Pokémon Company Scraps Yasukuni Shrine TCG Event Following Intense Chinese Backlash

The Pokémon Company (TPC) has canceled a planned Trading Card Game event scheduled for January 31st at Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine following immediate and severe backlash from China. The location choice sparked outrage online due to the shrine's sensitive historical ties to Japan's wartime past.

TPC moved quickly to remove the event from its official calendar and issued an apology on January 30th. The company confirmed it will "thoroughly review and strengthen our event information checking system and approval process" to prevent similar situations in the future.

Criticism from Chinese fans focused heavily on the fact that Yasukuni Shrine honors over 2.4 million war dead, including 1,066 individuals convicted as war criminals from World War II.

The shrine, situated near the Imperial Palace, is dedicated to those who perished in conflicts spanning from 1869 through 1954, covering engagements like the Sino-Japanese Wars and battles in the Pacific Theater. The registry, known as the Book of Souls, lists soldiers from Imperial Japan. Visits by Japanese politicians to the site are a frequent source of international friction, particularly with neighboring nations like China.

Despite this political misstep, the Pokémon TCG remains a major global success. TPC's rapid retraction appears designed to diffuse the current controversy and refocus attention back onto the game itself, avoiding prolonged political entanglement.