Yu☆Gi☆Oh!

Children's Card Games Saga Part I: A Long Time Ago In A Galaxy Far Away, Where Everyone Has Crazy Hair

Well, it's been a long time since I did a nostalgia review, and it took me so long to finish this series due to being unable to find synced audio and video versions of the show, I feel like I can be nostalgic about this show now. (Seriously, I had to quit watching this show for 6 months)

Anyway- so back in 1998, Yugioh was born. Not the 4Kids Yugioh I grew up watching in the early 2000s, but the version that nobody in the US ever ... saw- what we know as Season 0. Though it sports the Yugioh name, this show and Yugioh Duel Monsters are almost nothing alike- though you can see where many of the ideas for Duel Monsters came from in this- an homage of sorts for the Japanese audience who did see this. This one, though, is not really a kid's show.


Artwork and Animation: 4

The art is very 90s, and fairly low budget at that. Honestly, it's kind of ugly to watch, but I mean, what has Toei ever made that was very visually appealing in the first place? They're not exactly the paragon of animation quality. The quality drops noticeably in the last 3 episodes- even with the chibi stuff they were using to mask how rough it looked.

Never fear- Yugi's physics breaking hairstyle/head parasite is always in great form, as is Jounouchi/Joey's... hair... thing.

Basically, this show looks like a Phillips CD-I game.


Sound and Voice Acting: 4

No complaints about the voice acting, other than Yukana, the voice of Miho, is annoying as heck. Sorry C2- but you sound like a live hamster being put through a meat grinder combined with screeching children.

Now, what IS odious about the sound is the uber-recycled generic porno style hip hop muzak that plays in the background of scene setting and as insert music. You hear that, this 80s dance synth cut, and these two "spooky" sounding clips that loop every 3 seconds approximately 46 times each per episode. I think including the OP and ED, there were a total of maybe 6 pieces of music used in the show. Re-re-re-re repetitive.

It's just a shame that Dan Green never got to dub this Yugi.


Characters: 7

The same kids we know and love, but with the addition of Miho, and a few changes in personality:

Yugi gets beat up like once every other episode, and close to the end of the series actually gets his azz beat in an arcade by a guy that knows Hokuto Shin Ken! ATATATATA and everything! He's pretty much a pathetic woobie, but he makes up for it by being caring and determined to help people, I guess? *mumbles something about Heart of the Cards*

Yami Yugi on the other hand, either drives someone insane by breaking their mind with magic, sends them to the hospital due to the dangerous game they play (and lose), or just straight up kills them! He takes absolutely no crap in this series, and is keeping the mental health facilities and hospitals full of patients.

Jounouchi/Joey and Honda/Tristan are basically the same in this series- ruffian goons who torture Yugi in the beginning, befriend him, and then never leave his side except to be screwups for the sake of comedy. Jounouchi does beat the snot out of quite a few people in the show though. Honda's sole character trait is that he's absolutely infatuated with the airheaded dimwit Miho, who pays him absolutely no attention.

The biggest difference in character from Yugioh '98 to Duel Monsters is Anzu/Tea though. In DM, she's just a useless side character who takes the role of cheerleader and annoyance, but in '98, she's a legitimately likable and useful leading lady. She has a lot more self assertiveness and confidence in this series, and makes herself useful throughout. There's also a romance subplot, that, while it doesn't go much of anywhere, it still adds another facet to a character I think everyone at the least didn't care about, and at most outright hated in Duel Monsters.

Lastly, there's Miho- the blue haired, flirtatious, greedy, and vapid ditz who exists solely to balance out the Dude:Chick ratio in the series and be incredibly irritating. (I'm told she appears in literally one chapter in the manga, so her inclusion in the show is a mystery to everyone, including the writers.)


Story: 6

Where the Duel Monsters show was created basically as a gigantic advertisement for Children's Card Games™, Yugioh 1998 follows the mid-90s manga of the same name, with most of the same characters we came to know in Duel Monsters.

The main difference in the show is that Yami Yugi- the ancient king of games whose soul resides in the Millennium Puzzle pendant that Yugi wears- is not only proficient at Children's Card Games™ (AKA Duel Monsters), but essentially any and all games of chance. The show is almost entirely episodic, with two arcs coming at the very end, but in each episode, Yugi manages to find himself in trouble with someone or another, and then talks them into playing a game of chance- whether it's playing cards, riddles and word games, or more often, games involving life and death. The show has quite a bit of violence, including Yami Yugi driving people insane/sending them to the hospital, and includes actual weapon wielding baddies, including guns.

