In the frenetic world of trading cards, an interloper called Chaotic is threatening the dominance of Pokemon and its ilk, thereby granting new strength to the money-losing television production and merchandising company that unleashed the game little more than a year ago.
Chaotic, which features tribes of warring monsters, has stood apart in the trading-card game industry since its launch by New York's 4Kids Entertainment Inc. in October 2007 because of a new weapon: syncing the game's online version with the physical card game.
It became the bestselling trading-card game in Canada and reached No. 3 in the U.S. last year, deposing the venerable Magic game and trailing only Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh, according to distributor reports.
Online, Chaotic has surpassed Magic's popularity, according to figures provided by each. Magic the Gathering has 150,000 registered players, its website says, while 4Kids Entertainment executives say the Chaotic website, www.chaoticgame.com, had attracted 1.25 million registered players since its launch.
Bryan Gannon, chief executive of Chaotic USA Entertainment Group, a San Diego technology development company that is 4Kids' partner in the venture, had a ready explanation for the game's soaring popularity. "The codes are built in the card, so there's an exact duplicate in the digital world," he said. That allows players to trade, battle and build creature armies interchangeably between the physical and online card games.
Chaotic's success coincides with a relatively strong video game industry, which enjoyed 11% sales growth in 2008 despite layoffs, the credit crunch, the mortgage crisis and the recession.
4Kids announced Friday the fall release of the Chaotic video game for various consoles, including Nintendo's Wii and DS, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.
It helps that Chaotic is cheap. 4Kids has integrated its 48-card Starter Deck (usually priced at $14.99 in stores) with the online game at no additional cost.
Chaotic's mix of online and real-world success hasn't gone unnoticed.
Last month, Sony Online Entertainment acquired PoxNora, an online trading-card game that involves free play at a basic level with additional premium subscription and purchasing costs for cards and game pieces.
This spring Sony plans to launch a physical trading-card game for Free Realms, a multiplayer online trading-card game, under a licensing agreement with Topps.
