Announced in a new trailer for Pokemon Sword and Shield, The Pokemon Company unveiled an upcoming Gigantamax Snorlax event and offered fans a look at the middle and final evolutions for the three starter Pokemon, as well as new Gigantamax forms for Legendary Pokemon Zacian and Zamazenta. To cap it off, the trailer ended by revealing the first Pokemon Sword and Shield expansion for the Pokemon TCG which is due to hit stores in February 2020.
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Pokémon TCG: Sword & Shield
Appropriately called Pokémon Trading Card Game: Sword & Shield, the first expansion for the new series features over 50 of the new Galar Region Pokemon, and a new type of card called VMAX that showcase Dynamax or Gigantamax Pokémon. On February 7, 2020, Pokémon TCG: Sword & Shield will release with new booster packs, Elite Trainer decks, and special collections, giving fans a chance to obtain a new Pokémon VMAX card like Snorlax VMAX or Lapras VMAX.
Pokémon TCG: Sword & Shield has over 50 new Galar Region Pokemon including starter evolutions Rillaboom, Cinderace, and Inteleon, Galarian form Pokemon such as Galarian Ponyta, Legendary Pokémon Zacian and Zamazenta as Pokémon V, and many more. The Pokemon Company also outlined some of the rarest cards in the new series including 17 Pokémon V cards, 12 full-art Pokémon V cards, 4 Pokémon VMAX cards, 35 Trainer cards, and 1 Special Energy card.
One special collection has already been announced called the Meowth VMAX Special Collection. This collection is said to be one of the first opportunities for players to receive the new Pokemon V and Pokemon VMAX cards and will be available for purchase on January 3, 2020, a full month before Pokémon TCG: Sword & Shield. The Meowth VMAX collection includes 5 booster packs, 1 Meowth V card, 1 Meowth VMAX card, and 1 oversize Meowth VMAX card.
New Pokemon Descriptions
With the announcement that Gigantamax Snorlax will be making its Sword and Shield debut in early December, a few months prior to the release of the new TCG series, new details and descriptions have been given for Pokemon on showcase in the new trailer. These descriptions will apply to both the Nintendo Switch games and Pokémon TCG: Sword & Shield VMAX cards once they become available worldwide.
Gigantamax Snorlax
Zacian
Zamazenta
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Pokémon TCG is one of the biggest strategy games in the world with new expansions and Pokemon Championships tournaments coming out every year. In fact, as of March 2019, Pokemon TCG has sold over 27.2 billion cards worldwide since its inception back in 1996. None of this news comes as a surprise considering that a new card series is released for every Pokemon generation, just like the recently announced Pokemon Sword and Shield anime.
However, that doesn’t mean that Pokemon fans worldwide won’t be incredibly excited for the new Galar Region Pokemon to come to the Pokemon Trading Card Game, and for the chance to get a hold of the new VMAX cards. It was only a couple of years ago now that The Pokemon Company re-released the original Pokemon TCG cards as a callback and celebration of the brand’s success and the nostalgia people have for Pocket Monsters.
Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield are available now, exclusively on Nintendo Switch.
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