The second to last arc of the show even has Yugi and friends playing a game called "Death T", which is just a ripoff of "The Running Man" game show (from the 1987 Arnie classic!) put on by Kaiba! He has them placed in a giant arena and forced to fight through different stages, including Lazer Tag with actual electricity, a riddle game where the gang nearly gets crushed by a spiked steamroller, another where blocks fall from the ceiling tetris style, and games against the Kaiba Brothers.

There are a lot of setpieces and ideas used again later in Duel Monsters viewers will recognize like Kaibaland/ battle city duels and Capsule Monsters (Dungeon Dice Monsters). Many of the monsters from the other, non Duel Monsters games played in the show also make appearances later as Yugioh cards.
Yami Bakura and Yami Yugi play a Dungeons and Dragons game where the gang's bodies transform into their game figures (in Duel Monsters, their favorite cards) and they have to play to keep their souls.
There's also a virtual reality duel, and a mirror of Yugi and Kaiba's duel from the beginning of DM. Oh, and soul stealing. A lot of soul stealing.


Enjoyment and Overall: 8, 6

I enjoyed a lot of the dated references in Yugioh- (Tamagotchis FTW!) and general 90s-ness of the show. It was also cool to see Yami Yugi in a totally different form- making people go crazy/sending them to hell/etc and the inclusion of guns, violence, and the threat of violence, like with the bomber in the theme park who actually followed through and blew up both a building and two parts of a ride!

I enjoyed watching this little departure from the Yugioh I loved as a kid. It's definitely a fun little extra for someone who doesn't want to slog through 200 something episodes of Duel Monsters, but still feel like they're going on another adventure with the gang. (GX/5Ds/Zexal don't exist. That's schlock for another day.)

Many American Yu-Gi-Oh! fans were surprised when reading the first seven volumes of the manga, seeing how different the tone was compared to the dubbed TV series shown in the US (Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters) and how the stories that were shown in the manga weren't present in the anime. In truth, before the series that most countries outside of Asia would recognize, there was a series produced by Toei that was based on the game-centered first seven volumes of the manga.

Before I go into review-mode, I'd like to point out that this series IS NOT called "season zero", "The Shadow Games/Yami no Game", or ... whatever other crap people are calling it this week. This was done by a different animation company (Toei) and has nothing to do with the series most of us know in the US, aside from having the same source material (Kaiba's hair is green for heaven's sake!). Calling it the "Shadow Games" is redundant because people seem to forget that the WHOLE manga and anime series is centered around Shadow Games. >_>; And "more violent"? Um, yeah. What part of "Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters was dubbed by 4Kids!" don't you understand?

Story - 6

In truth, I enjoyed the first seven volumes of the manga. The first anime series? Well, that's a whole different story. The anime made liberties to the story shown in the manga, most of the time for the worst. A lot of the games that were originally pure genius were altered in the anime or just removed all together. Not to mention, it was comprised of original crap made by Toei and skipped over a lot of the more interesting chapters. I wanted to see the Zombire chapters and the "knife in the mouth" game animated, darn it! They had a lot of material to work with, but Toei decided to screw it up with their oh-so-good fillers.

The basis of the story and the theme is good, which is why I gave it a 6, but the anime was poorly executed, not to mention poorly paced.

Art - 3

The character designers and animators at Toei were smoking something unpleasant when producing this series. Green-haired Kaiba aside, the character designs for all the other characters were needlessly altered from their manga-counterparts and were drawn inconsistently throughout the series. The animation was quite inconsistent in general, and the BRIGHT color palette is a pain in the eyes.

Actually, the opening and ending themes are probably the only half-decent animation work that this series has to offer.

Sound - 6

The best thing I thought Toei did with the anime was the soundtrack, which isn't saying much because it wasn't all that amazing. The opening theme and the ending theme were OK (I especially liked the ending theme the most), but the background music is either a hit-or-miss.

