Except very few of the cards that are so expensive are even used in the card game for real battles. And the shiny / fancy ones have plain counterparts that would do the same thing in a battle.

The value is purely artistic. Which is its own value, to be fair. But people aren't buying these expensive cards to use them in the game. They just want them for the art (or simply the rarity)

> The value is purely artistic. Which is its own value, to be fair. But people aren't buying these expensive cards to use them in the game. They just want them for the art (or simply the rarity)

I think its pretty much just entirely based on a current hype cycle, not even really art per se, I mean the cards aren't hand drawn or anything, they are mass produced cardboard.

Eventually the market will implode like the sneaker resale market did and people will move on to the next thing that gets hyped.

A lot of the people paying the price of a car for a piece of mass produced cardboard aren’t doing it just because it looks nice they are treating it as an investment much like the man featured in the article when he bought the cards in the 2000’s, only difference is he could buy collections in bulk for hundreds of pounds while individual cards are going for thousands of pounds now.

> Except very few of the cards that are so expensive are even used in the card game for real battles.

Underseat floatation devices are rarely used. Do they have no utility whatsoever, as was claimed upthread for all pokemom cards?

The spendy cards don't have utility to match their price, but the commons are fine. If it's correct that all of the spendy cards have cheap equivalents, that's great for everyone. Nobody has to feel like they need to spend big money to get a black lotus and hope they don't damage it in use.

> it's glorified cock fighting for kids

I never "got" Pokemon.

The trainer is all lovey-dovey over their pets... NOW fight! One. At. A. Time.

I kept wanting police to roll in with oversized nets and tranquilizer guns to break it all up.