'Tis the Season for TCG Advent Calendars

Ho ho ho dear readers. In only a few short days, Santa Claus, the OG Delibird, will be dropping down chimneys all over the world to deliver presents to good little boys and girls. But you don’t have to wait for Santa (or a Delibird) to get some sweet holiday themed TCG loot.  In fact, two of the most popular TCGs, Pokemon and Yugioh, have previously released advent calendars to celebrate the countdown to Christmas, and today we’re going to take a look at them.

The Pokemon Countdown Calendar

Released in 2008, the first and so-far only Pokemon TCG advent calendar contained 24 cards reprinted from the Diamond and Pearl era of the TCG with a special foil snowflake set symbol. As with all advent calendars, starting on the first day of December, collectors opened a single slot on the calendar and obtained a card to help countdown the days until Christmas.

The Pokemon TCG Countdown Calendar

Glameow from the Countdown Calendar. Note the gold snowflake symbol

On Christmas Eve, collectors received a special holographic Pikachu promo card with a silver snowflake stamp, along with a diamond and pearl era booster pack.

Christmas Eve Pikachu

The Countdown Calendar never received a United States release, but it was available for purchase in Canada (as a Toys R’ Us exclusive) and a handful of European countries including Germany, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy. A sealed Countdown Calendar fetches a pretty penny on the secondary market today (probably because it remains the only Pokemon TCG Advent Calendar to-date) but the complete set of Countdown Calendar cards can be obtained for a slightly better price.

For collectors interested in grading cards from the Countdown Calendar, I have some bad news. The product was designed with sharp cardboard prongs to hold the cards in place in their respective slots. This has resulted in cards from the Countdown Calendar being riddled with puncture indentations, making mint copies of these cards very difficult to find.

The inside of the Countdown Calendar, note the sharp prongs in each slot

Yu-Gi-Oh! Advent Calendars

Konami released not one, but two Advent Calendars for the Yu-Gi-Oh! (YGO) TCG. Unfortunately for US collectors, both of these calendars were German exclusive products, but for collectors of both games, I think they are must own products. The first German YGO advent calendar was released a few years after the Countdown Calendar in October 2011.

German Exclusive Yu-Gi-Oh! Adventskalender from 2011

When compared to the Countdown Calendar, the YGO 2011 advent calendar offers a number of important improvements: first, the packaging for the YGO advent calendar was far superior to the Countdown Calendar, cards rested in little plastic (as opposed to jagged cardboard) slots, ensuring that the contents of the advent calendar were preserved in adequate condition; second, all of the cards in the YGO advent calendar were either playable or fairly popular reprints from the 5Ds era of the YGO TCG, unlike the Countdown Calendar which featured only glorified reprints of common cards from the Diamond and Pearl era sets; third, the YGO advent calendar contained cards with different rarities (16 super rare cards, 7 ultra rare cards, and 1 secret rare reprint of Stardust Dragon that collectors opened on Christmas Eve, along with a German pack of Extreme Victories) whereas the Countdown Calendar offered 23 cards with a gold snowflake symbol, and the silver snowflake Pikachu on Christmas Eve; and finally, the cards in the YGO advent calendar had a unique set symbol and numbering system, corresponding with the day that the card was opened in the advent calendar. 

Christmas Eve Stardust Dragon

These features represent significant quality of life improvements when compared to the Countdown Collection and these features were largely continued were largely continued in the second German YGO advent calendar.

German Exclusive 2014 YGO Adventskalender Zexal-edition)

Released in October 2014, the YGO ZEXAL-Edition advent calendar contained reprints of cards from YGO’s ZEXAL era. Like the 5Ds calendar before it, the packing remains excellent and the cards have their own unique numbering system. In a step backwards, all of the cards were printed as super rare cards, with the exception of the Christmas Eve card which remained a Secret Rare. In two huge steps forward, however, the cards featured in the calendar were all XYZ monsters (with the exception of December 22’s Galaxy Eyes Photon Dragon and the Christmas Eve card) and the Christmas Eve card was, at the time of its release, only available through the advent calendar. The card in question, Santa Claws, would later be reprinted and made available around the world in the second Premium Gold Set, but the ZEXAL advent calendar was one of the rare instances in which a card was released in Germany before the rest of the world.

What are your favorite holiday TCG cards? Let me know in the comments below.

Thecardpletionist has been collecting Pokemon TCG cards since the game’s English release in 1999. You can read more from the author at http://thecardpletionist.blogspot.com/ and follow him on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/thecardpletionist/