While spectating the Summer Battle Arena yesterday, we were pointed towards a family of Pokemon TCG players.

Not young siblings or cousins, but a whole nuclear family: the mum, the dad, and two kids.

Claire, 12, Daniel, 9, and Jen and Nick, who are in their 40s and 50s, respectively, were there at the Summer Battle Arena to compete in the Pokemon TCG (Trading Card Games) Nationals. When we met them, Jen had already advanced to the Top 8 of the Masters League – the Open category, if you will.

And it seemed like Daniel wasn’t doing too bad either. Nick explained that in their family, victories come in pairs. It would either be him and Claire doing well, or otherwise Jen and Daniel.

The family got into the Pokemon TCG simply because Claire needed a hobby.

“Stamp collecting would be very boring,” Jen said, “so I bought her Pokemon cards.” That was the start of it all. Nick and Jen decided to pick the game up after Claire managed to finish at the top of her division and win a trip to Hawaii for the global tournament. While the kids enjoy Pokemon TCG just because, well, it’s Pokemon, Nick and Jen are drawn to it because of the gameplay and mechanics of it.

It’s been three years since they picked up their first decks. Now they now have thousands of these cards, since they needed four competitive decks for every occasions. However, they’ll be staying mostly with the TCG segment of the Pokemon universe. Neither Nick nor Jen approve of their children being immersed in video gaming, although Daniel is allowed to own a DS handheld.

With new cards and a constantly-evolving meta game, it doesn’t look like this family will stop playing together any time soon.

Check out our coverage of the Summer Battle Arena as well as a low-down on how the tournament was conducted.

(Photo: Pokemon Palooza tumblr)