Anyone else feels bad about the short running Dragon Ball Z trading cards from 2005/6?

[Geraldo]

Allow me to start with a confession off the chest, I am against merchandise and think it's a waste of money and a way for corporations to feed their greed off the fans' pockets. However, I remember the hype around these cards in the summer of 2005, and how I used to check out their official website everyday after school to see which cards were released. I was expecting them to cover the entirety of DBZ for the power levels discussion (despite losing the grip of accuracy while dealing with Frieza and Super Saiyan Goku) but sadly low sales caused them to fall apart before the Android Saga cardset was even released.

[MrSatan2099]

Talk about good memories! I had played the earlier Z and GT games, but I finally kind of had money when these hit so I was all in from the start. I remember thinking they were going to jump the gun on power levels over 1 million for the Movie 11 and 12 promo cards, but they were just drastically underpowered.

I had a very good friend at the time who worked the counter at his parents' pool haul and I'd hang out with him all evening and play. A legitimately fun variation that corrected a lot of the confusing aspects of the previous games.

[Saiya6Cit]

"I hate how corporations bleed out fans, except when they are my nostalgia"


You know money comes and goes, no one should judge the other for whatever they spend their money on, as long as you pay your taxes to the government and don't get into any ilegal activity, it should be enough for all of us.

I suppose marketing for cards was simply better back then. Ever since smartphones people started to purchase "skins" for videogames and other electronic goods instead of pieces of paper. The world changed. Pokemon dominates the cardgame market. We will never get cool DB collectable cards in america anymore T.T


Here in mexico in 1998 every kid had these cards:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/153904524464

yes I have mine, no they are not complete, no it does no ruin my life as I love dragon ball in my heart not the merchandise I can get from it.

[Geraldo]

"I hate how corporations bleed out fans, except when they are my nostalgia"

I have long stopped taking ur comments seriously ever since u claimed that even if Akira Toriyama was found to have been a pedophile (a true thread, here in the General Discussion subsection), u will support him. Don't know if u tried to troll back then, but it burnt u for me.

Also, try to actually quote me, not paraphrase badly. I said I hate the greed of corporations who know nothing about a franchise, but will try to get as much money as possible from its fans. The "However" I have wrote referred to my fun teenage experience with this cards game.

[TheGreatness25]

I just want to point out that everything in entertainment centers around making money. You'd be hard-pressed to find a company that would pour their money and time into a project expecting nothing in return. Everything about Dragon Ball, Marvel, Disney, DC, Harry Potter--take your pick--everything is about money. So, if nobody bought merchandise, we'd be left with a bunch of crappy, low-budget projects that are made "out of love" until people realize that they can't sustain their lives by dedicating any time to those projects.

Anyway, I used to buy different cards (because I was a kid and "just had to have them"). I was the only one I knew with the collectible card game packs and always wanted to play, but didn't know anyone else who had those. It's funny because the DBZ craze was at an all-time high.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

I think we have Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! to thank for the card game boom of the early 2000s. You had Wizards of the Coast launching trading card games for Harry Potter, The Simpsons, Codename Kids Next Door, Spongebob Squarepants and X-Men and more or Decipher Inc who published card games for Beyblade amd Lord of the Rings, Score Entertainment also had card games for Yu Yu Hakusho, Sonic X, Fruits Basket, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and our own Dragon Ball Z and GT. Basically various companies were trying to cash in on a craze, which was quite popular with kids at the time. I know there's still new Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic The Gathering cards being released all the time, and Dragon Ball Super has a card game, but I'd imagine its not as hot now as it was 20 years ago as kids nowadays would tend to be more preoccupied with their tablets and iPhones.

The Dragon Ball Z cards were fun while they lasted though. I never got any of the 2005/6 cards, but I had a good few from the previous incarnation that was released a few years prior. I remember a kid at my school loved Dragon Ball Z and got these on holiday in Spain, he was happy to let me have some of his though, which was an unexpecdted surprise.

[NitroEX]

I didn't live in the US or regions where the US trading card game was officially distributed however they did appear as imports in a few UK comic book shops back in 2003-2004. I had managed to buy a Buu starter deck and a few booster packs before I realized how garbage they were. The cards were of poor quality with the 'art' simply being screenshots from the anime itself. The lazy/cheap approach was something to be expected of early Funimation and their tie-ins though. It was all just cash grabs at that time with little to no Japanese supervision.

I also remember the rules of the trading card game being confusing to me as a child compared to Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! (although Yu-Gi-Oh has arguably become more complicated since then). I have no interest in the current DBS card game but I'd imagine more thought has been put into that and its rules since it was most likely overseen and approved by Toei, Bandai, etc rather than just Funimation, like in the past.

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

I have no interest in the current DBS card game but I'd imagine more thought has been put into that and its rules since it was most likely overseen and approved by Toei, Bandai, etc rather than just Funimation, like in the past.

In general I don't think TOEI's seal of approval is very promising anymore. We know Lisa Yamatoya of TOEI USA is credited for ADR Approval in Funimation's dub of Super, which means that she and by extension the company are accountable for all Funimation's changes they did nothing about. That said I agree with your point about the old card game being a bit lazy with recycling screenshots from the anime, the Super card game does seem to have more effort put in with the art at least, and hopefully simpler mechanics.

[SaiyanLives]

Allow me to start with a confession off the chest, I am against merchandise and think it's a waste of money and a way for corporations to feed their greed off the fans' pockets. However, I remember the hype around these cards in the summer of 2005, and how I used to check out their official website everyday after school to see which cards were released. I was expecting them to cover the entirety of DBZ for the power levels discussion (despite losing the grip of accuracy while dealing with Frieza and Super Saiyan Goku) but sadly low sales caused them to fall apart before the Android Saga cardset was even released.

Yes but i have been collecting the new ones for dbs the art is amazing and if you lucky u can pull some cards worth serious money lol
But i love collecting them i also use to collect the ones u mention but i no longer have them i restarted from scratch,
Do you collect the new ones?

[Geraldo]

Hey, I don't collect the old ones nor the new ones, as merchandise was never my thing.

Back in 2018 I had a web gallery of these cards. At least of the ones that were still online, to see how they have ranked each fighter's growth in power.

Yamcha and Chiaotzu were the ones I was curious about the most. Since both of them got the kick out of the Z-Fighters the soonest.

[SaiyanLives]

Hey, I don't collect the old ones nor the new ones, as merchandise was never my thing.

Back in 2018 I had a web gallery of these cards. At least of the ones that were still online, to see how they have ranked each fighter's growth in power.

Yamcha and Chiaotzu were the ones I was curious about the most. Since both of them got the kick out of the Z-Fighters the soonest.

What about physical media do you collect that? Like dbz blu rays?

[Geraldo]

Hey, I don't collect the old ones nor the new ones, as merchandise was never my thing.

Back in 2018 I had a web gallery of these cards. At least of the ones that were still online, to see how they have ranked each fighter's growth in power.

Yamcha and Chiaotzu were the ones I was curious about the most. Since both of them got the kick out of the Z-Fighters the soonest.

What about physical media do you collect that? Like dbz blu rays?

No, I don't. I watch Dragon Ball content online via streaming sites, like most fans. It's easy and it's free.
I only have 2 DVDs (one is the first episodes of Dragon Ball Z I bought when I was 12, and the other is the Para Para Brothers episodes of Dragon Ball GT I bought when I was 14); and "Dragon Ball GT: Final Bout" with the original cover of adult Goku that I bought before that at the age of 14.