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Went to the Birmingham Gaming Market today and did some proper damage to my wallet – check a look at the pick-ups!  Trainer Gallery / trainer-present cards: A lot of cards I love here, I'm a big fan of the Hisuian Arcanine and have wanted to pick that up for a while, and as you can probably tell, I'll gladly pick up any card featuring N. My favourite of the bunch, though? Honestly, probably Clair and her Kingdra, I just love how dynamic the artwork feels.  Standard Pokémon: Finally picked up that Electivire to go with my Magmortar from last year's Toy Fair pick-ups! Think my favourite of these is either the Skarmory or the Cleffa. Okay, it's the Cleffa.  V cards  Quite a few I like here, obviously, and I really like the Arceus full arts. Having looked up all the Arceus cards and recently locating my Water-type Arceus card from my childhood collection, I'm considering a complete Arceus collection, which is why I broke my soft rule here of only one card per Pokémon – but I did spread the Arceus love out over several stalls at least!  I think my 3 favourites would be Raikou (Legend of Thunder represent! It was my most expensive card again £28 for most of the day – but we'll come back to that), the Hisuian Samurott (love the contrast of the golden leaves and the blue of the water), and that Lumineon (it just pops so nicely!).  Trainer cards:  Favourite of these has to be Cynthia's Ambition, which was the most expensive of the bunch at £20. She's probably another one like Arceus where I see myself collecting all her cards, she's just one of the characters I grew up on and all her full arts look rad as hell. Love the Friends in Sinnoh card too, but that Falkner card also looks far better than any first gym leader deserves to look!  So, going into this event, I actually have defined my collecting a bit more: it's about the cool artwork, characters and Pokémon I have attachments to from my childhood, and there are some Pokémon I'm considering doing 100% collections of, but I also want to draw a line in my spending a bit, and so most of my spending will be limited to events such as these and I have defined two categories I'm buying cards of – "standard" which are cards below a certain price threshold, and the "premium" cards I'll only ever buy one or two of at a time because they're over that threshold but limited by another. I don't care for graded cards as the value for me is in having the cards myself, I don't really care about the price (unless it's too much) but just want cool cards, and so while Near Mint is my ideal condition for my collection, I'm fine picking up Light Play cards if it saves me a little money.  I think having a ceiling on my spending and a better idea of what I wanted finally gave me the confidence in returning to the hobby that I needed to pick up some sleeves, toploaders (for the premium stuff), and two binders (black is standard, blue is for the premium cards in toploaders): With that out of the way, I can talk about the final 2 cards I picked up today – my premium pick-ups. I did a lot of research before the event and had a rough idea of what I'd be interested in when it comes to the lower end of the premium cards pile, but the higher end was much, much more defined as a particular subset of a certain subset of cards which I think have awesome art and just a lot of sentimental value. And I knew which of those cards I wanted first, too.  The first cards stall we hit up on the day was towards the back of the gaming market and had a great selection, with a loooooooot of great stuff, and it's where I probably picked up 40% of my cards straight off the bat. I spotted a few cards from the smaller subset of premium cards I want and another card which would make an excellent companion piece to a previous pick-up at the Toy Fair, but wanted to wait until the end of the show before pulling the trigger.  Hitting up a few more stalls I saw the same card from the small subset I want at a higher price, and also the most expensive card from that small subset. Eventually I got a bit burned out on looking through binders and after finishing off our run through every stall, I knew it was time to go back and revisit those cards and pick one of them to take home! Unfortunately for my wallet before doing that I had a run-in with not getting my hands on a limited edition Japanese PS3 box set of Shadow of the Colossus and ICO, so I decided to go above and beyond, returned to the stall and picked up both of the cards I was interested in: Umbreon VMAX to go along with my Umbreon from last year (which by the way has doubled in value to the point that it is nearing the threshold I'd consider a purchase at to be worthy of the premium binder!), both from the same set and featuring Karen, and the Crown Zenith Galatian Gallery subset's gold Arceus VStar. I mean, where better to start my premium collection than with the Alpha Pokémon that (in-universe) started it all?   