Vol. 2, Issue 36 - Interview with The PokéGym
An interview with PokePop from The PokéGym, a long-running Pokémon Trading Card Game strategy website, founded in 1999. We also have a recap of the latest Pokémon news!
Welcome to Vol. 2, issue 36 of the Johto Times newsletter! In this issue, I am delighted to be sharing our interview with The PokéGym. We delve into the history of this Pokémon TCG strategy website, which dates all the way back to 1999! It even served as the community forum for Wizards of the Coast when they swooped in to save it from closure in 2001. Mike Martin, also known as PokePop, kindly offered to answer my questions on behalf of the PokéGym team to discuss the rich history of the site and its important place in the Pokémon fan community.
It has been a quiet week on the news front, but I’ve shared a recap of the latest Pokémon news too. Be sure to share our newsletter with your friends and loved ones to help us reach even more Pokémon fans! For Discord users,you’re welcome to join our server for the latest notifications from our project. We are still open to sharing your mailbag entries, so if you have anything you would like to share with us, drop us a lineby visiting this link to contact us directly! With all of that out of the way, on with this week’s issue!
News
Niantic has announced that the next Pokémon GO Raid Day will feature Falinks, taking place on September 8th, from 14:00 - 17:00 local time. The Pokémon will appear more frequently in raids, and for the first time in the game, players will be able to encounter a shiny variant if they're lucky! Further details can be found on the Pokémon GO website.
Source: Pokémon GO
The Pokémon Sleep Suicune Research event has now started and runs for two weeks, until September 16th, 2024. During the event, players can collect samples of Suicune Mane, which can be changed for items such as Suicune Incense and Biscuits. The Incense can then be used to research Suicune's various sleep styles. Further details on the event can be found in the source link.
Source: Pokémon Sleep
Feature: Interview with The PokéGym
The PokéGym is a long-running Pokémon Trading Card Game strategy website, which was founded in 1999 by Brian Brokaw as “The Brokamon Center” and later became “The Psylum PokéGym”. The community has changed hands several times throughout the years; it even found a home with Wizards of the Coast as “The Wizards' PokéGym” (WizPoG), becoming their very first community forum. After WotC lost the licence to Pokémon, it was transferred to Team Compendium — a group of volunteers who manage the Pokémon TCG Game Rulings Compendium — who have run the community ever since.
Several administrators and moderators make up the PokéGym team, one of whom is Mike Martin, also known as PokePop, who I am delighted to be interviewing today. To discuss the history and importance of this community, PokePop will be representing the team and answering my questions in this interview.
Thank you so much for agreeing to this interview, PokePop, and for agreeing to speak on behalf of the team at The PokéGym. Please introduce yourself and tell us about your role in the community!
PokePop:
Well, role might be a bit too strong a word for it. Basically I have tried over the years to make myself useful. People found that I was useful and so gave me opportunities to do things. Currently, I am a member of Team Compendium, which maintains the Rulings Compendium. We work with Pokémon R&D to comprise the Rules Team which submits rulings to Pokémon and, once those rulings are verified by Pokémon, they go into the Compendium as official rulings. I am also currently a Regional Professor Coordinator, which is a volunteer that helps stores and professors with issues they need assistance with.
How did you first get introduced to the Pokémon TCG and The PokéGym?
PokePop:
My son brought home some cards when he was in 1st grade in 1999. I said if we were going to get these cards we'd learn how to play the game they are for. I found the PokéGym when I was looking for translations for Team Rocket cards. I was on the site for a week or two before I realized there were forums!
Team Compendium hosts a compilation of official rulings for the Pokémon Trading Card Game. The Compendium dates back to the WotC era, when it presented information from their weekly community chats. Tell us more about why The Compendium was created, and its importance for players of the Pokémon TCG.
PokePop:
In the early days of the Pokémon TCG, there was no Judge program, no training, nowhere that players or organizers could go during a tournament to find out how specific card interactions worked. You would go to one tournament and a card would work this way. You'd go to another, and it would work that way. There was no consistency. And there was no way to argue with someone about how it correctly worked. It was all just "I'm the judge, and I think it works this way, so that is that." Now, WotC did have their weekly chat where they would answer any and all questions asked of them. Many of the questions were about upcoming events or favorite Pokemon, but some of them were actual ruling questions and they would either answer them or go and get the answer from Japan and then report back with it next week (hopefully!).
One of the PokéGym mods, Koriborous, took it upon himself to start recording those rulings into a compendium that would be available for judges and players to use in tournaments with the goal of giving a consistent experience at those events. Unfortunately, he soon decided that he was going to switch games and join the MagiNation community. He asked for volunteers to take over his work on the Compendium and the 5 original members of the Team stood up and took it over. We worked at spreading the news about the Compendium to other pockets of the Pokémon TCG community. As noted above, WotC took notice of our actions and liked what they saw. At one point they tried making their own Compendium, but the trick of having a Compendium is keeping it updated, and that never happened with their version.
