Vintage Japanese Card Question

General
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Hi Experts, I picked a bunch of these 3-4 years ago, and they are really difficult to find on eBay any more. Do any of you know the origin story for these cards? Thanks

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Something may be wrong with the embedding as I can’t see the images you wanted to provide.

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You have two src attributes in your image-link, but you also need the imgur-link ending with the file extension (so i.imgur.com/7fofOb0.jpeg in your case):

[img src="https://i.imgur.com/7fofOb0.jpeg" alt="" style="max-width:100%;"]

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They’re Top Seika cards. Topsun changed their company brand to Top after a few sets. They’ve made a lot of different non-TCG card sets over the years, but the ones you have right there are Top Seika cards. Some more info can be found in this thread by @pichufan : www.elitefourum.com/t/wip-japanese-top-seika-pokemon-gum-card-checklist-2002/21729/1

I personally own a few myself in my Seviper collection:

https://i.postimg.cc/zzNpzXwg/DSC01897.jpg(image larger than 4 MB)
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Greetz,
Quuador

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Huge thanks Quuador! I suspected you would know, if anyone. I collected 124 unique cards, many with duplicates, from this set. Really appreciate you shedding light on this.

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@dragonroll this is my favourite non-TCG set. The list @quuador shared is not something I actively maintain any more - there are a few missing cards on there which I am now aware of, but I haven’t updated it in a long time. A slightly more up-to-date version is available on a small GitHub repository I maintain at github.com/PokeTCG/research/blob/master/GumCards_GBA.md - this includes images of the cards as well and lists both Pokémon on the cards rather than just the primary one.

To quote the opening of the GitHub document:

After starting to collect these back in late 2017, I finally added the 201 alternative artwork Jirachi vs. Pichu card to my non-TCG Pichu collection back in September last year:

https://instagram.com/p/CEr2aRKFcT\_

@joponnes sent me pictures of their 106 and 107 cards a while back and I still haven’t updated the list (sorry about that - I’ll hopefully remember to do that some time this week). I’m sure they won’t mind me sharing here that those are Grimer vs. Kecleon and Muk vs. Kirlia:

@dragonroll I’d be very interested to know if you have any of the cards missing from that GitHub list (Ctrl+F “Information required.”) - especially if they have Pichu on. :blush:

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@pichufan,

Hi, sorry to dig up old post - but your posts are the best I have found on these Top cards and have been very helpful for my collection of ‘every different pokemon card I can find’ :blush:

Hoping you might be able to help me with a couple extras I have that I haven’t seen amongst your posts.

sorry new to forum, don’t think picture inserting is working for me…

imgur.com/a/oejCNy1

From reading your posts my understanding is these are Top-Seika cards (or Top, former Topsun):

Top left: Whimsur = 2002 GBA
Top right: Poochyena = 2004 GBA3D
2nd left: Torchic = 2006 AG
2nd right: Chatot = 2007 DP
Bottom left: bulbasaur = gold border, black back background - not seen this type in your posts? it does not mention advanced or diamond pearl or anything, I wonder if this set is actually earlier than the 2002 GBA set? After 1998 since the company is Top, and before 2002?
Bottom right: Pair card - This one is a bit different style but the words in green made me think it was Top (although Top logo is not present), so it is possibly Bandai instead?. The copyright says 2006 which is unusual for top to have dates so again maybe it is a bandai carddass card.

thanks.

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@kryptonnn I have a couple of those gold-bordered cards but I don’t know much about them. I would guess as you’ve assumed that these fall between the original TopSun VS set and the GBA set, but as for when, where or how I do not know.

The Buizel card looks like a generic ‘Zukan Card’ which was what the “Adventure Card” series turned into (www.elitefourum.com/t/japanese-adventure-cards/21934/1).

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Thanks, I have a few random ones of these adventure cards too so that helps with their Id haha. Just got to figure out this black background one!

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I did see the black background one goes as high as #251 celebi (I have #1 Bulbasaur). Celebi would put it at late 1999 for Japanese or 2000 for English at earliest. Although these cards may be released in batches over years like you said for the GBA. So it could still be 98 up to 02…

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You are correct that it does go as high as 251. The Johto Pokédex has all Pokémon from 152 - 251. Here’s a page from my binder to show you.

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The Kanto Pokédex is a bit different. I still don’t have all of them, but from what I have noticed, it’s not all the Pokémon from 1-151 but just part of the Pokédex. Another thing about the Kanto set is that there are two back variants. The first one, the green back, was released with the other Topsun Vs set while the second variant is the black variant…but I am not sure if all the Kanto Pokémon have two backs. Johto definitely only has the black back. Here’s a picture of Porygon, which does have a green back and black back.

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The Kanto set is still a bit of a mystery to me, but as I find more info I’ll let you know.

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[quote author="@thedude1990" Here’s a picture of Porygon, which does have a green back and black back.

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The Kanto set is still a bit of a mystery to me, but as I find more info I’ll let you know. [/quote]

Hey thanks. Can i clarify something, is the front of both porygon cards the same? I do also have the green back style and did notice they are the first ‘attack’ style top/topsun card but I assumed they were a bit earlier. Interesting if they are the same front and the back style changed.