Magic: The Gathering of the Crystals

Let me preface this with a likely unpopular fact about me as a human being: I have never been a fan of Pokemon. 

There I said it. [insert abject horror here]

No sugarcoating. No turning back. It’s out there. I’ve tried to play a few of the video games in the past few decades and have never finished a single damn one. Nor did I even scratch the surface. I did think about trying Pokemon Go once though, which was out of absolute boredom. But never did. I just went outside instead and took a walk*. Anyway, I’ve never seen any of the anime series either, and have never cared to. The closest I have gotten to seeing one were the TV commercials that I saw in Japan.  

*I do have a crazy-ish story about Pokemon Go though. I’ll add it at the bottom 

Now, I know that this franchise is beloved worldwide. So if Pokemon is your thing, that’s awesome. I won’t try to diminish your fond memories. It just never resonated with me. So, with that, I could obviously care less about the Pokemon trading cards. The insanity that has stemmed from them, particularly in recent years is well, insane.

The boom surrounding these trading cards is far beyond the mania that ensues with a diehard fandom. Break-ins at hobby shops. Long lines before stores open for new releases with dude-bro’s snatching a stores entire supply by the cart load within minutes of the store opening. Some guys are literally snatching boxes from children, leaving them crying in the aisles. These people are then selling these cards and/or sets at incredible markups online or in their own brick and mortar or online “stores”. For all the good in the hobby. There is so much bad, and it is gross. It’s gone well beyond hobby and fun. It’s a cash grab. 

Alright, I started this entire piece off on a tangent, I admit. But it is not too far from the topic. I am not here to write about Pokemon. Rather, this is about a game that predates the Pokemon trading card game. 

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Magic: The Gathering

I started collecting MTG cards in the early/mid 90’s. Not long after they were first released in the latter half of 1993. Having considered myself retired from collecting baseball cards, I used my extremely limited allowance of approximately $2.50 to buy $2.50 booster packs of MTG here and there. I was mostly interested in the art and the actual collecting of the cards at the time, and admittedly had zero aspirations of actually playing the game. This changed a couple of years later when I had collected enough to make a few “decks” worth. And I use the word “deck” loosely. The problem was, this particular point in my life was… well… shit. Like the absolute shittiest part of my life, shit. So shitty that it qualifies the use of the letter “e” at the end. Read in an Irish accent: Shite

Some of the old art was absolutely incredible. Particularly tied with the quotes on the cards.

Anyway, I didn’t have anyone to play with. So, I did exactly what anyone in my situation would have done and, uhhh[cough], played with myself… In that I made two “decks” and literally played both sides of the table myself. Earnestly trying to outsmart myself with every upkeep. And you know what?  In my gaming lifetime, this is the only time I could say that I had a winning record. Which is crazy. With crazy taking multiple meanings here… Yeah, I used to play this game alone, or I would sort and create new decks just about anywhere and everywhere. With one of the oddest places being the roof of my mothers car. I would sit cross-legged and play with the cards spread out on the roof of a 1987 Volkswagen Jetta. Hoping the wind would not make this decision regrettable.

It wasn’t until sophomore year of high school that I found someone that would actually sit at the other side of the table to battle me. Like most other games he and I played, Tyson would beat the piss out of me regularly. And we would both have a good laugh about it in doing so. Then order Dominos before another round. There was one day though that I finally got the upper hand and I depleted his life-points to zero. When this happened I exclaimed(In all caps, obviously) “HOW DOES IT FEEL TO BE A LOSER!?” To which Tyson replied, while laughing without missing a beat, “KINDA LIKE YOU” 

He laughed.

I laughed.

We both laughed together some more.

And I continued to slightly die on the inside a little more by the second. What is left inside there anyway? I don’t know…

I was always a masochistic player, and loved cards like these, as well as the Leviathan above.

Tyson and I both gradually grew away from Magic and on to bigger things(40K), but I continued to collect cards here and there for a couple more years. However the allure eventually faded completely. I would pick up a deck box or booster here and there, but the game was changing, and it didn’t exactly have that same pull anymore for me. I kept all of my old cards though[pic at the beginning of this section]. Some ten years later I would try again, picking up some cards in bulk and some new cards at PAX East. It once again didn’t stick. It was fun to thumb through the cards to see how the art had evolved though.

The same cards through the years.

