PLEASE NOTE: This is a minimally-edited transcript that originates from a program that uses AI.
Anisa Khalifa: A franchise that's been an international sensation for decades centered around cute, colorful miniature monsters with special abilities ranging from electric shock detective to superpowered saliva. I'm of course talking about Pokemon. The world of Pokemon includes an anime show, films, video games, plushies, and a competitive trading card game. That competition is lucrative and reaches across the globe with a surprising number of top players based in an unexpected location.
Storms Reback: Yeah, it's the whole thing that North Carolina has as many players in the top 20 in the world as places with populations as big as New York City. We're Sao Paulo, Brazil, and it is an amazing community.
Anisa Khalifa: I'm Anisa Khalifa. This is the Broadside where we tell stories from our home at the crossroads of the South this week, how community of prestigious Pokemon players took root in the South.
Okay, so fill in this sentence for me. Pokemon is blank.
Storms Reback: Pokemon is a worldwide phenomenon. It is a network. Of children and parents that the average person doesn't even know exists, but it is everywhere if you go looking for it.
Anisa Khalifa: Storms. Reback is a freelance journalist based in Durham, North Carolina. He recently wrote a piece about Pokemon for the assembly.
An online news outlet, specifically storms dug into Pokemon TCG.
Storms Reback: Pokemon TCG is Pokemon the trading card game, and the card game is ridiculously complicated from my perspective.
Anisa Khalifa: Now we're not gonna break down the rules of the Trading Guard game because to be honest, a lot of it goes right over my head. Storms is a former professional poker player, and even he gets lost
Storms Reback: playing a hand of Texas Holden is. Easy compared to
Anisa Khalifa: really
Storms Reback: you've got, you know, five communal cards and you've got two cards in your hand. How hard can that be? In Pokemon? You have 60 cards in your deck. You have to constantly read them and swap them out.
Anisa Khalifa: But he says, for some people it comes naturally
Storms Reback: somehow. 10 year olds seem to master it pretty quickly.
Anisa Khalifa: For his story storms focused on some of these younger players based in North Carolina, players who've helped build a strong community around the game. And have gotten really good along the way.
Storms Reback: There's a really rich culture of great Pokemon players in the state.
Anisa Khalifa: One of those great Pokemon players is 18-year-old Caleb Rogerson
Unidentified Speaker: and Caleb playing the Sarza to pitch out deck.
He likes to search out cards,
Storms Reback: and he is currently ranked number seven or eight in the world.
Anisa Khalifa: Wow.
Unidentified Speaker: Yeah. Have our winner here in round five. Caleb Rogerson, getting the job done. Put that,
Anisa Khalifa: how old was Caleb when he started playing? I
Storms Reback: think Caleb was 12 and so he actually started kind of late, um, late.
Anisa Khalifa: Wow. Are they like Olympic athletes south me up?
Storms Reback: Well, I mean the, the juniors you, you'll have six and seven year olds out there, you know, trying to play. Okay. Okay. Yeah.
Anisa Khalifa: And then there's 15-year-old Nathan Oster Katz.
Storms Reback: Nathan has won eight regionals and winning one regional is the goal. He's won eight. And he's won three international events.
Regional.
Unidentified Speaker: Regional champion for the senior division. Nathan, Oscar Katz. Nathan, how are you feeling right now? Uh, I'm feeling pretty good. My deck was a little wacky, uh, and I got,
Storms Reback: he progressed just the way he is. He could be one of the greatest Pokemon players of all time.
Anisa Khalifa: And while Caleb and Nathan play because they love it, there is a financial incentive to stay in the game. Top players can earn tens of thousands of dollars in tournaments. The 2025 Pokemon World Championships will feature a prize pool of over $2 million. And for some Pokemon TCG has even become their career.
Storms Reback: There's this one expert Chip Richey who lives in Raleigh. He's a kind of an on air analyst for Pokemon, doesn't
Chip Richey: find it. Teal Dance number two and Boss Orders is the grab, brings up the squa Billy Ex.
Storms Reback: He analyzes matches over live streams for Pokemon.
Anisa Khalifa: Wow. So they have like sports casting Pokemon games?
Storms Reback: Yeah. Yeah, they do. For Pokemon games. They call them casters. They put on the headsets, they watch matches, and they, they make commentary.
Anisa Khalifa: Amazing.
Storms Reback: Yeah.
Anisa Khalifa: So tell me what first sparked your interest in this story.
Storms Reback: My kid. Um, so I have an 11-year-old and he's different. Um, he's autistic and not every activity resonates with him, but Pokemon was the one activity where we can take him to one of these. League events and he's just, his comfort level is very high and that's, that's what I found in all the Pokemon events. The Pokemon community is just really embracing and open and caring.
Anisa Khalifa: Hmm. So you're a polka dad now, I guess.
Storms Reback: Sure. I'm a polka dad.
Anisa Khalifa: Tell us about the parents who help their kids and what that involves.
Storms Reback: Yeah. I, I want every parent to, to give it a shot because it's such an open community, but if your kid gets obsessed, here are the things you're going to be doing.
