Transcription
Folks, welcome back! My name is Timmy, you're watching Alpha Investments. Hope you all are having a beautiful day. What we do here is discuss the cardboard world. Rudy, are you manipulating the entire market of flesh and blood again? Who's doing it? Is it the BGs chair? Who's doing it? I don't understand it. It's got to be two people; like they had to have come back just to do it again. Like it has to be, like it can't be, like there can't be anybody else doing this.
Today's update, per the request of patrons: Rosetta breaks above $100 a box. I'm telling you, I'm in Florida; this stuff comes designed, and the people who make this are in New Zealand. I feel like if I listen real quietly, I can actually hear the people in New Zealand going, "Told you so!" I feel like if I listen real quiet… It's just tough, cuz like we need like tacos and nachos; it's crunchy. But I feel like if I listen, and I open the window and I turn the washing machine off, I can hear the company going, "Well, you know, nobody believed in us, and everybody just made fun of it. And well, sometimes the bittersweetness of life can be heard around the world."
So now we have Rosetta hitting new highs. We have the Hunted brand new set, new high. We have Dynasty; now that we can follow up on it, it's been a month. Guess what? No, it didn't hold at $250 a box. A little bit of supply came to market, a little bit I guess, and the price is stable in the 140s plus tax online; 140s plus tax essentially, still doubling its price from 12 months ago. So the question is… oh yeah, Outsiders. So we got Outsiders, Dynasty, Rosetta, the Hunted. So it's about almost half of FAB 2.0 sets, right? So about half the sets have moved now, right? So the game continues forward into the future. As we know, we have the R pirate ship coming for the summer set. And now everyone's now going, "Um, what do I do? Do I… I… I haven't ordered Flesh and Blood. I have Timmy's Emporium. I didn't… I stopped ordering that for a few sets, but I don't know. I… everyone online… maybe I should go back to ordering some new Flesh and Blood cases. And I skipped the last couple sets, you know."
So now we have what we like to call the turn of the market. And we like to have the situation where stores are realizing that, "Gee, maybe you should have saved the course. Maybe you should have continued ordering Heavy Hitters, Misty through Rosetta and the Hunted." I mean, we… when you have four successful sets in a row, and people were really just blaming before that just Bright Lights, which I still don't think it's that bad, but I'm just, you know, just a personal opinion. But I… I really just think that we're looking at a situation where… [Music] Now, how does that impact when we go into the summer now for LGS's and pre-orders? Because now this is going to be the first set that's going to be coming in a few months that the market knows. This reminds me of about a year ago when Scarlet Violet Pokemon, Twilight Masquerade, was the first set to start going up in value. And that was the moment that people started to realize that maybe, "Oh, wait a minute, all the new Pokemon wasn't hot trash." So from that moment forward, suddenly the pre-ordering and the behavior shifted. So moving into Stellar them into Surging Sparks and Prismatic, all the… everybody knows. And that's an important variable when you discuss this industry long term. You have to understand not just the card game, not just a player base, but you have to understand the behavior of everything. Everything goes in these cycles, and everyone's going to judge you, and everyone's going to respond based on the recent situation.
So now the odds and the probability are: when Flesh and Blood has their next set, I would expect the print run could be higher because they may realize that they cut it too much. Or B, you know, you have a bunch of stores… the print run could be the same, and a bunch of stores who didn't order Flesh and Blood the last two, three, four sets return and say, "Hey, um, yeah, put me on the books for, I don't know, 60 boxes. You know, give me 15 cases of four." Suddenly you start to have a situation where stores who didn't request it start to request it, and the piece of the pie actually starts getting a little thinner, which is what we have happening with, you know, Magic in their collector boxes. We have it happening with all the Pokemon releases. We have it happen with One Piece. Okay, I mean, we… we see these situations where the behavior and how we feel impacts whether or not these people pre-order.
