Pikachu

Pikachu sits at #60 in Jungle, the second of the Wizards of the Coast print runs. Illustration by Ken Sugimori. Sugimori is the lead character designer of the Pokémon franchise itself. His TCG illustrations carry a tighter, more on-model feel because they are by the same hand that defined how the Pokémon look in the games.

The flavor text on the card reads: "When several of these Pokémon gather, their electricity can build and cause lightning storms." Pokédex entries from this era are short and often quirky, written by the original Japanese localization team for a specific stat-block layout that no longer exists in modern cards.

The franchise mascot. An Electric-type rodent with red cheeks, a lightning-bolt tail, and a vocabulary limited to its own name in the anime. The most-printed Pokémon card in history. The Base Set print has a famous yellow-cheeks variant that commands a premium over the standard red-cheeks 1st Edition.

Jungle shipped in two print waves: 1st Edition (stamped) and Unlimited. There is also a famous "No Symbol" error on some early Unlimited prints where the set symbol was accidentally left off the artwork. No Symbol variants trade for a meaningful premium over the standard Unlimited print and are a quiet specialty within Jungle collecting.

Commons grade most forgivingly of any tier in the set. Centering is the typical grade cap; the soft Wizards-era cardstock picks up edge whitening easily but the high print runs mean clean copies remain affordable. A first-time grading submission on a Common is the cheapest way to learn what each grading service is actually looking at.

Raw copies of this card are inexpensive enough that the grading math rarely justifies submission unless you have a clearly pack-fresh example. For set completionists, picking up a clean raw copy and sleeving it is the practical move.