So, the small subset I was referring to was the Creation Trio + Arceus gold VStars from Crown Zenith, all with beautiful art from Akika Egawa showcasing the legendary Pokémon at different spots in relation to Mt Coronet: Sinnoh means a lot to me in terms of my Pokémon fandom, and so the appeal just makes sense, and these cards helped me figure out that yeah, there are some cards I'm glad to up my budget for (but, you know, within reason and still trying to be sensible by pacing myself somewhat). While I think my aim is to buy most cards at events, considering I could've picked all of these up in September last year when I was starting to get back into the swing things for less than half of what they're now going for, I think I'll be picking up a few of these between now and the Toy Fair in September (assuming I go). We saw all of these cards at the event today, and Giratina, as I already knew, is by far the most expensive (roughly as much as Dialga and Palkia combined), but even though it's my favourite legendary Pokémon, I think it would've just been an odd place to start.  I'm counting 37 cards picked up today and a lot of damage done to my wallet, but it feels so fun and genuinely good to be back in the hobby. This is the most excited I've felt about Pokémon in a long time, and honestly the reason I didn't pull the trigger on some Paldean cards today isn't for a lack of art, it's a lack of context not having played those games, and so Scarlet is pretty high on my list to get to now!  What's more, Destined Rivals launches at the end of the month with some AWESOME cards coming! With partner Pokémon cards back in full force and Team Rocket the focus this time (ft. Giovanni and the HeartGold and SoulSilver Rocket Executives!) you essential have Rocket's cards returning, a new Cynthia full art, a few Ethan/Gold full arts (including an AWESOME Ethan's/Gold's Typhlosion; Legend of Thunder represent!!) and many other awesome looking cards to go with it all! And then there's the whole Black Bolt/White Flare situation where every Pokémon in the set is getting a full art and they've been split across two separate, parallel sets like the games? I can't wait 

Went to the Birmingham Gaming Market today, which was held at a different venue with SO MUCH more space than last year's event, had way more vendors, and was all around just a much jollier time. Just the one pick-up for me this year: When I picked up GTA IV a while back, I did what I normally do and dodged the Complete Edition (because I'm a bit weird like that; don't worry, this has already bit me in the ass in that I needed to restart my game after the opening 2 hours to install the trophy patch ), but then when I learned that the DLC was available as a separate disc, I knew I'd want to pick it up. Hovered over Episodes from Liberty City on eBay last week but figured I'd wait to see if I could pick it up at today's event, and with it being the main game I was gunning for, my friends helped me out and one of them found it. So, a success!  Besides that, my list didn't really change too much in terms of wants from last year... I saw a couple of copies of Silent Hill 2 on PS2, but they were all the cardboard, non-Platinum versions of the game and so...yeah, all looked worse for wear.  Hilariously... ...same stall, same guy, presumably the exact same Japanese copies a year removed still on sale. My question to him wasn't "oh hey is that Armored Core V/Verdict Day?" but "are those the Japanese copies?"  they also had a Japanese Platinum series-equivalent copy of Last Raven, and elsewhere on the floor I also saw a rogue copy of Nine Breaker which was only £50, albeit not in pristine condition, but much cheaper than the £140 copy I saw last year.  Suikoden V I found!  ...a Japanese copy of. Oof.  The big miss for me of the day - same stall as Armored Core V/Verdict Day - which I don't really see it as because this is the outcome I wanted, was a Japanese limited edition box set of Shadow of the Colossus and ICO on PS3, which looks like this: It's a lovely box set and something I've been aware of for a few years now, I think since my Birmingham Comic Con 2023 pick-ups of the standard Japanese PS2 versions of these games, think it's so cool they got the PS3 versions released separately. We actually beelined to the back area of the convention after first getting in (just in case there was anything worth immediately grabbing) which was when I spotted it, and it was £60 – high enough for me to want to give it a bit of thought, but low enough that I was happy to pick it up at that price (seen it for £40ish on eBay a few times). So I figured, hey, if it's mean to be, it's meant to be – I know it's not a super, super rare item, but it would have been cool to pick it up at a show rather than import it/buy it off eBay, and so decided I'd come back to it at the end of the show, and if it were still there? I'd pick it up, no questions asked.  