The origins of the community date back to 1999 with its founder, Brian Brokaw. What can you tell us about the earliest days of The PokéGym when it was part of The Psylum Network?
PokePop:
I didn't join the Gym until after Brian left, so I don't know about the earliest days. For those who don't know, Brian wrote one of the first books on the Pokémon TCG and coined the phrase "Haymaker" for one of the game's earliest deck archetypes. Back in those days, pre social media, message forums were where communities could get together. The PokéGym was a close-knit community where we could all interact with others who loved the TCG.
How would you describe the original community, during and prior to the Psylum Network days, and its interaction with other similar enthusiast communities during that time?
PokePop:
There were two main online forum communities [focused on the TCG] in those early days, PokéGym and Pojo. Pojo focused more on articles and actually managed a deal where they got Pojo magazines published! There were crossovers in contributions where both I and Chrisbo contributed to Pojo articles. PokéGym's forums were their heart. Many of the competitive players of the day contributed to discussions on the forums, and, for some reason, managers at WotC would pop in now and then to also contribute to the discussion.
In February 2001, The Psylum Network was purchased by USA Network, which went on to shut down all the fan websites within that network, including The PokéGym. The decision almost left the community without a home. What was the mood of the team and the community during that time?
PokePop:
Oh, it was shocking. There was no warning. One night the PokéGym existed. The next day, it was a black hole. Players met on different forums and some temporary forums were created and the word spread on where to find the community. Tyais, the webmaster, and the moderators, which included the members of Team Compendium, started making plans to create a new forum. Many other members of the community, since they didn't see immediate action, also started talking about creating their own PokéGym forums. Team Compendium also looked to host the Compendium on our own site. It was a bit of a panic. We all knew something would be created, but it was a bit up in the air exactly how it would shake out.
Shortly after the closure of The Psylum Network, Wizards of the Coast stepped in and agreed to take over the community, renaming it The Wizards' PokéGym (WizPoG). How did this opportunity to ‘rescue’ the community happen?
PokePop:
Well, before any of the plans we all were working on could take shape, we were contacted by WotC. Apparently, they were planning on starting up their own community forums for the Pokémon TCG. As mentioned, they had dropped in on the forums now and again. They had also invited the Team Compendium members to come judge at the 2001 Super Trainer Showdowns. So, since we happened to be free and they liked how we handled things on the Psylum PokéGym forums, they asked us to become their admins for the new forums and use the PokéGym name since it was now free.
What notable changes and developments occurred under WizPoG that differed from the original community?
PokePop:
I'd say there were two things. First, everything except the forums were no longer under our control. Articles were mainly written by WotC employees, but we did contribute somewhat in [that] area. Second, the size of the forums changed overnight by several orders of magnitude. While before it was a smaller, more focused community, overnight it became a huge community with all ranges of experience and maturity. Also, since it was an official forum, moderation had to be a little bit tighter with a view to the wider age range that was coming to the forums.
How was the working relationship between the WotC team and legacy members of The PokéGym team?
PokePop:
Oh, it was wonderful. The WotC reps knew us, trusted us, and gave us a wide range of autonomy. They knew that we thought about the game and players the same way that they did. They acted as a buffer with any problems or issues that might have come up from other parts of the company. We really felt like we were all rowing in the same direction. One thing we did make sure to do, though, was to keep the Compendium on our own site. We did not want to worry about losing ownership of it to WotC which might have happened if they had hosted it. They had no issue with us doing that.
How involved were The PokéGym team during hosted events, such as the TCG Tour, or Super Trainer Showdown?
PokePop:
We weren't involved with the earliest events other than as participants. But we did start developing relationships with the WotC managers at that time. Myself and Pokesensei on the East Coast and Chrisbo, Big Daddy Snorlax, and Qasic on the West Coast. I should also mention Stephen Mumford (Koribourus) who was the originator of the Compendium. At the time of these early events, the Compendium didn't exist, and Stephen was a fellow PokéGym moderator that came to these early events.
By the time the second Super Trainer Showdown series happened in 2001, the Compendium was established and WotC invited the members of Team Compendium to help judge at these [Showdowns]. We were also involved with helping run the World Championship held by WotC and the Fan Appreciation event that WotC held after they lost their license. Unfortunately I didn't make it to either of those last two, which I still regret.
What was it like for the team to be elevated from a fan-based passion project to representing the TCG in an official capacity with WotC?
