Forces of Nature Collection! Box Opening - Braving the Elements

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here and for today's adventure I've opened up this promotional box for the Pokémon TCG called Forces of Nature Collection!
If you don't want any spoilers, stop reading now and go check out the box opening on youtube.

In this box you get not one, not two, but three Black Star Promo cards! All of them are part of the titular Forces of Nature trio, also nicknamed the Genie trio. You also get 3 booster packs in this box. I have no idea if the selection of these booster packs are random, but for this box I got one booster pack from the HGSS series (Call of Legends) and 2 from Emerging Powers. This box was bought from Chaos Cards for £22.95 (that's roughly $36 USD), which is quite expensive but it is hard to find. Plus Chaos Cards was the only place I had found selling it at a reasonable price (seriously, Amazon.co.uk has them going at £80+ !!)

Anyways, now on to he more interesting stuff; the pulls I got.

First are the 3 promotional cards: Thundurus BW41, Tornadus BW42 and Landorus BW43. All three of these mons are in their Incarnate Forms- forms I have to admit I'm really not a fan of. However, these cards themselves are fantastic. Making two of them reverse-holos was a good idea, it really sets them apart from all the other promo cards in my folder. And Landorus as a full art... brilliant! He may look ugly, but he looks damn imposing too. 

The three cards we have here are the ones I got from the booster packs. The first one is a rare Typhlosion from Call of Legends. The two others are from Emerging Powers; holographic Virizion and a rare Simipour. I like the styilised bold art on Simipour, but sadly am not fond of the Pokémon itself. Not pictured: I also got a reverse-holo Ferrothorn.

Well, even though I got three promos and 1 holographic I can't say I'm too happy with the pulls in this box. They aren't bad per se, but for £22.95 I'd have liked at least one ultra-rare or even just a Pokémon I like more...

Oh listen to me, I'm acting like a spoilt brat haha. I had none of these cards to begin with so I'm happy to add them to my growing collection none the less!

I'll end here. Thanks for reading, hope you weren't too bored by my ranting. Please feel free to comment and share your thoughts down bellow or to check out my Pokémon TCG Opening Adventures so far on youtube.

Till next time, sayonara!

2 x Plasma Freeze Blister Packs - Fun Adventures in the Blistering Cold

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here and I'm begging forgiveness for the punny title, I couldn't help it!
For today's adventure I've ventured into the freezing lands of the Plasma Freeze promotional blister pack openings (erg, I'll stop, that's not even a good one!) If you want to watch the video without spoilers, stop reading now and click here.

These blister packs each contained a promotional card and a coin (more details bellow)

I got them on ebay for very cheap, £4.70 ($7.50 USD) for both, essentially getting 2 for the price of one. Now sadly as you can probably tell from the picture above the packaging is slightly worn and the cards within by extension ended up somewhat bent too, though thankfully not creased, scratched or ripped. It just means I'd classify them as Near Mint/Excellent rather than Mint really, and I can live with that. Now here's what I got:

The two on the left are the promotional cards, one being an alternate foil of Moltres from Next Destinies and the other being a Black Star Promo Electrode (BW76), underneath them are the game coins that came with each blister and that last card is a rare Quagsire from the booster pack. Not bad, until you see...

Latios-EX Full Art!

The last card I got was the full art Latios-EX and it was so unexpected that I stared for a little while before remembering that I had to end the recording of the booster pack openings haha. Definitely a great pull considering how little I payed for the blisters and that I won't have to worry about buying this guy independently for the collection (which would be pricy!)

So, a very nice way to end this adventure for today and look forward to what the next one holds. Hope you guys stay tuned. Bye!

6 x Plasma Blast Booster Packs - Opening Newest Set for New Adventure

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here and for today's adventure I have opened up 6 booster packs of Plasma Blast, the latest set in the Pokémon TCG, part of the Black & White series. I was really excited to open these packs since I have no cards from this set at all. But, even so, I have to admit it wasn't the best batch. Click here if you'd rather watch the video of me opening these up.
If not, read on.