You're going to be driving them. Places a lot. You're gonna be a chauffeur every Sunday. You're gonna be taking them to the local game shop. If it's a regional, you're gonna be driving them three or four hours at least, if not flying, and then standing in a convention center. For 10 hours
Anisa Khalifa: and on top of all that storms says there's the never ending quest to collect cards.
These cards can have Pokemon on them or do things like boost an attack. You don't necessarily gotta catch 'em all, but there's no standard deck in Pokemon TCG. So players have to build their own decks from scratch.
Storms Reback: If they're young enough, you are gonna be tracking down all the cards they need to build a competitive deck. And that's a really big thing. Certain decks play better against other decks, and so these kids are always trying to figure out which is gonna be the best deck. And it's 50% of the battle, 60% of the battle is coming up with the right deck.
Anisa Khalifa: But if you're a new poke parent. Don't freak out. Yes, a player can purchase Pokemon cards for their deck, but that's not the only option. After all, Pokemon TCG is a trading card game, so players will often swap cards with each other
Storms Reback: and having these really good game stores helps. That's a big part of it too, is that there are these places to get your foot in the door. Uh, rapid draw for
Knockout 60 and then rapid draw
Anisa Khalifa: the game store. It's the heart and soul of any good Pokemon scene like Atomic Empire in Durham, North Carolina.
Sure, you can buy cards there if you get lucky before they fly off the shelf, but the store also hosts an open Pokemon League every Sunday. Storms often goes there with his son and so do top players like Caleb Rogerson and Nathan Oster Katz.
Storms Reback: You walk in and anybody's welcome you can be. Kind of the weird kid, someone's gonna walk up to you and say, Hey, do you wanna trade cards?
Unidentified Speaker: Do you wanna play a game?
I've gotta choose someone else to stand up.
Knocked
out. Knocked out. Bummer. Okay.
Anisa Khalifa: Broadside producer Charlie Shelton-Ormond recently visited Atomic Empire to see what a league looks like in action.
Charlie Shelton-Ormond: What keeps you coming out here every week? What, what brings you back out?
Unidentified Speaker: Uh, I need to touch grass.
Unidentified Speaker: Uh, just the community. It's a very welcoming community. I always like to help out with the younger kids that help. Like we give them cards or, and play sometime. Yeah. Uh, today, like, yeah, we teach you out if you wanna try
play. Not. Okay. Awesome.
Storms Reback: And so it quickly turns from you feeling like an outsider to being an insider really quickly. I've spent countless hours at, at Atomic Empire, and so I almost think of it as like a second home at this point.
Unidentified Speaker: Oh, did, did you win?
Unidentified Speaker: No, I ended up losing, oh,
I, I, I missed a card. I needed a. I think yeah, you lose if you, if your opponent knocks out six Pokemon or knocks out all of your Pokemon in play.
Well played. Thank you. Yeah. You have the upper hand because look at how many cartoon fast.
Anisa Khalifa: Charlie watched several matches, but one in particular stood out. It was between William who's in college and Matthew, who's about eight or nine years old. William was showing Matthew how to play while Matthew's dad cheered him on.
Unidentified Speaker: You do all of your first game ever.
Anisa Khalifa: Now it's your turn. Oh, you got this. There'd be no upset on this day. William, the college student ended up winning the match, but it was a great example of the game's best qualities, patience, kind, coaching, and good sportsmanship. And
Unidentified Speaker: I'm gonna swing for the knockout
and then you win.
Because this is draw three prize cards,
Anisa Khalifa: but game stores and globally ranked players aren't the only connection. North Carolina has to Pokemon.
Storms Reback: The largest printer of Pokemon cards is located. Here in the triangle. From what I've heard, the security, it's would be tougher to break in there than Fort Knox, that these cards are so valuable that there's like multiple layers of security to get in and out of the building.
Anisa Khalifa: Incredible.
Storms Reback: Yes.
Anisa Khalifa: That's coming up after a short break.
Pokemon is a global brand with deep roots in Asia. It's partly owned by Nintendo. So you can imagine my surprise when I found out that a company located just a few miles from my house has been pumping out tons of Pokemon cards for decades.
Brian Gordon: Yeah. So the largest US printer of Pokemon cards. Is based in the triangle.
Anisa Khalifa: Brian Gordon is a business and technology recorder. At the news and observer.
Brian Gordon: There's a number of facilities in North Carolina, most of which are right around Research Triangle Park in Raleigh, Morrisville Durham.
Anisa Khalifa: The company Brian's talking about is the Millennium Print group,
Brian Gordon: which in very small text on their website says it's a Pokemon company, international subsidiary. And so it's not just a company that supplies or contracts with Pokemon, but it literally is part of the Pokemon company.
Anisa Khalifa: So how many cards do these facilities actually print?
Brian Gordon: So I don't know how many of these specifically, but Pokemon, the company, which is based in Japan, said last year they printed 12 billion cards in one year.
Anisa Khalifa: Billion would be, yeah.
Brian Gordon: And that's a big number. And it was not enough for many fans and people who wanna buy cards.
It is. Near impossible to buy a new pack of Pokemon cards in the triangle right now.
