Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Best Selling Trading Card Game After 2 Decades

Yu-Gi-OOOOHHHH!!!

Remember that awesome intro from the Yu-Gi-Oh sitcom? In the early 2000s, the youth were captivated by the high-stakes Yu-Gi-Oh card trading game.

You can ask anyone. With cards like the Blue Eyes White Dragon or the Dark Magician in your deck, you’d make a tough opponent for anyone to play against unless someone held one of the Egyptian God Monsters. Then, you’d best run away or if you’re confident in your skills, you may still come out victorious by believing in the “heart of the cards.”

One reason that fans love Yu-Gi-Oh is because of its story. The plot follows Yugi Mutou, a shy boy, who solves the ancient Millennium Puzzle, which awakens an alter-ego named Atem.

What follows next is an epic journey of intense monster card game battles with high stakes that can bring about the end of the world. Of course, Yu-Gi-Oh would win the public over with its strong character development and intertwining lore into its story.

However, despite its popularity waning over the years, Yu-Gi-Oh is still a popular trading card game among American teens and children, spawning gaming tournaments throughout the country.

How Yu-Gi-Oh Rose to Dominance

In the good ol’ days, as they say, fighting manga was at an all-time high. With popular manga like Dragon Ball Z and Naruto, it was hard to break new ground to capture audiences’ intrigue. 

However, Kazuki Takahashi answered the challenge with his exciting new manga called, you guessed it, Yu-Gi-Oh. 

In Yu-Gi-Oh’s early stages, Takahashi wanted to create a fighting manga with the added twist that none of the characters would fight each other. 

To work around this limitation, Takahashi incorporated card games as a plot device that drives the overall story. By using this gaming element, characters dual it out through monsters summoned from trading cards, rather than amongst each other. 

Serialized in Shueisha’s Weekly Shōnen Jump magazine, Yu-Gi-Oh ran its manga series between September 1996 and March 2004 and was highly praised among fans.

Oh, by the way, here’s a fun fact: did you know that Takahashi originally intended for Yu-Gi-Oh to be a horror manga? Well, by seeing some of the monsters’ grotesque appearances and devastating attacks, is this really surprising? 

Monsters, Magic, and Traps

Yu-Gi-Oh is a turn-based strategy game, similar to that of chess, except without the threat of monsters and magic spells. Also, Yu-Gi-Oh prioritizes a scoring system where both players, known as duelists, have 2000 or 4000 overall points respectively. 

To win a Yu-Gi-oh game is very simple. A duelist can only lose when their life points reach zero. By using your monsters, you deplete your opponent’s life points by attacking their monsters or your opponent directly. 

But be careful, attacking your opponent’s life points is easier said than done. In addition to rampaging monsters, magic, and trap cards can either aid or hinder you in battle. Unfortunately, your opponent can also use these magic and trap cards to strengthen their defenses. 

To be clear, each magic and trap card has its own special effects. That means you’ll need to implement effective strategies if you want to destroy your opponent’s monsters or build the best defenses to save your life points. 

Moreover, magic and trap cards have two different primary functions. Magic cards are mostly played on your turn to either strengthen your offense or weaken your opponents’ defenses. Each magic card can either give you a power boost or drain points from your opponent like a vampire depending on what card you play.

Meanwhile, trap cards work as their name implies. Depending on what moves your opponent makes, they can mistakenly activate your trap cards. With that said, you wouldn’t want to fall for any traps yourself. Failure to avoid traps could put you in the hot seat.

So, as you can see, it’s no surprise that people found Yu-Gi-Oh enticing to play. Who wouldn’t be intrigued to see giant monsters fighting each other on a battlefield up close? Add in the elaborate traps and spell-bounding magic and you’ll have the time of your life as you aim to become the king of games.

The Top-Selling Card Game 

The series, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters hooked American youth with its exciting new premise and action-packed fighting scenes. 

From its success, Kanomi Group Association, or Kanomi for short, developed and sold the Yu-Gi-Oh card game right here in America. Unsurprisingly, the trading cards were a big hit, selling over 22 billion cards worldwide.

Even more, Yu-Gi-Oh would win the  Guinness World Record on July 7, 2009, as the top-selling card game, outpacing even Pokémon. Likewise, Konami Digital Entertainment set the Guinness World Record for the largest trading card game tournament with 7,443 participants in total.

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