Now, for me, obviously, we've done the patron thing. We always do our thing. We take… we work with the company. I've… you know, James and LSS… it's been… jeez, six years now. Good God, has it really been that long? Yeah, five-year anniversary before that. Yeah. So again, we… I've always… we… I've never skipped a set. So… so for me, if you don't take into consideration what's going on in the world, it can be very confusing. Cuz for me it's, "Oh, cool, here comes the next set in a couple months. You know, I get… you know, we do the promo card, we slab and grade them all, which has been a godsend because now the cards don't get damaged in shipping, and everyone… it… it removes a lot of variables on my end, having everything slabbed and protected. And everything's worked out good." But what does that mean now for maybe… even… even if literally at 3,000 stores in the United States, even if 5% say, "You know what? Um, I think I will pre-order this new Flesh and Blood set." Think about… think about this: even if it's 5%, 5% again, law of large numbers, everything counts in large amounts. 1980s… dep… never mind. So even at 5% of the stores, that's like 150 stores. And even if these stores say, "You know what? Yeah, I guess I will order… give me 30 or 60 or 90 boxes," like that can redistribute the normal supply for many, many people and situations across the country just like that. And I think that's not something that people… you know, we're not understanding what that's going to mean because it's been a long time. And like I said, going into the Hunted, I was pretty excited because I just like the… the gore and just the raw melee, raw combat of everything. I thought, you know, I was… I was more excited about that than Rosetta with the beauty of, you know, Tales of Aria 2.0 thing. But… and I was like, you know, coming off Misty, that's a… that's a big hurdle to kind of jump over. So I was already feeling pretty good about the Hunted, but I didn't… I had no idea it was going to be like this. I had no clue we were going to run into this release and blowout. And just to this day, you guys are still asking me, and I'm going to tell you the same thing as always: I'm telling you what's going on, and I have none of those boxes. I don't have any for sale. I'm just telling you what's happening in the market. Go to your local LGS, support them. Ask if they carry Flesh and Blood. Ask if they have some of the older boxes, cuz some of these stores may still have them from a year or two years ago that have gone up in value, and they may not even realize it. I mean, that's what I would be doing. Sorry. I mean, patrons, you guys messaging me every time I do these videos on Pokemon or Flesh and Blood: "Rudy, can you sell me a case of Dynasty?" No, I don't have any. "Rudy, come on, sell me more of the Hunted." I don't have any. I'm sorry. So go to your local LGS, support… you know, go on TCGplayer, buy from an LGS, whatever you want to do, but just understand… understand the market is shifted. Nobody is questioning at this point, "Well, you know, is it getting better? What's…" No, no, no, that's over. We're past that conversation now. It's, "Where does… where do we settle? How does the company now navigate a post-COVID stable situation? No drama, no Channel snowballs, no COVID shutdowns, no sensitivity, no everybody… you know, the events and organized play, everything… everybody sensitive, quiet, don't get near each other… the COVID… it's all over with. The runway, like I told you guys in 2025 and moving forward for these card games, it is… it's a very bullish playground. You know, all these hurdles… you know, there's always going to be hurdles, some… but the amount of speed bumps that have been removed is… you know, especially for a company like Flesh and Blood who just crossed five years. I mean, for most of those five years, you know, the company's been dealing with constant issues. And now it's like, "Wow! It's like, wow, finally it's a little easier." You know, the… you know, the market conditions are better, the public's reception, the stability of the market. And of course, I still stand by what I said before: the reason you guys are not seeing a lot of cases and boxes Rosetta selling online, you're not seeing a lot of Dynasty selling online, you're not seeing a ton of the… I… I stand by what I told you a month ago, and that is: I think most of these people and most of these stores, they're just… they gave up. They're not listing on TCGplayer. They're either cracking the boxes, selling the loose packs, drafting in their store, and they're just selling the single cards. I told you guys that before. I've only done my first the Hunted box opening, finally. I've got two more in queue, my nice little dented, scratch-and-dent boxes. And I'm telling you all right now, I look at the first one, like, you know, the value of the cards… you can enjoy the experience of a draft or just cracking packs with your family and friends. And then look at the value of the cards, the demand… they have value because there's demand for the cards. Look at the Majestic slot! Holy smokes! I know there's a million Majestics now, but still… look at the Marvels, look at the Legendaries. You know, look at… look at the demand and playability of some of these cards, you know, hero-specific or generic. You know, the market wants the cards; the market's bidding up the singles. And as long as that happens, and unless those single cards drop substantially, I don't think we're going to see more single or sealed product brought to market. There's too much activity in the single cards. It's kind of like an inverse Pokemon or Magic situation with Flesh and Blood. You know, like if you open a Pokemon box, everyone's like, "Bro, you're not opening Pokemon… like you'll get 30 cents on the dollar." Like… and even a lot of the Magic boxes, some of the collector boxes, you can get bad pools and things. But on Flesh and Blood, if you open on a decent scale of a case or two cases or 10 cases, the pool rates and the volatility, when you level that out, there's a lot going on there, man. And that's… that's why, again, everybody a month ago when I made the video were like, "Rudy, you know, these prices aren't going to hold, right? You know, a bunch more sealed product of Flesh and Blood's going to come back to market because everybody's been holding heavy bags." And well, guess what? It's a month later, I'm doing a follow-up, just like I said I would. And guess what? Dynasty, 140 plus tax. Outsiders, what? 110, 120, 130, depending when you watch this video. Now we got more things going over 100. We have the Hunted and Rosetta. And look at some of the older