So we do that. We go back at the end of the show. It's gone! Little bit of a bummer, but alas. I ask the guy working the stall, standing right in front of where it was earlier in the day, and he has no idea what I'm talking about, and then there's a guy right next to him flicking through some games (quite a few customers had gone behind the stall to access the more costly games) with what in his hand? That same Japanese PS3 Shadow of the Colossus/ICO box set.  Must've just barely missed out, which honestly made it sting a good bit more than just knowing it was gone. But don't worry, those funds were allocated elsewhere in my gaming market spending – just not on retro games  Let's see, other stuff I noticed about the event/cool stuff I saw walking around? There was a chips stall (as in, chips from a chippy) and I had my belief reaffirmed that some people don't understand how much vinegar is too much because MAN could you tell from half a stadium away that someone was approaching with chips in their hand! A lot more vlogging and cameras this time around, spotted a few smaller YouTubers I follow again this year (mostly the same ones from last year's event).  Suikoden II on PS1 still goes for an extortionate amount (£375), saw a bunch of copies of Symphony of the Night on PS1 (also extortionate, pushing closer to £500), loads of Pokémon (extortionate pricing for pretty much anything on DS or earlier when it came to the main series – so glad I still have my childhood collection as I would have had a tough time affording to pick them all up for nostalgia's sake now! My Pokémon White 2 purchase at the start of COVID is paying off though, that was £35 and people are selling it for over £100 more ), and ooo I didn't know this but Peace Walker HD on PS3 in Japan got a separate physical release to the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection? Super cool find that, I was admittedly very tempted! Not quite sure what form, if any, my MGS collection could take (Birmingham Comic Con being a month after the MGS concert means it'll probably be a thing...), so I left it for now, but it'll be something to keep an eye out for in the future. Shortly after finding that Peace Walker HD, there was a kid who was probably 13 or 14 there with his mum who I heard saying he was looking for Snake Eater, and it was so sweet hearing his mum help him out and take interest in his hobby, and she swiftly spotted Sons of Liberty. This was a Japanese-only stall but I wanted to try to help and encourage him a bit (because his taste in games was clearly excellent!) and had just spotted the Snake Eater shortly before myself, so I grabbed it for him, but also pointed out it was Japanese but that I was sure he'd find it another stall. I hope he did!  Overall, much better than last year's event, had a blast! Bigger venue, more space, super friendly staff and vendors, admittedly it did get a bit hectic when the second wave of people came in around 12:00 and the congestion at the stall themselves with the third wave around 13:00 when we hit the middle of the floor was rough. I left shattered, but I went in a bit worse for wear and my eyes a bit strained still from an entire day of building LEGO yesterday, so  Looking forward to next year's already! Third time's the charm for Suikoden V, surely? Rather than the fifth? 

Okay, I unpaired his console through my account online and can now load them onto my Switch. So it obviously locked me out because he must've tried to play one my games downloaded to his Switch and loaded the virtual game card. This then meant my PRIMARY Swicth couldn't load a game without pairing localy. Why the fuck would it it let him load one of MY GAMES to his Switch and then lock the PRIMARY CONSOLE out from playing ALL games. Fucking Nintendo, that's why... 🙄

I have a family plan online subscription, but my nephew's Switch was a brand new one he got a few years ago. At one point I set it up as my primary so he could play Mario Kart without having to buy it but I changed it back to my console being the primary about 6 months ago. I know that worked because it no longer had to check if the software can be played when starting a game. I've gone into my Nintendo account and it says virtual game cards "can be loaded" next to my nephew's but mine says "not paired". I'm wondering if my nephew has loaded one onto his Switch which has locked it out of mine without pairing the consoles. But surely they would only let you load a virtual game card onto the primary Switch... right?!

Did you ever upgrade your Switch, and give the old Switch to you Nephew or something similar? Even so, if you transferred everything over to your new Switch, I still can't see a reason why this would be happening. Do you share a Nintendo Switch Online subcription? As part of a family plan? Aside from that, I have no idea, and I'd probably ask @Glen-i as he might know a bit about game-sharing.