Even when I tried to jump back in following the PAX East trip, I hadn’t really followed the progression of Magic over the years. But one day, some time later, something piqued my interest. The Square Enix facebook page had posted about the official MTG x Final Fantasy collaboration that was coming in 2025. I saved the post, completely forgot about it. I also wasn’t in the market for a new hobby at the time. I was still in the middle of a hobby mid life crisis, as it were.

The closest I got, which wasn’t at all, was that I had picked up a box set of the official Final Fantasy Trading Card Game in 2024 on impulse when visiting Tyson. But my interest was quenched then and there. The art for the FF TCG cards was that of the official artists from the game. Which was cool. But I never collected any more than that box. In fact, I never even researched how to actually play that game. After opening it, the box sat collecting dust at my workstation.

Now when it comes to the MTG FF collab, I had some pretty good excitement to get started once I had made the commitment. I had recently realized that I had given up on painting miniatures a long time ago and had made the decision to pack up my all of my painting supplies. I repurposed my desk into a gaming setup too. Finally using my PC again for the purpose I bought it for, and not just a place to work on a website and screw around on the internet. It’s much more spacious and comfortable, and I have space for sorting cards and whatnot. I was finally in a place to start searching for a new hobby. I suspect that the decision to try MTG again had a lot to do with the fact that there was a massive amount of nostalgia involved, as it was familiar. Pair that with a game series that I love and said, “Fuck it. Let’s go.”.

I then jumped into the deep end.

Without my floaties.

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MTG x Final Fantasy  

It all started with the beginners set that comes with two 60 card pre-built decks. Which I found online for a very reasonable price. As soon as I got the cards I fell in love with the art. There was a lot of art that was directly from the games, and there is a lot of art that is done by, from what I can tell are, unaffiliated artists to the franchise. So all in all, you get a mishmash of different art styles. I was hooked, and definitely wishing I had jumped on this when they released, and not chasing them down. As I was thumbing through the cards I got nostalgic. I was reminded of those days 30+ years ago when I started ripping packs open.

Instead of buying LOT auctions of collected cards, where all the good cards have been poached, I then began to search for booster packs. I found these “get started” box sets that come with: a special foil card, 6 boosters, a couple of deluxe booster sample packs, and 3 land boosters. These boxes are outstanding. So I picked up a few of those from a seller that had a really solid price tag. While the foil card and lands are the same, these boxes are an incredible value for getting a collection going. Particularly to get a jumpstart on collecting mana cards. I remember it being difficult to get land cards back in the day. At least I had the worst luck at pulling land cards. In particular, Forest mana cards. Now, for the Final Fantasy collection, I have a fuck-ton*.

*Yes, fuck-ton is the actual amount I have. It is a real unit of measurement recognized internationally. It’s known as a ‘metric fuck-ton’ in Europe though.

I moved on afterwards to individual booster packs. Ahh yes, the booster pack. The lifeblood of trading card games. And in this day and age, they are one of the biggest traps there is on the online card markets. Mind you this wasn’t a thing back in my day, but apparently at some point along the way, people realized that they can open the packs, check out the contents, pull out the good shit and replace them with mundane regular shit, then reseal the packs and sell them “new and unopened”. Or some crazy ass shit like that. This all harkens back to my comments way up top about Pokemon cards all the way up top, mind you. 

I’ve bought a bunch of boosters online, and while most are as listed, “brand new”. Some were definitely suspect. A couple in particular, the packs wrapping was brittle and the cards inside were out of order. Some were face up, some face down. Token, or art cards, which are usually at the bottom of the pack, were in the middle. Yeah… Trading card games are a crazy, crazy thing in this day and age. Wouldn’t be surprised if I have some scam cards in my collection now. Like, aftermarket printed cards. That too is a thing now. It is what it is, I guess. I’ll maintain my blissful ignorance for now.

The art of these cards are downright amazing. There are some great details included in the various types of cards of this collaboration. There are the regular MTG cards style art, “art” art cards that use the original Final Fantasy artists style, cards with art from the games directly, and various other styles as well. And almost every version has a foil variant. Which I thought was odd at first. I remember when foil cards were super rare. Now, they seem to be throwing them in almost every single booster pack. I have so many foil cards.

