Japan OCG: May 2001
NA TCG: Late 2002 with some Sprinking of LoN 2003 cards
(Imperial Format)
With the prior two games (im barely thinking about Dungeon Dice Monsters), I found myself interested but ultimately whelmed by the lack of engaging playstyles or cards to work with. What are rather interesting perspectives and introductions to the Yugioh card game don't entirely add up to accurate or fulfilling matches but instead grindfests with a snappy soundtrack. Thankfully by the end of the first year of Yugioh's introduction into the west, fans would be given a chance to play with a GBA simulator of the game, an English 'remake' of Duel Monsters 5: Expert 1 in Japan.
Finally, some good ass Yu-Gi-Oh.
The game plays similarly to Dark Duel Stories, being a 5-duelist 'wave' format, where upon beating each duelist of a wave a certain amount of times unlocks the next tier of hardened duelists from the YGO anime (two wins each, incrementing by one each tier). Thankfully this game does a lot more to substantiate a still early and juvenile format of the card game.
For starters: its actually extremely accurate to the actual format and rulings of the trading card game! Hallelujah. Chains, different spell and trap types, effect monsters, an actual backrow, tribute summons, etc. are actually represented in their purest state. The game isn't without its rulings glitches and mishaps, but its pretty damn close.
Additionally all of these actual mechanics can be felt from the very get-go. Tristan Taylor and Tea Gardner aren't just complete jobbers and will draw good cards. My eyes did bug out a bit upon seeing the ladder drop Gemini Elf, the single strongest vanilla monster at this point in the format. But they'll also drop mystical elves and graceful charities and man, does that remind me: the card pool in this game.
From here regarding later games I might review, I'm uncertain how in depth I'll go into them since early YGO games can get samey, some games might just be 'Its Eternal Duelist Soul' but in March 2003 or w/e format. I'm incredibly worried as to how interesting the GX games will be to talk about, now knowing how middling much of the meta for that was. Thankfully early Yugioh was broad and stupid enough to have incredibly powerful cards around almost each corner. In the prior two games it didn't seem like you had any chance whatsoever to engage with the truly powerful cards as those game's progression systems and mechanics didn't reflect how you would actually play Yugioh in real life. Thankfully two major changes added much to the depth of this:
1) One pack, every duel, 5 cards each. Also after so many matches you can get 'Weekly' magazine packs and tournament packs to add to your repertoire
2) The introduction of cards from the later OCG, or in the west Magic Ruler.
Tracking the release of cards within the Japanese 'OCG' compared to the North American TCG is somewhat nutty, for example 'Jinzo' as a card wasn't released in the TCG until Dec. of 2002, but was included in Dark Duel Stories, Dungeon Dice Monsters and this game prior to its release due to it being a card from 1999 in the OCG. It's why my header above mentions 'sprinklings' as cards like Gemini Elf didn't hit global TCG release until half a year later. The format minutiae is somewhat intriguing to... mostly myself, but its important to note as the prior two battling games either didn't have much of these cards, they were so hard to get due to the grindfest, or just weren't worth bothering with compared to beatdown strats.
It is so satisfying playing a game with:
The Forceful Sentry, White Magical Hat, Waboku, the Jars, Change of Heart, Confiscation, Delinquent Duo, Giant Trunade, Graceful Charity, Snatch Steal, Harpie's Feather Duster, etc. all in like, actual full force.
White Magical Hat is the funniest card and going through this game with even a single copy makes this so much more of a treat than anything so far. Being able to snatch steal an enemy's monster, swords of revealing for stun and attack with white magical hat to discard an opponent's card from hand is the most satisfying experience.
The only awkward part of collecting these cards is that it's incredibly unbalanced. You get card packs over time, many of which mirror real life (japanese) card pools, but its hard to figure out which cards are in what without a guide and a good chunk are duds. It is super fun coming up with strats prior to getting super broken cards, and I even had a Chain Energy/Toll burn strat going at some point, but it's best if you just look to see what packs contain what. Also, many of the card packs require a lot of battling of a random duelist to unlock. I'd say this is really just the game for a young aspirational duelist with a bunch of free time to get through these on weekends or after school, rather than someone going through these games on a whim like myself. But also some of these grindier packs are just not worth the grind (Celtic Guardian as a secret rare for beating Yugi 20 times? really?).
Also while the AI's do have really cool decks and can often put you into trouble, a bit of their 'cheating' nature does shine through near the end. But even weirder is how stupid the AI tends to be? Painful Choice is a funny card to include against computers. 'Pick 5 cards from your deck, show them to your opponent and they can choose 1 for you to draw to your hand. You discard the rest into the graveyard, shuffle your deck'. This card is already incredibly broken but the amount of times my opponent just picked the best card for me to have felt really funny, like yeah ill take that Change of Heart over the Rush Recklessly, thanks Bakura. It is a shame that the opponent kinda 'knows' when you have a Wall of Illusion and they won't bother attacking it because they know they can't kill it and they'll be set back on field advantage, but its not the biggest deal.
My only other complaint -and maybe this will be remedied by the later 'RPG'-ish titles- but it is really plain. I'm not sure at this point if im a big fan of the just standard 'fight this duelist X times' formula, even if its inoffensive.
Overall this is the game I recommend most to anyone that just wants to know the basics of Yugioh, no link summons/pendulums/hand traps/etc involved. Upon looking at Duel Monsters 5 I did wish the west received that game's 'D-Tactics' feature which helped explain some of the game's mechanics as I think that would also help to better explain some of the mechanics and stratagem at this point in the meta. But even without that function this acts so well as a simulator that just basic understanding of the game is all you need for the first two tiers. Really fun game, just really vanilla.
