Last week the Pokémon TCG (Trading Card Game) Illustration Contest became embroiled in controversy, after accusations of several broken rules were made. It appeared that AI had been used to create several entries, and that some contestants may have used false identities to fraudulently submit more entries than allowed. An announcement was made that the top 300 would be being reassessed, with entries found to have broken the rules being replaced.
Today the top 300 list was updated, with a variety of entries removed, and new art taking their places. Pokeguardian did extensive checking and discovered quite a few entries had been removed and replaced:
| Names removed from the Top 300 list | Names added in the new Top 300 list (not present in the old list) |
|---|---|
| Amanda Navarr | Emma Bieber |
| Daisuke Unno | Kaitlin Jackson |
| Masumi Doi | Margaret Li |
| SeikaGabriela Togo | Mia Lloyd |
| Takafumi Kijima | Sarah Hamilton |
| Tomomi Morita | Valerie Ng |
| Vigen K | akira |
| Vigen Khachadoorian | daisuke unno |
| Vigo K | ejbcya |
| Vigo Khachadoorian | hitoya sumi |
| Yuzuka Watanabe | kaeria |
| kaえりあ | kumakis |
| tenten | |
| yoshiyma yuga |
As many suspected, the entries with V & K names have been found to have broken the rules, and have been removed, along with several other entrants. Some incredible new artists have replaced those who have broken rules, you can see the full list of the top 300 here.
Some particular stand outs of the new entries are the Bidoof by Kaitlin Jackson and Flygon by Emma Bieber.
Round two of the contest will now follow, with the top 300 reduced to a top 100, with semi finalists expected to be announced during July 2024. The Finals are next, with one Grand Prize Winner; one Best standard card illustration Winner , one Best ex card illustration Winner; six First Place Runner Ups; and fifteen Judge’s Award Winners will be selected from the one hundred (100) Semi-Finalists on or about September 2024.
Which is your top pick of the entrants? There are so many incredible artworks!
