If you remember back a few months ago, Bunt became the first digital platform to release a sister physical product. Although there were some MAJOR hiccups in the release, the achievement was no less important. First, because it signaled the commitment that Topps has to increasing the reach of their Digital platforms, but also because it gave physical collectors increased exposure to what they might be missing on the digital side.

Now that the SWCT physical checklist is here, we are getting a bit more info about what is going to be included. From what it looks like, the product should function in a similar target market to what we saw with Bunt, as a cheap and fun pack ripping experience. More importantly, the focus on delivering fan favorite sets in a physical form has a lot of attractive qualities.

We also see that there will be digital autograph redemptions that start at 25 copies and have parallels down to 5 copies. These are likely going to be code cards like we saw with some of the insert sets in Bunt, and will be VERY difficult to get your hands on. Going to be interesting to see how secondary market performs on some of these cards, as Bunt had a bit of a dud factor due to how little information was provided to the physical collectors who were the ones mostly opening the packs.

Also interesting that all parallels will have codes for redemption in app, and although it might not be a code specific to the card in hand, it could still unlock product specific content in the app. This is a new thing different from what we saw in Bunt, and that is really intriguing to say the least. This is one thing I think went really wrong with the previous product, as there was so little content that was able to be unlocked in the app through code cards, it made things really hard to follow. I wanted more card for card unlocks and less pack based stuff. I hope there is some method to this madness.

If I am Topps right now, I am pushing as much info out to the shops and collectors in every way shape and form I can. I already see they posted on the blog – here – but that cannot be the end of the communication. They need to document and divulge as much info as possible and start peppering people with expectations ahead of time. Then, as we saw with Bunt, those expectations need to be coordinated among the teams. Both Physical and Digital need to cooperate on this, and make sure what is promised is actually delivered. This was a MESS with Bunt, and hopefully the team was able to learn from the mistakes.

I have confidence that things will be better and trust the people executing this on both sides. The original SWCT base cards with new characters alone is worth a look, and seeing our favorite SWCT inserts and marathon getting the love they deserve is also really cool. I absolutely love that the Reflections cards are included, as they are definitely a subset I will want to collect. Hopefully they are a bit rarer and more valuable, but you never know when its a lower end product.

Bottom line, this has the makings of something awesome, especially with pack redemptions and code cards included. Even with the fiasco, I bought a lot of Bunt, and will definitely be in for a few boxes of this too.

Click here for the checklist from Topps.