The Pokémon World Championships began with the Trading Card Game in 2004.
The inaugural World Championship was held at the Wyndham Palace Resort and Spa in Orlando, Florida. It marked the culmination of organized Pokémon Trading Card Game competition and established a global event for top-ranked players.
The video game competition was added later. Play! Pokémon began organizing tournaments for the video game series in 2008, and those events became known as the Video Game Championships, or VGC. The TCG and video game divisions now share the broader World Championships event.
The first championship is therefore not the same thing as the first video game world title. The 2004 event was a TCG milestone, while video game championships arrived several years afterward. Pokémon’s competitive program later expanded to include additional formats, such as Pokkén Tournament DX.