stuff. Look at Arcane Unlimited. Anybody see those boxes hitting all-time highs? Interesting stuff, right? We are continuing to see that kind of spread of kind of the overall direction of all this stuff moving. And it fits the overall… you… direction of the market, the overall direction of the… the United States, the economy, the stock market, Bitcoin. I mean, you know, all the collectibles, all the way up from the Magic, Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh!, all the way to Flesh and Blood to Weiss and these other… I mean, all the card games are moving in a similar trajectory. And that means… well, everything's pretty healthy. And I, again, I don't think it's a bubble. And based on this bullish nature, the player base is really happy. The collector base is really happy. Yeah, and I… know… cover your ears! Hurry up, everybody, cover your ears! Earmuffs! There are investors again, and they seem to be excited. Okay, earmuffs off. You know, and that's… I… I just… I think this could go for quite a while. There's quite a runway on this. I don't know the specifics of some of these sets, unfortunately. I don't have some of these sets to offer you guys. So again, it's very interesting to see how fast it's happening. And I told you all a month ago when I did this first, you know, "Hey, look what's going on." Everybody just kind of made fun of it and said, "Oh, it'll crash right back down." And I told you… and now a month later, I don't think it's going to crash back down. If anything, I think we're going to hold. I think Dynasty between 130 and 150… I… I think that's the new floor price. I think over the next couple years, that product… which, please, again, I don't have any for sale, stop asking me… I think it drifts higher to 150s, back to 200 over the… into the future. It's just a good [ __ ] product. You know… oh, and by the way, everybody talking about the Hunted: "Rudy, it's all about Command and Conquer bust, dude. Are you serious?" Like the H is out; the drama around Command and Conquer is over with. And the amount of Majestics and just expensive Marvels and things people are going after is really the talk of the town. And now everybody's over the Command and Conquer. And before the Hunted came out, "Oh my God, Command and Conquer…" You know, I… it's like… isn't that crazy how fast attitudes and markets just hone in and focus? Command and Conquer R… it's all… I mean, why are they just reprinting it for the 69th time? What… what do it? And now the Hunted comes out, and everyone was talking about all the other cards in the set and the demand for them and the sell-through rates and the price and the Marvels and the Majestic. And it's like, "Well, I thought we were all upset about this over here." Does anybody still care? That's last month; that's over with. So it looks good. That's all. No real points this video. I just told you guys a month ago I would make a follow-up, and I told you I'd make another video whether or not the price is held. And well, not only does Dynasty still just under 150 and Outsiders is around the 120, 130… we actually have more products that are now over 100 a box. And I just… I just want to be on record: people still bashing it like it's a fake thing or being manipulated… I think you're stupid, you're full of [ __ ], you're just negative, and you're just being ridiculous about it because I… I don't… I don't understand why it doesn't seem real to people. You know, I… I feel like Flesh and Blood's going to be something in like 15 years from now, people are going to be like, "Oh, Flesh and Blood? That's that new game? Hasn't even been out for 25 years." "Oh yeah, that's a bubble; no one plays that." It's going to be like 20 years from now, and [ __ ], you know, Flesh and Blood could be… have its 20th anniversary, and you're going to have these little Timmies going, "No one plays that. I remember… I… I remember 2021." You're gonna… you're always going to have… you're going to have people that are going to hone in, and they're going to focus on anything they can find to be negative on things. And I… and I'm going to tell you before I end the video, I promise I'm ending the video… I'm telling you all the runway right now in the economic environment, in the condition of Flesh and Blood, just like many other CCGs, the player, the collector, and the investor, and the overall health in the market is probably the best I have ever seen. And again, from the five to six years I've been talking about Flesh and Blood, even before it came out and everything to you guys, this is probably the healthiest, most stable, best market conditions I have seen for Flesh and Blood, full stop, period. That's all. I mean, I'm excited for the summer set. I'm excited for the Gem Keeper puzzle. You guys are ready? Season 2 Gem Keeper games. So as of right now, we currently have the syllabus, The Exchange Rate. We have the key to the game is currently being designed. And uh, once we finalize that over the next 30, 45 days, I'm going to get play custom-made and printed on that. And on this, it will have the puzzle in the middle. It's going to have on the left all the exchange rates on how to get pieces, and on the right it's going to have kind of cheat codes, you know, kind of uh… different things you can do to get pieces without having puzzle pieces. So I'm very excited about it. So when we release the parchment scroll treasure map coming up in a couple months towards the pirate set, that's going to be really cool to go over with everybody. It's going to be so much fun. That's it. I got some Flesh and… more Flesh and Blood sales coming up uh… all throughout the year to celebrate the breaking of five years. Um, we did a fun little Arcane Rising first edition sale; um, that was an awesome throwback. I got some really fun uh… box opening videos uh… coming up also, but I got the… the Hunted videos coming up before that. And uh… that's it, folks. Hope you guys enjoyed the video. As always, it is a beautiful world out there. And remember, folks, surround yourself with good people. Life is short; the internet is just like a leech of negativity and drama. And remember, folks, your life is usually a product of the people around you. Have good people, smart people, successful people around you, and that will help bring you in a good direction. Be careful getting sucked into the drama because that stuff… it's like… it'll spiral you downhill, and it makes you get a view on the world that may not be accurate. Have a beautiful day. As always, we end the video on… what… what do we end the video on? You guys know… you guys know we're end the video on… come on… you guys know where we're end the video on.