Celebrate Pokémon Day 2023 Today With Bleeding Cool

The Pokémon Company International has announced a ton of new exciting releases for today’s annual Pokémon Day. We have new Pokémon TCG news, a new Scarlet & Violet DLC, and more. Celebrate Pokémon Day 2023 with Bleeding Cool as I break down all of the announcements.

New Generation Nine DLC: Pokémon Scarlet and Violet: The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero

A two-part storyline of Downloadable Content is coming for the new Generation Nine game, including Fall 2023’s Part 1: The Teal Mask, which will be followed by Part 2: The Indigo Disk at a later date. Tsunekazu Ishihara, president and CEO of The Pokémon Company had this to say of the DLC:

“We are so grateful that millions of Trainers around the world have chosen to explore the expansive Paldea region. In The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero, fans will take a trip to the land of Kitakami where they will meet new Pokémon and interesting characters. I sincerely hope that Trainers who embark on this new journey find the same excitement and joy they experienced when they encountered their first Pokémon.”

The Teal Mask will focus on a school trip to Kitakami. In these DLCs, new Pokémon will be introduced including the Legendaries Ogerpon in The Teal Mask and Terapagos in The Indigo Disk. Other new species include Okidogi, Munkidori, and Fezandipiti.

Pokémon Trading Card Game Classic Decks reprint the old and introduce the new

A new product will reprint certain Base Set cards with a new foil pattern distinct from what we saw in Celebrations. This product will contain three 60-card decks and will come to Japan in October 2023 and in the West later in 2023. Here’s how Pokémon TCG Classic is described:

[This product] contains everything fans need to play the Pokémon TCG, including preconstructed decks and gameplay accessories—all of which have been uniquely designed to be both beautiful and functional to deliver a polished battling experience.

It will reprint Base Set Venusaur, Charizard, Blastoise, Pikachu, Chansey, Mewtwo, and more while giving Lugia, Ho-Oh, and Suicune ex cards.

Pokémon GO News

With more to come as a new season is set to begin March 2023, Niantic has detailed the following information for today’s special announcements:

• The GO Plus+ will be released July 21st, 2023, and will pair with Pokémon Sleep which will finally be released in Summer 2023. Pairing these will allow Trainers to track their sleep and will result in a Special Research with a nightcap-wearing Snorlax.
• Connectivity to Scarlet & Violet begins today, introducing a way to catch Gimmighoul using the Coin Bag and evolve Gimmighoul into Gholdengo using 999 Gimmighoul Coins.

Other News

• Pokémon Concierge is a stop-motion animated series set at a resort. It is coming to Netflix at a later date.
• Zacian joins Unite today, February 27th, at 4 AM GMT until March 27th, at 00:59 AM GMT.
• The Paldean Starters Fuecoco, Sprigatito, and Quaxly arrive in Café ReMix today until March 17, 2023.
• New Paradox species arrive today in Scarlet & Violet, including Walking Wake in Scarlet and Iron Leaves in Violet. Walking Wake is a Water/Dragon-type past relative of Suicune and Iron Leaves is a Grass/Psychic-type future relative of Virizion.

Watch the full Presents here.

Also, let’s crack open the sparkling cider because TPCI was gracious enough to send a food-themed care package for the day. This package included cookies — delicious ones at that — along with a special set of glasses, a bottle of sparkling cider, a spatula, and even packs of trading cards.

Here’s what I was able to pull from the packs, which included a selection from 2022’s main series releases of Sword & Shield – Brilliant Stars, Sword & Shield – Astral Radiance, Sword & Shield – Lost Origin, and Sword & Shield – Silver Tempest.

These last four expansions remain legendary due to the Trainer Gallery subset of Character Rares, Character Super Rares, Full Art Trainers, and Black & Gold VMAXes which add to the overall pulls. Thanks so much to The Pokémon