PokePop:
That was a bit surreal. We'd get asked for autographs at big events. People would expect us to know all sorts of inside information, which, while we did know some things, wasn't anywhere near as much as people thought we knew. But for the most part, most people didn't know who we were and that was just fine. The only thing we ever wanted to get known was that the Compendium was where to get rulings and that the PokéGym was where to get information.
After WotC lost the licence to work on the Pokémon TCG, WizPoG was closed on August 8th, 2003. Team Compendium then took control of the community. After two and a half years of support from WotC, what was it like to go through another transition period and become independent again?
PokePop:
We had some warning this time. Unlike when Psylum shut down, we knew a few months ahead of time that WotC was losing the license. With that amount of time, we were able to make plans and set up our new independant site. Luckily, Mike Boozer (Dark Master Trainer Mike), the WotC customer service manager, interceded on our behalf to allow us to keep the PokéGym name and even some of the graphics. WotC lawyers initially did not want to hand over anything!
What has the relationship been like between The PokéGym and The Pokémon Company International, the current publishers of the Pokémon TCG, since they took over in 2003 with EX Ruby & Sapphire?
PokePop:
When Pokémon USA started holding their first events, which were the prereleases for the Ruby & Sapphire expansion, we made sure to attend those events on both coasts and try to build a relationship with the PUSA reps that were there. We were able to make those connections, and luckily, they knew about us and were happy for us to continue doing work for them on a volunteer basis. The way that rulings were collected changed dramatically. During the WotC era, rulings were collected from weekly chats that their reps held on a weekly basis. PUSA had no interest in holding chats like that, so we worked with the R&D department to start the process that we still use today.
We take ruling questions that are asked by players or judges, or create questions on our own, and submit them [along with] suggested answers to R&D. They either confirm that the answers are correct or give us the correct answer. We then publish them in the Compendium. We also had a great relationship with the early Organized Play team. They also made frequent appearances on the PokéGym site and invited us to judge at all the early major tournaments.
Which decisions about the TCG generated the most controversy at The PokéGym?
PokePop:
Hands down, that had to be when WotC eliminated the Masters division. As you can imagine, since most of the players, and almost all of the online community, were Masters, this was an extremely unpopular decision. Luckily, they came to their senses after seeing the backlash. But if that decision had stayed for longer than it did, it might have destroyed the community.
We are now in 2024 and Team Compendium continues to host The PokéGym, twenty-five years after it was originally created. What do you believe are the reasons the community has continued to be active for all these years?
PokePop:
Well, I don't know how active the community is currently. Certainly the Compendium still gets a lot of usage and we get asked rulings questions in the "Ask the Rules Team" forum, and we do post the new set's FAQs on the front page, but otherwise a lot of the community has shifted over to other social media such as Facebook and Discord. I find it a little sad because those apps have little to no way to find discussions or posts that happened in the past, even within the past few days. It's all so transient now.
You host a podcast called PokePopCast, which conducts interviews and shares information about the Pokémon TCG. Tell us more about it!
PokePop:
When I started the PokePopCast, there was a hole in Judge training. There would be Judge seminars held at the largest events such as US Nationals and Worlds, and the staff of those events and some other professors that happened to be there could learn techniques and principles. And the thought was that these leaders in their communities could take those learnings and spread them more locally. But that never really worked out very well. The numbers were too small. and the seminars were too hard for many judges to get to. So I decided to share some of the techniques that I had learned over the years, and also help explain new rulings or documents as they came out.
Once the COVID shutdown came, two things happened. There were no events or tournaments being run that people needed help with and, more importantly, Pokémon started running online seminars for judges and got the Professor University up and running. Both of these things helped fill the hole that I was trying to fill, so there was less need for my PopCasts. I'm in the process of shifting the focus of them to sharing info for both players and staff so that I'm not covering the same ground that Pokémon is now covering on their own.
As someone who has been involved with the Pokémon TCG since the release of the Jungle expansion, what are your thoughts on how the game has evolved throughout the years?
PokePop:
The one thing that is very clear to me is that the quality of judging has improved tremendously over the past 10 years or so. I used to have to run around at events helping judges make all kinds of rulings. That is not the case anymore. Judges know their resources for both card rulings and game rulings. The events are just so much larger, too. The staff at this year's NAIC was about as large as the number of players at the first US Nationals, about 500. Streaming is such a big part of Pokémon Organized Play now. That just didn't exist years ago. I had a picture of US Nats finals from 2012 pop up on my Facebook timeline recently and it was being held at three tables off to the side of the hall. No stage, no streaming. No one [was] able to really watch other than the table judges.
As a judge, do you recall any difficult decisions you’ve had to make? How do you reflect on those?
