Pokemon Center Online Opens!
For the last few years, the
only way to do online shopping
from the Pokemon
Center (from within Japan, of
course) has been
to pick from the select items listed on the Pokemon Center’s
official Amazon storefront.
This system has
been pretty good —
Amazon style service, fast
shipping, the option to pay at
convenience stores. So imagine our surprise
this January, when posters started
popping up in Pokemon Center/Stores saying that a new online store
would be opening this
February!
At 10am JST today
the store went live –
well… for the most bit. As could be
expected, there
was a lot of traffic, so this error/maintenance image was
not a happy sight.
There was
also a huge glitch in the system where credit cards were being
processed for
incomplete orders – meaning
every time it errored and you tried
again to place your order, there was a
chance your card was charged! The
glitch
seems to be fixed now and orders are processing normally.
The main draw is the limited edition Kanto-region
badge set. For about $170US,
this beautiful framed set includes the original 8 badges from the Pokemon
Red/Blue/Green series.
Preorders run through March and it’s the first online-
only item to be
offered. They’re to be delivered in
mid-June.
There is
also a campaign for every ¥5000
spent, you receive a
special file folder with Pokemon Center Online
exclusive art. There’s 3 to
collect
(designs cannot be chosen) and there’s a limit to 10 per order. It
should
be noted that a lot of the more
expensive items, like the badge set
above, are exempt from this
offer.
Some sold out items,
such as the N Nendoroid figure
& 20th Anniversary 2DS
systems
are also for sale on the new online shop. The Monthly Pikachu
series is also
being re-released especially for
the online market in March, so if
you missed any the first time, you can
complete the set!
With
every
order, you’ll receive a postcard that has a special code to download
a Pikachu
in your game
(Japanese cartridges only).
As well,
every order
is shipped in a gorgeous Pikachu-themed box — with Pikachu
packing tape!
They’re also
offering the gift bag wrapping service (for a fee), which has
usually only
been available around Christmas
time.
On the
whole, the new Pokemon Center Online
looks pretty good
(glitches aside). Like most Japanese online stores, they
accept credit card and
cash on
delivery (although items like the badge set say they only accept credit
card) and you can schedule your
delivery to when you’ll be home. They have a
lot more than the Amazon
storefront and there are lots of nice
campaign
bonuses.
It will be interesting to watch and see how they
handle new
released goods and
to see how fast they sell out. With the Amazon storefront, it
was customary
to list at 0:00 and sometimes
popular items would disappear
instantly. Maybe now that you can order from
home, some of the chaos of in-
store
release days will die down a little (on popular releases, it’s not
unusual to
see lines outside
the larger Pokemon Centers starting from 8am) — but we can
only
hope.
If
you’d like to check out the
store yourself, it’s
www.pokemoncenter-
online.com
Unfortunately this
store is Japan-
only.
If you’d like to get Pokemon goodies for yourself, there is an official
American counterpart that does sell
quite a bit (note that all
merchandise
here is remade for the American market, they do not sell the
Japanese products),
but they
only ship within the United States/APO addresses. If
you’re
outside the US/Japan — or would
just like to get some Japanese-only
merch– you’ll have to use a shopping
service to order from the Pokemon
Center
such as Hoshiiya.com
Micajah McGregor, Editor in Chief of FanFest.com and renowned entertainment journalist, graduated from USC with a focus on Journalism and Film Studies. With an MBA from The Wharton School, he began his career at “PopCulture Pulse” and has been instrumental in shaping FanFest into a prime entertainment news source. Known for his financial analysis of celebrity net worths, Micajah received the ‘Digital Editor of the Year’ award in 2018. He’s also an active blogger, sharing his passion for superhero films and ’90s TV. Contact him at [email protected] for engaging entertainment insights.
