{"id":278610,"date":"2025-10-05T03:18:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-05T03:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/278610\/"},"modified":"2025-10-05T03:18:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-05T03:18:10","slug":"famously-useless-pokemon-card-sees-100-price-spike-in-just-two-weeks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/278610\/","title":{"rendered":"Famously useless Pok\u00e9mon card sees $100 price spike in just two weeks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Magikarp is, canonically, one of the most pathetic pocket monsters in the entire Pok\u00e9mon TCG<\/strong>. All it’s capable of doing is splashing, tackling, occasionally flailing about, and eventually evolving into Gyarados. Despite being the fishy punchline of the Pok\u00e9dex, though, Magikarp does sometimes get a moment in the sun. In 2023’s Paldea Evolved set, the floppy fish finally got its own Illustrated Rare card – and it’s now seriously sought after, with Magikarp 203\/193<\/strong>‘s market value shooting up by over $100 in the last two weeks.<\/p>\n

The card has steadily been rising in value since May 2025, but it suddenly hit true ‘price spike’ territory in mid September. On September 19, according to data from TCGplayer<\/a>, this printing of Magikarp was valued at $296. Two weeks later, on October 3, that price had risen to $405, an increase of $109.<\/p>\n

This card’s artwork was drawn by Shinji Kanda, and it’s not the first of their pieces to abruptly explode in value<\/a>. Collectors often buy up cards illustrated by Kanda, anticipating that the value of cards drawn in their signature style will only increase with time.<\/p>\n

\"Pokemon<\/a><\/p>\n

Gameplay-wise, this Magikarp is incredibly unremarkable. With a measly 30HP, just about anything from Sunkern to Spinarak can finish it off. Its only attack, Expert Splasher, deals just 10 damage. By flipping two heads in a row, you can boost that to a (still deeply unimpressive) 30. Clearly, like its fishy forebears before it, this ‘karp will only see combat once it has evolved into Gyarados.<\/p>\n

But it’s just another reminder that, for collectors, a card’s charisma, uniqueness, charm, rarity, and artistic merit tend to trump its in-game power 99 times out of 100.<\/p>\n

Paldea Evolved’s Illustrated Rare Magikarp isn’t even the most valuable Magikarp out there. In fact, it’s a pretty small fish in a very big pond. Our list of the most expensive rare Pok\u00e9mon cards<\/a> of all time features three Magikarps that can swim financial rings around this one.<\/p>\n

Would you ever spend 400 bucks on a fish that can’t fight? Let us know about your zaniest Pok\u00e9mon card purchases in the Wargamer Discord server<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Magikarp is, canonically, one of the most pathetic pocket monsters in the entire Pok\u00e9mon TCG. All it’s capable…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":278611,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[70816,246,67410,158,143994,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-278610","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-card-game","9":"tag-family","10":"tag-pokemon-trading-card-game","11":"tag-technology","12":"tag-the-pokemon-company-international","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115319400462575005","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}