Anisa Khalifa: Like any good reporter, Ryan did some investigating himself. A few months ago. He stopped by a Walmart to see what he could find.
Brian Gordon: There were two packs left. I think I got the second to last one.
Anisa Khalifa: Can you read some of the names of these Pokemons to me?
Brian Gordon: Yeah. Ancy. We have a pita, a Gruin, Cradley.
Anisa Khalifa: It's just at a certain point it just sounds like gibberish.
Brian Gordon: Yeah, I know. I'm, I'm probably not pronouncing all these right. I showed it to my friend who knows Pokemon and said, I have no gems. I.
Anisa Khalifa: No jackpots in Brian's pack, but behind the walls of Millennium Print Group, it's a different story.
Brian Gordon: Security is so important to them. Uh, an executive, he used to work there, described how they had a private detective that sort of checked, uh, employees in and making sure that cards weren't going away. Now there's 24 7 guarded security and CC TV. Um, they don't just print Pokemon cards, so they wanna show all clients that this is a very secure facility and if you entrust them with printing their products, the products won't be walked out.
Millennium Print Group isn't advertising. That they do Pokemon. So I don't think they're really trying to make a, their presence known. So I don't think most people know that Pokemon cards are printed in North Carolina more than any other place in the us. They're printed right here in our backyard, which is fascinating.
Anisa Khalifa: The pack Brian bought on the shelf with 10 cards inside was about five bucks, but rare and collectible cards can go for thousands, hence the high security.
Storms Reback: There's this crazy secondary market
Anisa Khalifa: writer and polka dad storms reback. Again,
Storms Reback: you can go and find boxes of Pokemon cars unopened. They have to be unopened 'cause that creates this mystery.
That's what people are paying the top dollar for is what could be in there. There's an unopened box of Pokemon cars on eBay that's selling for $6,000 right now.
Anisa Khalifa: Even though cards are such a hot commodity storm says it's unlikely that the younger Pokemon players in the triangle know there's a printing company in their backyard
Storms Reback: that's probably beyond them.
Uh, I don't think the average kid would know.
Anisa Khalifa: Instead, players are more concerned with getting their decks ready for competitions.
You are in line for seniors
Anisa Khalifa: tg. This spring storms traveled with his sun to Atlanta for a regional tournament.
Storms Reback: It was going to this regional in Atlanta that sort of opened my eyes to, wow, this is an entirely different thing.
Um, there was over 3000 people there. You know, people had it on their calendars for months in advance. You have to rent hotel rooms. Some people flew there. Walls are lined with vendors selling stuffies and everything you can imagine Pokemon related. And then. These kids are playing for 10 hours a day.
Unidentified Speaker: You could have the best card, but if you don't barely know how to play it, it's nice score.
I probably could have scooped earlier, Gabe, too, when I lost right on this, on me. Did this,
Storms Reback: there was just such a incredible swath of humanity. Was there countless People had dyed purple hair. Kids were cradling their stuffies. It felt like Comic-Con, half these people were players, but the other half were just fans. They were just people who wanted to come and hang out in this environment all weekend. And I really feel like they did that because they felt comfortable there and and safe there.
Anisa Khalifa: Hmm. So now that you've become immersed in this world of Pokemon with your son, what are your biggest takeaways around the game and its culture?
Storms Reback: It's a pretty magical world. It's inviting and it's created this acceptable world for kids who might not find their place in other pursuits, that it's not about playing football and being a cheerleader anymore. That there's a million different options that kids can embrace, and Pokemon is legitimately one of them.
And Nathan and and Caleb, I don't know what else they would be doing that they could be one 10th as good at as they are at Pokemon. And in that world they are rock stars.
Anisa Khalifa: What's next for Nathan? Caleb?
Storms Reback: A world championship for both of them. Hopefully as hard as that is, it would not shock me.
Anisa Khalifa: What about for your son?
Is he gonna keep playing? You think
Storms Reback: so? His interest in it isn't. On the same level as theirs, and I don't wanna put any pressure on him. I just think the fact that he loves it and is interested in it is great, and I'm gonna that.
Anisa Khalifa: Yeah. And you don't have to win to enjoy it and to find a valuable thing.
Exactly.
Storms Reback: There was plenty of people there that weren't gonna win in Atlanta, and I saw lots of smiling faces.
Anisa Khalifa: What's your favorite Pokemon
Storms Reback: Squirtle?
Would you like to come along with us? Squirtle?
Anisa Khalifa: Thank you so much. This was delightful.
Storms Reback: Thank you for having me.
Anisa Khalifa: I learned so much.
This episode of The Broadside was a co-production with the assembly. If you'd like to read Storm's Reeboks article about Pokemon at their website, we've dropped a link in the show notes. Charlie Shelton-Ormond is our producer. Jerad Walker is our editor. Our executive producer is Wilson Sayre. The Broad Side is a production of WUNC North Carolina Public Radio and is part of the NPR Network.
If you have or a story idea, you can email us at [email protected]. If you enjoyed the show, leave us a rating, a review, or share it with a friend. I'm Anisa Khalifa. Thanks for listening, y'all. We'll be back next week.