NA TCG: Late 2002 with some Sprinking of LoN 2003 cards
(Imperial Format)
With the prior two games (im barely thinking about Dungeon Dice Monsters), I found myself interested but ultimately whelmed by the lack of engaging playstyles or cards to work with. What are rather interesting perspectives and introductions to the Yugioh card game don't entirely add up to accurate or fulfilling matches but instead grindfests with a snappy soundtrack. Thankfully by the end of the first year of Yugioh's introduction into the west, fans would be given a chance to play with a GBA simulator of the game, an English 'remake' of Duel Monsters 5: Expert 1 in Japan.
Finally, some good ass Yu-Gi-Oh.
The game plays similarly to Dark Duel Stories, being a 5-duelist 'wave' format, where upon beating each duelist of a wave a certain amount of times unlocks the next tier of hardened duelists from the YGO anime (two wins each, incrementing by one each tier). Thankfully this game does a lot more to substantiate a still early and juvenile format of the card game.
For starters: its actually extremely accurate to the actual format and rulings of the trading card game! Hallelujah. Chains, different spell and trap types, effect monsters, an actual backrow, tribute summons, etc. are actually represented in their purest state. The game isn't without its rulings glitches and mishaps, but its pretty damn close.
Additionally all of these actual mechanics can be felt from the very get-go. Tristan Taylor and Tea Gardner aren't just complete jobbers and will draw good cards. My eyes did bug out a bit upon seeing the ladder drop Gemini Elf, the single strongest vanilla monster at this point in the format. But they'll also drop mystical elves and graceful charities and man, does that remind me: the card pool in this game.
From here regarding later games I might review, I'm uncertain how in depth I'll go into them since early YGO games can get samey, some games might just be 'Its Eternal Duelist Soul' but in March 2003 or w/e format. I'm incredibly worried as to how interesting the GX games will be to talk about, now knowing how middling much of the meta for that was. Thankfully early Yugioh was broad and stupid enough to have incredibly powerful cards around almost each corner. In the prior two games it didn't seem like you had any chance whatsoever to engage with the truly powerful cards as those game's progression systems and mechanics didn't reflect how you would actually play Yugioh in real life. Thankfully two major changes added much to the depth of this:
1) One pack, every duel, 5 cards each. Also after so many matches you can get 'Weekly' magazine packs and tournament packs to add to your repertoire
2) The introduction of cards from the later OCG, or in the west Magic Ruler.
Tracking the release of cards within the Japanese 'OCG' compared to the North American TCG is somewhat nutty, for example 'Jinzo' as a card wasn't released in the TCG until Dec. of 2002, but was included in Dark Duel Stories, Dungeon Dice Monsters and this game prior to its release due to it being a card from 1999 in the OCG. It's why my header above mentions 'sprinklings' as cards like Gemini Elf didn't hit global TCG release until half a year later. The format minutiae is somewhat intriguing to... mostly myself, but its important to note as the prior two battling games either didn't have much of these cards, they were so hard to get due to the grindfest, or just weren't worth bothering with compared to beatdown strats.
It is so satisfying playing a game with:
The Forceful Sentry, White Magical Hat, Waboku, the Jars, Change of Heart, Confiscation, Delinquent Duo, Giant Trunade, Graceful Charity, Snatch Steal, Harpie's Feather Duster, etc. all in like, actual full force.
White Magical Hat is the funniest card and going through this game with even a single copy makes this so much more of a treat than anything so far. Being able to snatch steal an enemy's monster, swords of revealing for stun and attack with white magical hat to discard an opponent's card from hand is the most satisfying experience.
The only awkward part of collecting these cards is that it's incredibly unbalanced. You get card packs over time, many of which mirror real life (japanese) card pools, but its hard to figure out which cards are in what without a guide and a good chunk are duds. It is super fun coming up with strats prior to getting super broken cards, and I even had a Chain Energy/Toll burn strat going at some point, but it's best if you just look to see what packs contain what. Also, many of the card packs require a lot of battling of a random duelist to unlock. I'd say this is really just the game for a young aspirational duelist with a bunch of free time to get through these on weekends or after school, rather than someone going through these games on a whim like myself. But also some of these grindier packs are just not worth the grind (Celtic Guardian as a secret rare for beating Yugi 20 times? really?).
Also while the AI's do have really cool decks and can often put you into trouble, a bit of their 'cheating' nature does shine through near the end. But even weirder is how stupid the AI tends to be? Painful Choice is a funny card to include against computers. 'Pick 5 cards from your deck, show them to your opponent and they can choose 1 for you to draw to your hand. You discard the rest into the graveyard, shuffle your deck'. This card is already incredibly broken but the amount of times my opponent just picked the best card for me to have felt really funny, like yeah ill take that Change of Heart over the Rush Recklessly, thanks Bakura. It is a shame that the opponent kinda 'knows' when you have a Wall of Illusion and they won't bother attacking it because they know they can't kill it and they'll be set back on field advantage, but its not the biggest deal.
My only other complaint -and maybe this will be remedied by the later 'RPG'-ish titles- but it is really plain. I'm not sure at this point if im a big fan of the just standard 'fight this duelist X times' formula, even if its inoffensive.
Overall this is the game I recommend most to anyone that just wants to know the basics of Yugioh, no link summons/pendulums/hand traps/etc involved. Upon looking at Duel Monsters 5 I did wish the west received that game's 'D-Tactics' feature which helped explain some of the game's mechanics as I think that would also help to better explain some of the mechanics and stratagem at this point in the meta. But even without that function this acts so well as a simulator that just basic understanding of the game is all you need for the first two tiers. Really fun game, just really vanilla.