$375,000 Pokemon Trading Card Game box opening ends in absolute tragedy

Brent Koepp
youtuber opening pokemon cards

A Pokemon Trading Card Game livestream ended in disaster after it was quickly discovered that the booster packs were fake. The YouTube channel spent over $375k on the 1st Edition base set box, only for it to be resealed. 

Despite making its debut in 1999, the Pokemon TCG has exploded in popularity over the past two years. The hobby hit an all-time high in October when influencer Logan Paul opened a base set booster box he paid $216k for while livestreaming.

However, things didn’t work out as well for another YouTube channel who paid $375k for the same item. The livestream unboxing of the rare collectible quickly turned tragic when it was discovered that the TCG item was actually fake.

fake pokemon card booster box
The rare sealed 1st Edition booster box was actually fake.

Rare Pokemon TCG box opening ends in complete disaster

The event was hosted by YouTube channel ‘Dumb Money Live’ and included popular Pokemon content creators such as Lee ‘Leonhart’ Seinfeld. The rare 1st Edition base set booster box was bought for a record-breaking $375k through Logan Paul’s collectible trader ‘Collectables Guru.’

“The owner of the box supposedly bought three boxes when he was a child. They sat in the gun safe the entire time,” the Pokemon dealer explained. However, they quickly realized something was amiss after breaking the seal. Several booster packs were different colors, and some weren’t even 1st Edition.

“Oh no. That is a major f**king deal!” Guru exclaimed. The personality opening the box then revealed the problem: “It’s not even base set cards, these are Jungles! Wow. This is a resealed box. It’s random!”

(Topic starts at 35:41)

Upset, Collectable Guru called up the seller and explained that the box was resealed. “We opened the box literally live and they’re resealed packs. There is like base set 2 mixed in, half of them are 1st Edition. But they are all resealed, this is absolutely unacceptable. How is this going to be taken care of immediately?”

Stunned by the whole thing, Leonhart stood by and said, “Oh my gosh, I was not expecting that.” Guru came back and updated the group and explained that the seller had two other boxes that they were going to open first before bringing them back to the YouTubers.

youtubers opening fake pokemon card box
The YouTubers were floored after the rare Pokemon box was fake.

To add salt to the wound, the box opening was done on stream for charity. Dumb Money Live gave an update and addressed the situation a day later stating: “I don’t know a single person in my network that hasn’t been defrauded as an investor. You have to give sellers a benefit to make this right.”

At the time of writing, the situation has not been entirely rectified. The channel will open a booster pack on October 30 live to verify that the second box is actually real. However, it appears that if this one is fake as well, the seller claims they will refund the content creators their $375k.

About The Author

Brent is a former writer at Dexerto based in the United States, who covered topics such as Pokemon, Gaming, and online Entertainment.