Mirroring @shizzlemetimbers’ sentiments. The Hiroshima XY-P promo was one of the most hyped up cards for me. I still have a few extras that I will one day grade in hopes of getting a black label (now considering CGC too). So we’ll see.
But most recently, the discord already knows my love of the Psychic Beans card. So much so, that I purchased a Japanese Explosive Walker box just to see if I could pull the Japanese version of Suspicious Food Tin and I did!
It must’ve been around 1999 when my dad managed to acquire some Japanese cards for me before their corresponding sets were released in America. These three cards still stand out in mind 20+ years later. I remember being in awe at how different the art looked compared to the other cards I owned; it was the Team Rocket set where I feel like when the artists really started getting more experimental. The new art, combined with the foreign language on the cards, made them seem like a world apart to me–like a revolutionary advancement in the Pokemon universe.
The mind of a kindergartner is quite easily impressed. Then again, these arts–especially Dark Wartortle and Lt. Surge’s Rattata–still stand out as two of my Top 10 favorite of all-time.