited mobile adaptation of the physical trading card game that saw its inception in the mid-1990s. I downloaded it mostly as a safety valve away from PoGO, but also partly because I was curious how the game worked as someone who had never considered TCG as a hobby. Since picking up Balatro, TCG Pocket has taken a bit of a backseat, but I still access the app daily and could see myself become more active again once I’ve had my fill of the former. Which, for anyone who knows Balatro, could very well be coming soon. Right now, I’m trying to beat Black Stake with the Black Deck, and I encourage you, dear Reader, to pray for my sanity.

As someone who has his finger on the pulse of mobile gaming (read: Google’s algorithm thrust this story into my feed), I was quite intrigued to learn that, per Pocketgamer.biz, the world’s number one consumer site for mobile and handheld games, Pokémon TCG Pocket has usurped Pokémon GO upon launch as it closes in on one billion dollars in revenue after a mere six months. Its $915.3 million made over that span easily eclipses PoGO’s $800.7 million. GGs—get rekt, Pokémon GO.

Having played both games and having written before about the PoGO-TCGP comparison, I thought I would explore my feelings about this article and the two titles in a bit more depth. I’m especially motivated to do so given that, with all due respect to Aaron Astle, his report linked above is chock full of detailed information about player spending and fairly light on the analysis of what this all means and whether this consumer trend is sustainable.

Before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s get to the meat and potatoes, shall we say, of Astle’s piece. Astle gives a brief history of TCG Pocket, identifying 90s-era nostalgia and the social component of the game (“OMG—look at this sick pull!”) as key factors in its ascendancy. He highlights as well how, in terms of sales, other Pokémon mobile games have paled in comparison, before ultimately providing a compendium of the sets and expansions released in the game thus far as well as an effective advertisement for TCGP’s half-year in-game promotion. Is this journalism or marketing? The answer is yes.

Now that I’ve nicely summarized the contents of Astle’s article—you’re welcome, Mom—let’s take a deeper dive and ask some questions about the intersection between Pokémon GO and Pokémon TCG Pocket.

What has made TCGP such an apparent smash hit?

Astle cites nostalgia and word-of-mouth enthusiasm as critical elements of TCG Pocket’s success, but I’d argue that, without the right aesthetic appeal and user experience, it wouldn’t continue to be the hotcakes seller it has been since launch. Bear in mind that I come to the game as a novice, but it seems to me that TCGP is a faithful adaptation of its IRL inspiration. Something may be lost by not being able to feel the weight of the cards or sit directly across from your opponent, but you still get to play the game as it was designed and without the inconveniences of having to manually shuffle and deal cards or apply Energy to your Pokémon on the board. You also get to try to complete collection challenges and organize your pulls from packs within virtual binders.

The game, by the way, looks clean AF. A lot of it is owed to the designs created by the illustrators of the card art themselves, but the animations are fun, especially as concerns the rarer “immersive” cards that guide you through a sweeping tour of the scenes depicted within each card’s rendering. This polish and attention to detail help distinguish Pokémon TCG Pocket as a well-orchestrated product, and I think The Pokémon Company’s direct involvement as a publisher rather than relying on Niantic and now Scopely to develop and publish the game has made a difference.

So, is Pokémon TCG Pocket better than Pokémon GO?

Just because something sells doesn’t mean it’s necessarily good. For instance, for all the discussions about female sexuality it generated and bringing kink into the limelight, Fifty Shades of Grey is and shouldn’t be considered a great work of fiction in terms of the writing skill of its author. That said, if Google Play Store reviews are any indication, Pokémon TCG Pocket is the superior crowd-pleaser, earning an average 4.5 rating to Pokémon GO’s comparatively minuscule 3.9. An obvious caveat is, seeing as TCGP launched less than a year ago while PoGO is closing in on nine years of existence, there are many more reviews of the latter, such that the sampling size, if you will, simply isn’t comparable.

Another consideration, even if I agree with many of the criticisms levied against the game and Niantic within these negative reviews, is that sometimes users will weaponize low ratings against content they don’t like on principle and despite a lack of authentic engagement with the matter at hand. A year ago, when Pokémon GO overhauled its avatar feature in seemingly rushed, ill-advised fashion, there were endless critiques from the “go woke, go broke” crowd suggesting Niantic had “caught the DEI bug” in trotting out lifeless character models with options for different body types and offering unisex clothing options. That fake outrage likely spilled over into the Google Play evaluations, intermingling with the genuine discontent from actual players who disdained the update not because of the attention to diversity, equity, and inclusion, but rather that these new models were, well, ugly. Personally, while not a dealbreaker for me, from an execution standpoint, the change certainly didn’t further enamor me to PoGO—I’ll tell you that much.

Ultimately, though, not only is beauty in the eye of beholder and not only are all appraisals of these games subjective, but the comparison between Pokémon TCG Pocket and Pokémon GO is a bit of an apples-to-oranges one, making any relative value judgments problematic. You were hoping that this post would definitively declare which app is superior? Get clickbaited, son! TCGP evokes a tabletop setting. PoGO encourages open world exploration. TCG Pocket is turn-based and draws out the experience with convoluted animation sequences. Pokémon GO emphasizes real-time action, especially in PvP and PvE battles. Whether you like one more than the other probably depends on what type of game you generally like more.

The only thing I can say with utmost certainty at this point is that Pokémon TCG Pocket is better in terms of technical performance. But you already guessed that, didn’t you?

Will TCG Pocket’s relevance last?

This is, ahem, the billion-dollar question. Though it’s not hard to imagine and as Astle’s piece details, spikes in TCGP player spending have coincided with the release of new card sets and expansions. Duly learning my lesson from PoGO, I haven’t spent a dime on Pokémon TCG Pocket, eschewing the extra pack openings, reduced time between pack openings, and other bonuses in favor of simply waiting longer. Maybe the scenario would be different if I were more heavily invested in the product. Maybe then I would be inclined to spring for some Poké Gold. Even with the acceleration of Pokémon GO’s monetization over the years, however, as a casual enjoyer of TCG Pocket, I don’t know that I’d be inclined to fork over my cash anyway.

As of now, there’s no sign that the influx of new cards is set to slow anytime soon, if ever. Still, I get the sense that without additional modes of play or a more attractive reward track, it’ll be hard to maintain this fervor over the long haul. Pack opening is a momentary diversion, and Solo battles against CPU opponents unsurprisingly can become stale after a while. As for Versus battles, I feel like I get enough PvP gameplay from GO Battle League, so I haven’t done any. Not a single one. I doubt that I’m in the minority in this regard, either.

To put it another way, Pokémon TCG Pocket succeeds in what it aims to do with recreating the classic trading card game experience, but I don’t know that that’s enough. As an alternative to Pokémon GO for fans of all things Pokémon, I hope it does thrive. That said, its staying power is far from a guarantee.