A shop owner who runs a retro game store in Japan's Mie Prefecture was arrested by Japanese law enforcement following the sale of a forged Pokémon card in December 2021, according to a report from CBC TV.
Yukinori Harada, the 48-year-old owner of Alive Yokkaichi Tokiwa, allegedly sold the fake for 2,200 Yen (about $20) to a customer, but his arrest wasn't just for the card — he also allegedly had a fake copy of "Rockman" displayed in store, which is the Japanese name for Mega Man. Harada admitted to the police investigators that he thought it might have been a fake when he sold it.
A further 150 cards and games were confiscated from the store on suspicion of being fake, and the police are attempting to determine the original sources of the forgeries.
The shop's Twitter account made a tweet apologising for the "inconvenience", assuring customers that the store will remain open, and that they are refraining from making any further comments while they investigate.
This is just the latest story involving forged Pokémon cards, as the market continues to boom. Late last year, 7.6 tons of fake Pokémon cards were seized at customs in China, and Logan Paul was scammed out of $3.5 million with GI Joe cards that were sold to him as Pokémon cards.
[source news.yahoo.co.jp, via kotaku.com]
Comments 26
So these were the cards Logan Paul got scammed into buying lmao
I'm just here for the "Nintendo's gone to far" comments, even though they weren't even mentioned in the article. 🤣
I’m pretty sure I have fake Italian Pokémon cards from about 15 years ago. There’s always been a problem.
This is why you don't buy gaming items from Wish dot com.
Grrrrr evil company putting the little man down even if he is a conman thief. Did I do it right?
@eaglebob345 Haha, me too. I've got the popcorn ready for the show! I come to the site for the news and awesome reviews, and definitely stay for the comments.
Bro, I remember collecting knock-off Spanish Pokemon cards in the china shops on holiday when I was younger. I even managed to get a knock off secret rare Zekrom which in hindsight is amazing. Reading this article unlocked a memory from years ago jaysus.
Maybe he was just trying to preserve Pokemon cards and that copy of Megaman?
And yet Redd has an entire shop full of forgeries for sale on Harv’s Island and no one has done a single thing to stop him. Where is Booker?!
@Arawn93 I mean, it only counts as being a conman thief, if you actually know the item(s) are fake. Just because you suspect that they aren't the real deal, doesn't mean you actually know for sure.
Back in like 1997/1998 a guy my sister was dating gave me a Japanese holographic Togepi card, which was a big deal since most of the kids at my school didn't even know about Togepi yet at that time (I was in 4th grade). I never really confirmed if it was fake or not, but it could have been - the guy that gave it to me couldn't have been any older than 16.
I decided to trade it for 2 other normal holographic cards (Charizard and Chansey I think) because this was actually my first one so I met some kids at a park and they flat out jumped me. Held me down and took turns kicking me and then put a useless potion card across the park and said it was my Togepi card. Not afraid to admit I cried for at least an hour after they took my card and left.
I stopped collecting all Pokemon cards after that. My mom still asks why I didn't keep them but I don't feel it's worth it to tell her what happened decades ago. In hindsight, I'm glad it went down that way, I don't like collecting items unless I can enjoy them.
Those "fake" Rockman games have been around in Japan forever. And it's not a "fake" so much an an unofficial release as Rockman was never released on the PC Engine.
@Astral-Grain Oh man, that sucks… 🙁
I know that was quite some time ago, but traumatizing crap like that from childhood often sticks with us forever. A kid should never have to go through that experience.
@Gitface I appreciate you saying that. I haven't thought about it in a while but I don't have any bad feelings about it, especially after how long it's been.
I don't care about how much money I could have made if I saved them or anything like that because it's just stuff that would have sat in a box for no other reason besides hopefully selling them later. I'm just not into that "buy it up just to sell it for a profit later" kind of style. I didn't even know how to play the card game lol I just played the gameboy games and watched the anime. I only collected cards because everyone else at school was doing it and it helped me make friends.
Kids are kids, and if something becomes so popular it becomes tempting to beat a kid up to get it yourself - I can't even blame them, Pokemon seemed more popular than ever during those times - especially to kids who had to ask their parents for money to even get them.
@Arawn93 Yep, you're on the right track. Don't forget to curse Nintendo's continued existence while you're at it.
@Arawn93 more righteous-indignation please. also, some kind of anti-corporate sentiment (coming from a corporate website) would help.
Nintendo’s gone to far
That Rockman port was a fan made conversion. The author converted a few NES games to PCE for fan enjoyment. Because of people like this, it's no wonder he stopped.
Finally I can sleep at night
@Lony85 I think if you're running a shop and selling something to customers you kind of have a duty of care
If you suspect something is wrong/fake...then you don't sell it to customers, you return it the supplier.
Maybe if they didn't artificially make cards scarce and let everyone buy one who wants one this wouldn't happen. The creators of these cards are just doing their part for card preservation since Nintendo clearly has no interest.
@Coalescence ah here is the classic handwaved “well…illegal thing would never have happened if they just did something they were never obligated to do in the first place” as if it was a brilliant justification of any kind lol
@Coalescence
So even though Nintendo had nothing to do with this, it is still their fault?
Edit: so after rereading the comment this seems kinda like sarcasm. If that is the case then disregard my comment.
@Hck I know, just online, the guy who wrote the conversion.
Like in the late 2000s.
He ported a couple other NES games I think as well, with the intent that people would be good people and download the NES ROM patches for their own personal use, like playing on a flash cart or emulator, or burning their own CDs. For private, non-commercial use.
I guess it's not too surprising that once he converted Rockman to CD, that someone would be a bad person and start selling them, and ruining it for everyone.
@eaglebob345 Nintendo is not even in charge of selling the cards, but yeah 😂
The card in the photo didn't look like any Pokemon card I've seen before, so I went looking and found these pics of the same fakes. Looks like someone's faking golden 'metal plate' cards.
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