West Edmonton Mall hosts Pokémon tournament

By Kevin Penny

EDMONTON — It was a self-described “nerd paradise” at West Edmonton Mall this weekend with the Alberta Pokémon Trading Card Championships taking place on Saturday.

Geoffrey Carr, tournament organizer and acting head judge for the event, has been a Pokémon enthusiast since the trading card trend took off over 13 years ago.

“I have a complete base set one from day one,” he said. “So those are collectively the oldest ones.”

The game has expanded significantly since the first 151 Pokémon appeared in 1998. Now there are around a thousand cards people can choose to create their own custom deck. The simplest way to learn how to play is to show up to a game with a 60-card deck and an open mind, Carr said.

And show up they did. A total of 81 participants showed up for the tournament, with leagues broken up by three separate age brackets: Juniors (10 and under), Seniors (11-14), and Masters league (15+). People from all ages came out to play, showing a wide diversity of players.

 

“It’s a very family-friendly game,” said Carr.

“Nintendo has made sure to keep it very kid-orientated so it’s very easy for families to get into. The card game is just another way that kids who enjoy the video game can do stuff with Pokémon.”

One of the participants was 34-year-old Eric Hulowski, a part-time gamer who plays with a league every Sunday at Happy Harbour Comics.

 

“My daughter got me into it after we got some cards for Christmas two years back,” said Hulowski.

“We were just playing at home and it was a nice little strategy game, and it just took off from there.”

Hulowski said he attended the event to show support for the small Pokémon community in Edmonton after several other players asked him to come. His wife and daughter sat in the stands cheering him on as he played several long-paced games against opponents both younger and older than him.

Both Carr and Hulowski noted there was an ever-prevalent power creep with the newer expansion decks. Carr mentioned how the stronger cards have slowly caused the game to evolve from its original format of attack costs and health to larger numbers. However, he did add that Nintendo had begun dialing back the strength of the cards with their newest expansion, Pokémon Black and White.

“There’s going to be some cards that are going to be stinkers and some cards that are really fantastic; you can’t have everything overpowered,” said Carr.

Tournaments will be held around the city on April 23rd for the release of the Black and White expansion.