Digimon Animated Series Edition -
Upper Deck/Bandai (USA)

Upper Deck's first set of trading cards based on the Digimon animated television series is now available to collectors in the UK. Digimon follows the adventures of a group of school children who find themselves immersed in a digital world whilst visiting summer camp. Upper Deck's basic set contains 34 regular-sized trading cards featuring colourful artwork of characters from the animated series, along with text descriptions and statistics. A rarer parallel set, made up of 34 holographic foil cards featuring identical designs to those used in the basic set, can also be collected.

The series is being sold in packs containing eight cards, including one parallel card and a checklist card. There appears to be only a single checklist design available. Additional insert cards are eight Ultimate Digimon cards (1:11). The inserts feature the more advanced monsters from the television series and are printed using holographic foil, giving them a similar look to the cards from the parallel set. Card Zine found packs selling in Electronics Boutique for £1.99. Upper Deck's Digimon CCG, Digi-Battle, looks set to hit UK stores later this year.

>> This article was added to Card Zine in summer 2000.

Update, summer 2001
UK Digimon series
A special edition of this set has been distributed by Bandai in the UK. The UK series is more or less identical to the US release, the only real difference being that the cards make no reference to Upper Deck. The Upper Deck hologram does not feature on the cards and the copyright message simply reads "Copyright Akiyoshi Hongo - Toei Animation, TM and copyright 1999 Bandai."

Update, summer 2001
KP/McVitie's promotion
Around spring 2001, Digimon trading cards featuring designs taken from the Animated Series Edition were given away free through a KP Skips snacks and McVitie's Penguin/BN biscuits promotion in the UK. Again, these cards do not mention Upper Deck. Two different promotional sets exist. The first is a collection of 25 regular sized cards. Collectors could send away four tokens from promotional packs of Penguin and BN to obtain five cards. Alternatively, they could find a selection of the cards in multipacks of Skips. The second promotional series was available with individual packs of Skips. Cards were given away as "prizes" and were not included in every pack. These cards measure approximately 3.5cm by 4.6cm. All the cards have "NOT FOR RESALE. FOR PROMOTIONAL USE ONLY." printed on the back.