Pokémon · 1999–2003

The Wizardsyears

Base Set, Jungle, Fossil, Team Rocket, the Gyms, the Neos — the cards from when Wizards of the Coast printed Pokémon. Holos photographed front and back.

[n] in stockReal photos on $40+ · one of each

Shop the Wizards years Priciest first

Why it matters

The cards you remember, the cards that held their value

Wizards of the Coast brought the Pokémon Trading Card Game to North America in January 1999, three years after Japan, and for four years every English set came out of the same Renton office that made Magic. Base Set's 102 cards sold on a scale no card game had seen — the holographic Charizard became the most recognised trading card of its generation — and the sets that followed are a tidy, finite list: Jungle and Fossil in 1999, Base Set 2, Team Rocket and the two Gym sets in 2000, the four Neo sets through 2002, Legendary Collection, then the e-Reader sets before the licence moved to Nintendo in 2003.

Finite is the point. Every one of these cards has been out of print for more than twenty years, the holos were pulled and played by children, and most of what survives is creased. A clean holo from this era — a sharp-cornered Fossil Gengar, a Base Set Blastoise with its blue still bright, a Neo Destiny Dark Espeon — is the collector's version of a sealed NES game: the thing itself, from the year it mattered. We photograph every one of these front and back, and the condition line on the listing is ours, not a stock scan's.

How we grade cards

Fast facts

First English setBase Set, January 9, 1999 — 102 cards
The printingsShadowless (no drop shadow on the art box) came first, then Unlimited; 1st Edition carries the stamp
The runBase · Jungle · Fossil · Base Set 2 · Team Rocket · Gym Heroes · Gym Challenge · Neo Genesis · Discovery · Revelation · Destiny · Legendary Collection · Expedition · Aquapolis · Skyridge
What "holo" means hereThe 16 holographic rares per early set — the cards collectors chase
End of the era2003: the licence moved to Nintendo; Skyridge was the last Wizards set
Did you know?Base Set went through four English printings. "Shadowless" — no drop shadow on the right edge of the art box, thinner HP text — is the earliest and scarcest of the Unlimited-stamp family; collectors check the shadow before anything else.
Did you know?Jungle's first print run shipped some holos with the Jungle set symbol missing — the "no symbol" error cards are a chase of their own.
Did you know?Fossil (October 1999) is the only early set whose holos are led by a ghost: Gengar #5, the card that opens most Fossil binders.
Did you know?Team Rocket (April 2000) introduced the "Dark" Pokémon and the first secret rare in English — Dark Raichu, #83 in an 82-card set.
Did you know?Gym Heroes and Gym Challenge are the only sets where the cards belong to a trainer: Lt. Surge's Raichu, Blaine's Charizard, Giovanni's Gyarados. The Challenge set is the harder of the two to complete.
Did you know?Neo Revelation (2001) slipped the first two "Shining" Pokémon — Gyarados and Magikarp — in past the set total, and Neo Destiny (February 2002) added eight more: the first alternate-colour Pokémon on English cards.
Did you know?Legendary Collection (May 2002) is a reprint set — Base, Jungle, Fossil and Team Rocket cards — and the first English set with reverse-holo versions of every card, which is why the Legendary Collection Mewtwo and Charizard trade far above the originals they reprint.
Did you know?The English Base Set's Charizard holo is the card that made the hobby; a 1st Edition Shadowless one in top grade is among the most expensive trading cards ever sold.

THE SHELVES HOLOS WORTH REMEMBERING

Hand-picked shelves, filled live from what is in stock right now. Photographed front and back. Every card appears once — priciest first, then set by set.