Pokémon TCG Pocket Players Discover Flaw In Search Function, Making It "Completely Useless"
A player has discovered a critical flaw in Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket's search feature, which they claim renders the function "completely useless." The official mobile platform for the collecting and trading of Pokémon cards, Pokémon TCG Pocket has become immensely popular with fans of the franchise everywhere. However, it's still in its early days, and TCG Pocket is missing several features that players say it'll need if it wants to compete with physical card collection in the long run.
One of those features, as noted by Reddit user leetshoe, is an improved search function. While attempting to find Pokémon with restorative abilities amid their card library, they typed "heal" into the in-game search bar. However, instead of returning a full list of Pokémon who can heal their teammates, it only returned two versions of Butterfree. This is because TCG Pocket's search function doesn't allow players to search the entire text of the card. This led commenter DoctorNerfarious to call the search feature "completely useless."
Player Notices The Search Function In Pokémon TCG Pocket Does Not Work As Intended
Pokémon TCG Pocket Doesn't Let Players Search The Entire Card
The reason leetshoe couldn't find all their healing Pokémon with a search is simple: Pokémon TCG Pocket only lets players search the names of Pokémon, the names of their abilities/attacks, and the names of card artists. Ability descriptions are inexplicably left out of the search function, which makes it difficult to find a particular kind of ability if you don't know its specific name. Butterfree has a move called Powder Heal, which is why it showed up - searching a word only returns results that contain it in their move titles, not in their descriptions.
This can make it especially difficult to build any kind of competitive deck. Say you want to center your playstyle on inflicting a certain status effect, or you realize, like leetshoe did, that you could probably use more healers on your team. You'll have to know by heart which Pokémon can use the type of move you're looking for. You could, of course, search for Pokémon with the right moveset online, but you'll still have to be intimately familiar with your own TCG Pocket library, or you'll spend a lot of time uselessly searching through it.
Our Take: Is The Search Function Is Pokémon TCG Pocket "Useless"?
It's Not Perfect, But Can Be Improved
Frankly, I think it's a bit of a stretch to call the search function "completely useless." It's not great - it's one of many features that need to be improved, along with trading. It'd be more accurate to say that the current iteration of the search feature isn't for the faint of heart. If you know your Pokémon well enough, you won't necessarily need an enhanced search function to find out which ones can heal. Still, this system is pretty hostile to new players, and it needs a lot of work.
And it's a simple point of fact that Pokémon TCG Pocket's main focus isn't battling - it's collecting and trading. While it does have a battle feature, it's greatly simplified compared to the physical card game, and wasn't even available at launch. This search feature wasn't made with battling in mind; players who simply collect cards without battling them are more likely to search their libraries by name or artist instead of for keywords in ability descriptions.
Thankfully, Pokémon TCG Pocket has been getting better with updates. Its developers have listened to fans' pleas before, so it's likely this search feature will come up for improvement eventually. For now, though, players will have to content themselves with a Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket search feature that's a lot less than perfect.
Pokemon Trading Card Game Pocket
- Released
- October 30, 2024
- Developer(s)
- DeNA, Creatures Inc.
- Publisher(s)
- The Pokemon Company
- Multiplayer
- Online Multiplayer
- Franchise
- Pokemon
Sources: leetshoe/Reddit, DoctorNerfarious/Reddit
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