Some cards also have two sides. Which threw me for a loop as I have never seen those before. I guess if you meet the requirements on one side, you can evolve the card to the one on the other side. Which is pretty interesting. There is also one pair of cards that I found that if you collect them both in your deck, you can activate them as a pair, flipping both cards over reveals an uber-summon. With one card having the upper half and the other having the lower half of the card. Thus creating a two-card-sized MTG card. Crazy.

I have over 3,000 cards in my legacy MTG collection, and some of them are individually worth some money. Unfortunately, these cards are not mint condition. While they spent much of their lives in a card case, countless times they were shuffled, sorted, handled, and whatnot. I would not let my new cards follow suit. So I set about to double sleeve the cards as I opened them. Peace of mind.

I also set about to create a spreadsheet for my cards, that way I can keep track of my collection. I did this for my cards back in high school for a short time. But never kept it up to date. With the one I created now, I can literally add to or update duplicate cards on the spot. I also have my cards sorted alphabetically and by card type. So I can sort them immediately after I input them into the spreadsheet. Yeah, I am at the age of being excited by a spreadsheet and sorting shit. Help me.

I have had a blast in the past month and a half in researching and collecting these cards. Now I have slowed down and am past the manic stage of it all and am leaning into it casually. I also branched out and reached even further back into my hobby history and picked up some hockey cards. I used to collect baseball cards heavily when I was a kid. I used to love to collect my baseball heroes cards, and use the lesser liked players cards in the spokes of my bike with a clothespin. Or the motorcycle to bicycle conversion from the analog era. I fell away from baseball card collecting a very long time ago, and nowadays I am much more of a hockey fan. So I said “why not?” and picked up some packs from the newly released 2026/27 season’s cards. 

All in all, this foray back into card collecting has been very fruitful for me. Particularly since I have been struggling with my hobbies as of late. I have found myself being unable to find anything to occupy my time constructively.  These cards have helped fill the massive hole that grew when i stopped painting miniatures a long while back, and I look forward to seeing where this collection goes. I already have plans to try playing a game again with Tyson in a bit. Which should be a fun time.

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The Pokémon Go story

When this game launched it was insanity in the streets. Literally. People were getting hit by cars chasing fake monsters with their phones. I, on multiple occasions in the city was run in to by people frantically trying to [groan] Catch ‘Em All each had their faces buried in their phones. A much larger plague than just this particular video game, mind you.

Anyway, a couple of years ago, during the post COVID recovery of the world, my wife and I returned to Japan for a long overdue visit. We were driving around her hometown on one overcast and slightly rainy day when we decided to check out a park near the biggest lake of the region. The parking lots were full, which we thought was a bit odd considering the weather. Nevertheless we started walking around. Initially it was nice, with only a few people about. But after about 20 minutes, or so, we end up at one of the more central parts to the park. And there were people everywhere. Easily hundreds of people, of all ages. Some in groups, some alone. Some with babies in tow. Some in wheelchairs. And each and everyone of them were holding their cellphones moving about here and there. Some more frantically than others. Some would randomly set off in a dash somewhere, with others intently walking off in different directions. My wife and I were legitimately confused.

It took me a bit, but I finally realized what was happening. These people were all playing Pokemon Go. Every. Single. One of them. This was confirmed when I was walking near to someone that stopped one of the middle aged men staring at their phone to ask what was going on. The office worker-looking man told the other person in friendly, yet serious, Japanese that he was looking for a rare Pokemon. My wife and I were blown away. Sure enough, I started peaking over shoulders discreetly, every singly one of the people there were playing this game.

The whole scene in this park was surreal. Everywhere you looked were throngs of people with their faces buried in their phone desperately searching for an augmented reality pocket monster. I honestly could not tell if these people were having fun doing what they were doing either, or if they were on a life or death quest. There was a seriousness on almost everyone’s  faces. And when I tell you it was people of all ages, I mean it. There were kids barely able to walk, all the way to white haired people using walking sticks. Some people were holding multiple phones. Hell, I even saw one person with a clearly homemade rig that held at least 5 phones and each had a charger cable hooked up to his backpack.. All of the phones had the app open. He swung the whole apparatus around like a steadycam camera rig from a decade back. This man was a professional. Crazy stuff.

I have been part of many game manias in my life. I’ve been to midnight releases of games at GameStop. Participated in regional tournaments at Blockbuster. Played MMORPG’s. Been to expo’s and game conventions. But seeing this blew me away. 

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