Here's what I got:

I'm happy to have gotten all these cards since I needed them all, but I won't deny I would have liked at least one more holographic than I got here. I guess I'm being greedy though, I'v clearly been spoiled by the great openings I'v had so far :P

And besides, that Sigilyph is beautiful - the linear pattern looks pretty good and shiny. 

Anywho, I'm thinking of maybe doing questions or some other method to give away codes for the Pokémon TCGO, what do you guys think? Let me know in the comments.

Well for now, have one for free haha: TSV-73DL-6NB-NW8. 

Enjoy what's left of the weekend and see you guys next time.

Shining Palkia + Legend of Korra

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here, and in case the title for this post wasn't clear enough, I'm going to do a quick update on two things I've recently done: downloaded the event Pokémon Shing Palkia for my 5th Gen games and watched the premiere of Legend of Korra: Book 2 - Spirits.

The first is fairly simple, in a lot of countries now there is currently a download event going on for 5th Gen Pokémon games (Black, White, Black2, White2) where you can download the legendary Sinnoh Pokémon Palkia, as a shiny! It's what I did today by going down to a GAME shop (in the UK). For everyone else, I suggest you go over to Serebii.net and check their Event Database to see where you can download this critter in your home country (hurry up though, it's only going for about 2 weeks, maybe less in some countries, after that is a different event which I'll mention when it starts).

Secondly, the season 2 premiere of Legend of Korra was on yesterday and I'm sure that you've all checked it out already. If not, WHAT? WHY NOT?! GO NOW!
Seriously though, it is one of the better animated series to have come out in a very long time and it's hard not to fall in love with it immediately (along with its parent show Avatar: The Last Airbender). I was very happy that LOK was renewed for a second season after the first one had finished because I truly feel it was a strong and successful sequel to ATLA, and although I could have lived with it being a one off I really can't complain with the decision to continue it either.
So, was the start to Book 2 - Spirits any good? Hells yes.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there weren't any flaws. The animation looked sub-par in certain areas and the flow of the story was somewhat choppy. But I'll give them a pass for that because once the action started it looked so beautiful. Clearly that's where a lot of the budget went and I'm glad it did. As for the story and how it flowed, I guess they're going to try to cram in as much stuff as possible into each episode which is not surprising since they only have 14 episodes to tell that story and develop the characters in. I have a feeling they will fall slightly short on this like they did in the first season, but if that's the only problem then I can live with that. Considering the subject matter and world building I think it's amazing they even manage to do as good as they did in season 1, so I won't hold it against them in the least.

Anywho, the episodes ended on a good cliffhanger and I can kinda guess the direction this series' socio-political subject matter is going to go in, so I'm very eager for next week's episode.

Charizard G LV.X Tin 2009 Opening - Hopeful for the Journey Ahead.

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here and I am pleased to announce my (official) first Pokémon TCG opening!
As promised in my last update, what I choose to open was going to be a tin, and a very special one at that. And here it is, a Charizard G LV.X 2009 Fall Tin:

I won this tin in a bid on ebay, it was the last item I got before beginning this little project but I'm starting off with it to make up for the lack of video for the other tin I opened (and was meant to start off with).

I won the bid at the reasonable price of £22. I say reasonable because this is an old tin now and when I have come across it online it was usually being sold somewhere between £29.99 to £45+, so yeah, very fortunate to have gotten my hands on it.

Well enough babbling, here's what I pulled:

Naturally, the Charizard G LV.X Promo DP45 that came with the tin

Some cool rares...

... and these fantastic pulls!! An ultra rare Torterra LV.X from Diamond & Pearl and a secret rare Moltres and holo Swampert from Platinum: Supreme victors! 

Needless to say, this tin was fantastic and well worth the price. I now eagerly await the next opening for this journey for which I think I'll open up a few booster packs. So look forward to that.

But until then make sure to check out my youtube channel, including the video to this tin opening, at: The Amateur Collector.

Don't hesitate to leave a comment bellow!

