Game Review - Yu-Gi-Oh! Ultimate Masters:World Championship Tournament 2006 ( GBA 2006 - duh!)

The rather oddly titled "Yu-Gi-Oh! Ultimate Masters: World Championship Tournament 2006" (why oh why do they need to give these games such long titles?) was the 2006 entry into the hugely popular games series which, at the time, were exclusive to the Gameboy advance (I say this because similar games based on Yu-Gi-Oh! released on other systems usually followed some kind of storyline, whereas the "World Championship" games played as an electronic version of the CCG) 

Released during the "Yu-GiOh! GX era, the game featured nearly all the cards and game mechanics that had been employed in the RL CCG up to that point, however, unlike the previous game , the 2006 edition did not feature any of the characters from the anime, nor did it feature any storyline.

Reflecting the lack of storyline, the game itself made various changes to game play modes, which were selectable through the menu screen:-

Free Duel Mode.
The "Main" game mode, in which you duel against various other players, starting off with players ranked at "level 1", all of whom play a deck themed around the particular card they use as their avatar. Each tier contains 5 different duellists, all of whom use different strategies depending on the type of deck they are playing.

Challenge Mode.
This option consists of  4 sub categories of play:

1. Duel puzzle - You join a game in mid match, and using the cards you already have in your hand or in play, you must win the duel by the end of that turn.
2. Limited Duel - A series of duels in which restrictions are placed on what cards you may have in your deck.
3. Theme Duel - A series of duels in which as well as winning, you have a secondary objective of some sort, for example getting the maximum amount of direct damage to an opponents life points, drawing as many cards as possible, etc.
4. Survival Duel - You face off against random opponents one after another until you are defeated.

 As you begin the game, you get to choose a starter deck, but as you play, you can aquire additional cards by buying them from the in game shop, using Duel Points that you have won from competing in the free duel and challenge modes.
This game has a much wider selection of cards available than the 2003 game, which can make getting the cards you want difficult, as cards from the newer (at the time of release anyway) usually cost 400 Duel Points, whereas booster packs from older sets can cost as little as 150 points.

As a game, it does exactly as it says on the tin, it is indeed an electronic version of the real card game, however, it does present some problems which can put a dampener on new players...

• Difficulty - The game starting difficulty is WAAAYYYYYYYY off whack, requiring advanced knowledge of the card game and its mechanics in order to get any wins. This will, and did, put off a lot of novice players.
• Paying for everything - Earning duel points to buy new cards with is extremely difficult due to the above, and even then, the games strict adherence to the "Forbidden/limited" cards list (which was correct for tournament play at the time the game came out) means that sometimes you will open a booster pack and get an awesome card, only to find that it has been banned, and the game will not allow you to use it in any games. In addition to this, although the game allows you to enter the codes from your real life cards into the game, it makes you pay Duel Points in order to add them to your collection, if you dont have the point, you cant have, simple as. Very frustrating in the early game being as the game saddles you with very few powerful cards.
• Prescience - While playing through this games free duel mode, I got the distinct feeling that the games A.I seemed to know exactly what cards I had in my hand. This may just be me being paranoid, but when your A.I opponent manages to pull just the right card at just the right time 20 times in a row, you know that "the heart of the cards" seems to be giving way to borderline cheating.
• Whats the point? - The games lack of storyline takes something away from the gameplay. Even though the 2003 games storyline was generally weak, the complete elimination of it from this game makes the game a little dull.

 All in all though, the game isnt that bad, while it could have been a lot better, it still provides one of the best electronic recreations of a collectable card game.

Game Review - Yu-Gi-Oh!, Worldwide edition: Stairway to the Destined Duel (GBA 2003)

 Yu-Gi-Oh!, Worldwide edition: Stairway to the destined duel is a 2003 game that was released exclusively for the Nintendo Gameboy Advance.

Based on the popular CCG (that's Collectable Card Game for the uninitiated), which is in turn based on the popular manga/anime series of the same name, the game is basically a way of playing the card game without having to go to the trouble of purchasing packs of random cards and spending time building decks to play with.
This is not the first game based on the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise, as previous games were released on the playstation and gameboy colour, however, this game is what I would consider the first game to accurately replicate the dynamic of the CCG, albeit without the bad losers, cheating and other such occurances that can ruin gaming for most folk (myself included, lol).

The gameplay is simple, provided you are familiar with the original card game, if not, its fairly easy to be able to pick up the rules as you go along, enabling you to decide which strategies work best for you and allowing you to select cards for your deck accordingly.

There are two play modes:-

Story mode

Taking place during the "Battle City" story arc from the anime (series 2) you begin the game by selecting a starter deck from a random selection, and then you move around a map of the city challenging other duellists, who are all characters from the anime, to duels.
Each time you win, you earn points and are allowed to choose a prize from a variety of booster packs.
As you win more duels and aquire more cards for your collection, more duellists and special "side events" become available, eventually culminating in you battling the character Marik Ishtar and his minions who have a dastardly plot to rule the world using the dark magic of the milennium items and the egyptian god cards.
There are numerous achievements to beat over the course of story mode, all of which can be completed with varying degrees of difficulty depending on your play style.

Multiplayer

Using a link cable to connect your Gameboy to someone elses, you can then battle them directly, gaining duellist points and enabling you to trade cards from your personal collections.


Oddly enough, this game was released before the Japanese version, but, at the time of release, it made heavy use of cards which had not yet been made available in the west.
In addition, some cards featured in the game had different names to their "official" western releases, which caused some confusion amongst players.
Also, the western release of the game came packaged with three promo cards in the form of "Sinister Serpent", "Harpies Feather Duster" and "Valkyrion the Magna Warrior", whereas its Japanese counterpart came packaged with one each of the "Egyptian God Cards", which left many fans of the series feeling cheated, but also it allowed people who had managed to get a hold of these powerful cards via other avenues to sell them on for ridiculous amounts of money.

All in all though, the game itself is still good to this day, with its simple to use interface and heavy use of characters from the anime, but it is let down by its rather lackluster storyline which seems to end very quickly.

This game is reall ymore for fans of the anime and players of the card game than for general gamers.