Game I played on and off for a while. Of the 5D’s games, 2009 is the one I have the most nostalgia for, but it has some of the worst game design and balancing of any game I’ve ever played, and 2011 is probably the most complete and accessible of the bunch gameplay-wise, but the removal of complete battle sprites for cards was really noticeable. This hit the sweet spot of the trilogy in my opinion, it has the best story mode and the most interesting premise, and it holds up enough that I think a lot of times I’d rather play this than ‘11 even though that one gives you more cards.

It's just Yugioh. I like Yugioh 5D's a lot, and this game's story recounts much of the second arc of the anime series. I like the series, so I like the game. Nevertheless, it isn't REALLY anything special.

So why does it still compel me so? This game, in particular?

The follow-up to this game, Over the Nexus, was my childhood white whale for years. I pined for that game, but circumstances, both logistical and financial, never allowed it to come to fruition. Come 2019-2020, I have officially seen the holy grail of 3DS hacking, and have now the entire catalogue of DS games at my fingertips. Thinking back to childhood desires, Over the Nexus was a first pick, and yet... it just... wasn't as GOOD as Reverse of Arcadia. And let it be known, this isn't EXCLUSIVELY because of a rose-tinted rearview mirror, because I recently replayed Reverse of Arcadia and felt that same joy well up inside me. So, what, if anything, gives?

Well, to begin with, the story. Arcadia's story is far better and more emotionally evocative. In it, your player character is inserted into the happenings of the Yugioh 5D's plot as an amnesiac member of the Arcadia Movement, a group of psychic duelists (I'm going to assume the viewer knows the general rules of the society of Yugioh 5D's), run by the evil Sayer. Your reason for being a silent protagonist makes some sense, and the story integrates you into the exploits of Yusei Fudo and his colorful friends quite quickly. Your character is revealed to have been a part of Yusei's old gang, and the way this is done is oddly harmonious with the plot of the anime, without the player really CARING that it deviates from the anime in order to give you a chance to... well, play the game. There is even a genuine sense of escalation of the plot in the present as the secrets of the Signers are gradually unveiled. There's variety in the sorts of duelist puzzles you need to tackle, and even at its worst, Yugioh TENDS to be a pretty fun game to play, especially in the constraints of a video game version without worrying about rotating banned cards and the like.

Then there is the music. This music. Did NOT need to go THIS hard. Even now, I can still go back to those tracks and jam out. This will be a common throughline in many of my reviews, so I'll say it outright here: good music can absolutely make OR break a video game. It can turn a dismal experiene into one I at least would like to see through, and it can elevate an "okay" experience into the stratosphere. Gameplay is king for me, but music is a close second. And this game has some good music. EVERY duel theme is a banger, every TURBO duel theme is a banger, every Duel Runner minigame theme is a banger, and half the location themes seem straight of a Shin Megami Tensei game from the 90's. It owns so hard.

Obviously, this game isn't exactly The Wire of video games. And I only like it because I already liked Yugioh. But DARN IT, Yugioh is fun. This game is fun. This game's story is "pretty good!" -- better than Over the Nexus at least. And the music is quite transcendent in almost all respects. I wouldn't recommend it to people who aren't interested at all in the card game of Yugioh itself (and considering how much Yugioh has changed these past 11 years, it wouldn't be a great introduction anyway). But if you like Yugioh already, especially the 5D's era, and you have a 3DS, you really have no reason NOT to get this game. It's a good time! Especially when/if you have the freedom of all the cards at your disposal, since you have the option to transfer cards and duel runners to subsequent playthroughs. So go ahead, if you're able! It'll be a hearty experience, I would say.

Builds off the base of World Championship 2009, which had taken a completely different direction to the ones before. This one is definitely a much lesser jump, but features new areas, new duelists and of course, new cards.

It includes the same box puzzles and stealth sections as before (the stealth sections take place in the exact same hallways as last time), but now there's also a handful of "time reverse" puzzles which are some of the slowest sections in the game. To be honest I'm not a fan of the story stuff in general. Dialogue goes on way too long for a narrative I just don't care about (I've never seen 5D's, which I assume this is a direct re-telling of, but with an OC thrown in, kinda like Spirit Caller). The city of Satellite is just kind of boring with most areas feeling the same, though the brief trip to the Spirit World was a nice change, and I wish we could get more places like that, but I understand it's not the games fault as long as it wants to stick to the anime.

Luckily unless you want to rush through it, the story takes up a relative little amount of the time you play this game, as unlocking packs requires so much grinding of duels that you can go hours without progressing. Which sounds like a bad thing, but for me I enjoy it.

One aspect I've come to appreciate from these games over the Tag Force series is how you can't just duel anyone at any time. Tag Force stories feel anti-climatic because most of them just have duels against people you can find on the overworld and duel infinite amounts of times. These games make major characters like Yusei and Jack inaccessible except for specific story points, until the post-game where you can duel them as much as you want.

I appreciate that the game made DP grinding a little easier too. Slightly buffed numbers to certain bonuses, and a "bonus bonus" which continuously goes up the more bonuses you unlock. This gives a purpose to all those bonuses that you can get for summoning hard-to-summon monsters, as in the past it is never worth trying to summon Gate Guardian for an extra 100 points, but now do it once and not only do you get those 100 points, you also get an extra point for every duel going forward. Still not worth it? Maybe, but the more of these you do the more it adds up, and if you plan to grind a lot, it makes it worth it in the end.

And speaking of grinding, you can get speed spells from the expanded duel runner side game. While buying them from a pack is an option, doing these short time trials can net you up to 3 speed spells per ~1 minute run, plus some DP for your trouble. Unfortunately buying actual bike parts still costs DP no matter what.

While I do think this game is better than the last, and how couldn't it be when it's basically just that game but a little more, it doesn't fix many of the issues I had, and in some cases makes them worse. Performance in duels is still bad, especially when the field starts getting full and the AI takes a long time to do anything. This is exacerbated in tag duels where you need to wait through 3 AI turns to get to a single one of yours.

Card distribution is still so freaking bad. Archtypes are spread out across so many packs, all of which can only be gotten at different points in the story, and many can only be unlocked post-game. It's near impossible to build actual decks beyond just strong staples for most of the playtime.

I still think Turbo duels are the dumbest most half-baked idea. I already complained about them in my last review so no point doing it here.

The lack of ability to unlock anyone from past series sucks. And I can't remember if it was the case for the last game, but even your tag partner choices are heavily limited in this one. At least in 2008 I know you could get absolutely any duelist as a tag partner by dueling them 10 times.

I'll be real, while I think it's still fun, I don't care for having a story in this type of game. I loved 2008's world concept where you unlocked different areas and fought against different opponents, many of which had different gimmicks. And where beating challenges would unlock anime characters in World Championship mode.

I love yugioh, so I love this game to death. If you don't like yugioh, this is realistically a 3 star game at best. If you've watched the 5Ds anime, you'll remember flashbacks of The Enforcers taking over Satellite before Yusei's duel against Kalin.

Here, you actually get to live that out, essentially participating in Yu-Gi-Oh turf wars with rival gangs. Afterwards, you get thrown into the Dark Signer arc of 5Ds. It's really cool to do all this as someone who loves Yugioh & the 5Ds anime, but I can't imagine anyone who isn't already familiar with both to get too much mileage from this game.