OUR FAVOURITES FROM JAPAN
Join the circle of Duelists
Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links
PvP Card Battles
The enduring popularity of Japanese games is nothing short of a phenomenon. Whether they’ve been created as games from the outset, or been adapted from their manga or anime origins, they’ve proven a hit around the world for decades.
In celebration of iconic games from Japan, today we take a look at one of the country’s most popular manga adaptations, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links.
Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links brings all the excitement of Yu-Gi-Oh! – the popular trading card game – to mobile and is based on the manga series that was serialised in the Japanese magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump.
The original manga Yu-Gi-Oh! told the story of a boy named Yugi Muto, who loved games and was always getting bullied. After solving the ancient Egyptian Millennium Puzzle, he awakens an alter-ego called Yami Yugi, who takes on the challenge of different games.
One such game was a fictional card game in which two competing players (Duelists) alternately place cards with monsters drawn on them into the field and ‘duel’ each other in battles.
Originally meant to be one of many games, its popularity with readers led to the content of the original manga changing in the direction of a card game.
In 1999, the Yu-Gi-Oh! Official Card Game was released with the motif of cards that appeared in the manga series, and rules were established for the card game.
The game – which enables players to actually hold and play cards with monsters on them, like the Dark Magician (which was a favourite of the main character Yugi in the original) and the Blue-Eyes White Dragon (used by rival Seto Kaiba) – became a hit.
The Yu-Gi-Oh! Official Card Game has since been launched in 75 countries and regions in many other languages, further expanding the circle of Duelists around the globe. To date, more than 10,000 variations of cards have appeared in the game.
And as the types of cards increase, new strategies are emerging and Duelists around the world compete against each other’s card skills daily.
The number of Duelists continues to expand thanks to the mobile version Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links – as of March 2020, the number of competitions played by Duelists in the game was approximately 4.1 billion!
But who dominates the world of Duelists? Every year, the Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championship esports tournament brings together the best players to compete for the crown. In 2019, Japan’s Shuhei Kobayashi became the new champion of the Duel Links Division category.
From a manga to a popular card game to a major esports tournament, the Yu-Gi-Oh! series has had an epic evolution and continues to connect people all around the world every day.
Ready to join the ranks of the Duelists? Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links awaits!