Often labeled as one of Pokemon’s worst sets in history, XY Steam Siege pushes toward $300 per booster box.
Here are some recent sales data from TCGPlayer. eBay is similar at $299 per box for buy-it-now listings.
Thoughts on this development? Is this set unfairly treated by the community? Looking forward to your thoughts.
It’s objectively a bad set. The only thing going for it is that it’s “old”. I’d rather have any sword and shield set.
Here are the “chase cards”
Why do you consider this set to be objectively bad? I’m genuinely curious and have no strong opinion one way or another. Is it the financial value of the cards? Playability? Artworks?
Playability was decent but that has no influence of my opinion of the set now since it’s way out of rotation.
It’s not even the finances of the set that are bad. The “chase” cards are just not good. Full arts of non-popular mons.
I think most would agree with your perspective!
Steam siege is not crimson invasion or emerging powers bad, but its definitely mid. Its 6 years old now, and there are newer boxes that sell higher. The pokemon selection isn’t the best, but I do like the professor sycamore, and the Chandelure is probably my favorite.
Looking at the price for the “top” singles in the set, the most expenisve is still only $25 (Gardevoir ex). So looking at that the single vs sealed ratio for a set like this doesn’t make sense to me.
I still remember everyone trying to unload these boxes for pennies a few years back. Guess it shows how much demand there is for sealed (regardless of the actual product)!
That’s a really good point @handschoen. Demand for sealed product is to the moon regardless of the pulls available in the product.
And to think there are so many Japanese sets who have the oposite “problem”.
Don’t tell anyone though, it’s a little secret…
I’m not a fan of Gardevoir by any means but I really do like the look of the secret rare/ M Gardevoir here. Those, plus the Steelix and Sycamore are on my eventual wants list.
The price of the box itself seems high compared to the potential value inside, but sealed seems to always do its own thing. Even at $300 I’m sure there are plenty of people who would buy in just to own a sealed box of the meme for fun.
This statement will never be false. 
Couldn’t this be a good indicator that there are still a lot of the new Pokemon “investment” folks around ?
So regarding the current market thread that was opened recently this could be an indicator that we still didn’t see the bottom ( at least for sealed product).
I’m not sure that it is possible to know what proportion of the increased demand for sealed product is driven by collector interest vs. expected resale value.
Regardless of the intent (collector or “investor”), buying behavior may look similar across both groups (e.g., low prices and “hype” appeal to both collectors and investors). Although it is tough to make generalizations about “why” the market moves, we do know “how” it moves thanks to sales data.
This proves even meme sets go to the moon 
This is the same price as some of my pop 100 or less E series holos in PSA 9…
Given the age of the set, $300 doesn’t shock me. Time has a funny way of morphing prices of sealed product.
Take a look at emerging powers. That’s the real skink of a set and hard to see that price 
It may be a bad set, but the general price movements are roughly predictable for pre-2020 boxes. EP price curve data pre-2020 was a great baseline for bad sets. My models from a couple years ago had Steam Siege hitting $300ish sometime in 2021/2022. $360ish 2023/2024 (assumptions and variances on these predictions of course).
Age and scarcity can move the price of even the worst sets in a predictable way.
i must acknowledge that steam siege has an ooyama card
Yep.
Let’s all keep in mind that Base Set 2 was a laughingstock and WOTC’s red-headed stepchild for years. Look at the prices of sealed Base Set 2 sealed product now.
I’m not saying Steam Siege will follow the same upward trajectory (it won’t), but I am saying that age definitely matters. Base Set 2 was looked at as a terrible set by most for a decade-and-a-half. Now it’s actually desirable for the mere fact that it’s vintage. The holo pattern being different (and admittedly really cool) doesn’t change the fact that it’s just a lame reprint set at its core.
