As someone who traded Pokemon cards on the playground (where I spent most of my days) as a wee lad, the Base Set Pikachu was not regarded highly, as its artwork was not quite as clean and recognizable as Ken Sugimoris from Jungle
The player-character is almost always someone from one of hundreds of Vaults buried beneath the ground and ostensibly protected from the apocalypse, and their emergence signals great change for the wasteland
He's not able to quest during the turn after being readied, but he can be used to continually banish your opponent's characters if set up for it
Slap a couple of Powerful Energies on it to give it an attack boost and it can very easily take out most Pokemon with just one attack.
A $5 difference is a pretty significant gap for things like Unlimited WOTC holos, 1st Edition Base Set non-holos, etc
In all other zones, its power is 0