See ya next time!

Mewtwo-EX 2012 Tin Opening - Journey Off to a Bad Start!

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here and I have started my journey to open up Pokémon TCG merchandise and share it with you. Starting with this tin which I bought in store at Forbidden Planet for £12.99 (cheaper than most places online!):

Or so I thought... sadly things aren't off to a great star! I filmed the opening of the Mewtwo-EX tin but for some reason the camera either didn't record or the file was lost somehow. D'oh!

It's a real shame too since in the very first booster pack of the tin - which was also my very first Black & White booster pack ever- was awesome.
Luckily I have a scanner, so I can still share my swag with you all:

The Mewtwo-EX Promo BW45 that came with the tin

                                        

These are all the rares that I got, with the bottom two being Reverse-Holos

 And finally the very first rare card I opened, in all its awesome awesomness:

            Zekrom Full Art                   

I was a little disappointed with the rares since I already have two of them (they came in a bundle I bought at a flee market) but this Ultra Rare Zekrom more than makes up for them. I'm also really liking the Reverse-Holo Marowak, the Fighting Energy logos in the background look really cool.

Anyways, sorry again for not being able to show a video of this, but I've already planned the next opening which I think will more than make up for that (hint: it's another tin).

Also as a way of apology here's a code to use for the Pokémon Trading Card Game Online: XTS-FD3E-BW7-NXH.

Let me know in the comments bellow who managed to get the code!   

See you guys for the next opening, hopefully this time it'll work!

Pokemon TCG Openings - Adventure Begins!

Hi all!

The Amateur Collector here and I am eager to share with you a little project I'm going to get started.

But first a little exposition. (if you're not interested in that, skip to the 4th paragraph!)

One of my all time favourite franchises is Pokémon. I've been a fan of it ever since it came out in my country. I had always enjoyed comics, cartoons, toys, etc- when I was young but Pokémon is what solidified my love for these things. Pokémon Red was the first video game I ever owned, The Electric Tale of Pikachu was the first manga title I ever owned and the original Pokémon cartoon is what renewed my interest in Japanimation. Needless to say, I owe a fair amount to this franchise.

Sadly there is one thing I failed to keep up with and that was the Pokémon TCG. It's something I would have continued pursuing for all these years if not for other interests, money and peer pressure. Yes sadly it got continuously hard to find others to play with as time went on, and increasingly more expensive to continue buying too.
But no more, i say!
My interest was peeked again when I started looking up the value of some of my old cards to sell off, but instead came across loads of sites and videos of peoples' collections. In particular videos on youtube of people opening up boosters packs brought on a flood of nostalgia and I just fell back in love with these cards.

And so this is where my project comes in. Over the past month and a half I have been stockpiling a little collections of Pokémon TCG merchandise, all unopened! What I plan to do is to record me opening them up one by one and uploading the videos onto youtube and here, so as to chronicle and share with everyone my re-discovering of the Pokémon cards! I plan to have a steady flow of videos throughout the weeks to upload of booster packs, promotional boxes, blisters, tins and whatever else I got my hands on. This will include cards from all sorts of different sets, from old to new- I have a lot of catching up to do after all!
And here's a taster of what I have to open:

So if you're interested in sharing in the adventure don't hesitate to follow me on this blog and/or subscribe to my youtube account at The Amateur Collector.

Let the journey begin!

Blog Start!

Hi all!

I'm the Amateur Collector and this is my blog.
I'm a self confessed geek and have an interest in most things related to fandom. This includes but is not limited to games, sci-fi, animation, toys and collectables, comics and more.

I'm just an average person in real life with little time and disposable income. But I decided despite of that I should still follow my hobbies and interests, even if I only get to delve into them from time to time. And so, I have started to this blog to chronicle and share in my (albeit slowly) growing collection of stuff, and I have a little project to start this going which I'll post in my next blog update- straight after this one!

For now, don't hesitate to follow if you're interested in geek-related paraphernalia and are curious to see what kind of things I'll be putting up!

Till next time!