PokePop:
Without going into details, any judge that says they haven't made a mistake either hasn't judged enough or is lying. Yes, I've made mistakes. And I hold every one of them in my heart and my head to remind me how important it is that I get things right.
What have been your favourite Pokémon TCG expansions?
PokePop:
That's a hard one. Not counting Base Set, I guess I'd say Neo Genesis because that was the first major update to the game that, combined with the first card rotation in the game, made a big change to the game and breathed new life into it.
What are the most satisfying moments you have had during your time working on the Pokémon TCG?
PokePop:
I think I'd have to say the time I ran half of the Last Chance Qualifier. It was early on and while I had judged a number of times, I had never run a tournament and had never even seen TOM (Tournament Operations Manager). Dave Schwimmer (Sr. Manager of Organized Play at TPC Intl.) came up to me and said, "We have 800 players for the LCQ and that's too many to run in one room. Take half of them and these people and go run it.” I had an absolute ball running around taking care of all sorts of problems: card rulings, TOM issues, player issues, and game state disputes. It was literally the first time I was in charge of an event. I loved it.
What are your fondest memories and proudest achievements from your time working at The PokéGym?
PokePop:
I'll pick a funny one. Back in the WotC days, Mike Boozer would show off his binder at the end of events, and while pointing at his Prerelease Raichu, [he] would deny that it existed. So, while those in the know knew about the card and that it did exist, there was a lot of confusion and disputes about it. In early 2006, someone was looking to buy a copy of the card, and I helped connect the buyer with Dark Master Trainer Mike. The sale was consummated in late March. I saw the opportunity to have some mischief and announce the sale on April 1st. This of course caused a lot of confusion, in line with how Dark MT Mike always showed off the card while denying it. Lots of people thought it was an April Fools joke and even when I announced that it was real the next day, there were still doubters. I'm glad that it's now been proven to be a real card after being graded by CGC.
In all the years you’ve been involved with the Pokémon TCG, do you have any items or merchandise that are special and meaningful to you?
PokePop:
Hmm. Well, not that I can talk about.
But I guess something I can talk about are the "Banned at the Super Trainer Showdown" Sneasel giant cards. I happened to come across them on eBay years ago. One had just ended unsold with an asking price of $99. I checked and found it relisted and immediately bought it. When arranging delivery with the shipper, I asked if he had any more. He did. He also had the other three. I arranged to buy two of them and he threw in a couple of other display pieces from the Super Trainer Showdowns. Unfortunately I no longer have any of the Sneasels, but I'm glad I saved them from destruction. And I do use the other display pieces in my office.
In the past few years, the game and hobby have faced challenges with the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, there’s been a high demand for product that wasn’t reaching its audience due to a number of factors, such as resellers flipping their product for profit. Based on your own experience, how did these events impact the players?
PokePop:
I haven't experienced that issue so I can't say much about it. I haven't heard my local players complaining about [not] being able to get the cards they need.
Are any of the founding members of the PokéGym community still in touch? If so, what are they up to these days?
PokePop:
Chrisbo, Big Daddy Snorlax, and myself are still active. PokeSensei has been active[ly] moderating the Gym for the past few years and we did see him in person a few years ago. We'd love to see him get back to being active in judging and running events. We haven't really heard much from Qasic over the years. While not a founding member, IPGeek has shown up a few times to visit at big events. He's been [doing] youth counseling in California for the past few years.
What do you believe the future holds for The PokéGym, Team Compendium, and all the work that you and the team are doing?
PokePop:
At some point we'll have to think about handing over the reins to a new generation. But we're not quite there yet. We've kept it going for 25 years now and we'll want to find people with that same level of commitment.
PokePop, thank you for taking the time to speak with Johto Times and representing The PokéGym to share its long history and importance within the Pokémon fan community. Do you have any closing comments you would like to share?
PokePop:
Thanks for letting us share a bit of the history of the Gym and the Compendium. All we ever really want is to help the game run smoothly and consistently. We're always willing to look for new ways to help with that.
Additional Photographs
I would like to thank PokePop and the staff of The PokéGym and Team Compendium for taking their time to answer my questions. The PokéGym holds a special place in the hearts of the Pokémon TCG community, thanks to the hard work and dedication of these people. I hope that work continues for many more years to come.
I LOVED this interview, it was such a fun nostalgia trip!! PokeGym and the Rules Compendium have been extremely important resources for my competitive Pokemon TCG journey, and it was awesome to read PokePop's perspectives about the legacy of the site. All of the photographs made me smile, and I could even identify some of the tournament locations in the photos before reading the captions because I was there too haha! It's so cool that they're still friends and working together to this day. I'm glad we have such passionate folks with a deep knowledge of the game ensuring that competitive Pokemon TCG continues to thrive. Thanks so much for yet another incredible newsletter!