The voice actors were great, but the large gap in tone between Yuugi and Dark Yuugi's voices were quite exaggerated by Megumi Ogata. Still, she made Dark Yuugi sound like a VERY clear-cut badass teenager.

Characters - 6

MOST of the characters retain MOST of their personalities that were shown in the manga. But seeing the alteration to Honda's fairly likable character into a pansy that got beat up in the first episode for no reason, and adding Miho into the story, all I have to say to Toei is...

What the hell were you thinking?!

Enjoyment - 5

If it wasn't for me reading the manga first, I probably would've enjoyed this series more. But I DEFINITELY wouldn't have seen the "lost potential" the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise had if I didn't read the first seven volumes of the manga first... The way the anime was constructed was neither "genius" nor would I see any LITTLE connection this series has to the later series. I probably wouldn't even know what the hell was going on.

Overall - 5

Toei turning something potentially watchable into something quite horrible? That totally never happened before.

If you want a SLIGHTLY more faithful adaptation of the manga, SLIGHTLY better character designs, and SLIGHTLY better animation, watch the second series (Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters, subbed). In truth, the second series isn't all that great either, but it's much better than what this series is hyped out to be in the more idiotic portion of the Yu-Gi-Oh! fandom. Personally, I recommend staying away from the words "Yu-Gi-Oh!" and "anime" put together, all together.

I've decided to nostalgia trip a little bit on Yu Gi Oh! duel monsters, a show I grew up watching after school and realized that I did not ever see the actual first season (King of Games otherwise known as Season Zero). Likely for good reason, if this "King of games" season was what I was first exposed to of the franchise, I'd have a hard time believing the Duel Monsters season would be worth watching because at times this show was laughable.

With all the censorship 4kids had done on the franchise I can't even imagine how they would even present this up to their ... standards. Yugi gets beat up seemingly every second episode among other tricky subject matter to get around. I also feel like the card games profit would have suffered initially just because of the nature of this show was again laughable, and I was surprised to see how little the duel monsters game was played. Every time I felt it was leaning towards what I was familiar with seeing of the franchise, it just went completely off the board and lost any resemblance of what it was I grew up with then back on, then off the board again like "what am I watching?". It's also chalked full of morality plot points, very... good behavior beats out bad behavior, but I want to say a different brand than in the Duel Monsters season, then again I don't remember Duel Monsters super well but that's just what I felt I was seeing, putting out a good message as most shows do when they first gain airtime.

Out of the 27 episodes I maybe got 8 or so episodes that I did find quality enjoyment in, especially the last 3. Otherwise I found it hard to believe I was watching Yu Gi Oh because of how different it was, sometimes shockingly so. I was happy seeing Yugi's friendship origins, which is mainly why I wanted to see in the first place. From what I grew up with they seemed generally unimportant aside from morale support and a duel here and there, but this season is where I felt they played a huge role and I got to see their relationship with Yugi in more depth. I'd consider it worth watching for that alone. Also, if you're a Kaiba fan, there is quality insight to his character as well. Glad they changed his hair to how it is in the Duel Monsters season.

I doubt I'll ever return to this season (or series once I eventually finish Duel Monsters) and could easily have given this season a 5. To me it's not a bad show, but I can't really call it an especially good one either. I don't see it as anything lower than a 5.

If anything, watch it to see just how different it used to be, if you want to see Yugi's friendships origin, for a laugh or to be dumbfounded by it. It is by no means unenjoyable. I'm looking forward to seeing season 1 (Duel Monsters) again without censorship and hopefully be entertained with it for awhile.

Amazingly fun and enjoyable. At first the events do not revolve around a central plot, which is partly negative (since the first episodes, except the first, can be considered "unnecessary"), and partly positive (because those very first episodes end up being independent and very fun).

It's also interesting to see how Yami Yugi is presented, and how the other characters see him, always seeing him as the same Yugi as ever, just with more confidence. It was kind of sad that they did not attach so much importance to his past as Pharaoh the way they later did in Duel Monsters.

... One thing Yugioh Zero sins on, in my opinion, is about character evolution, since almost everyone has no personality change or maturation from start to finish (except for Jonouchi, which shows remarkable evolution at the end of the anime), especially Miho with its uselessness and Honda with its Miho veneration.

Kaiba's bow is average, certain moments get boring, but the final battle against it is incredibly epic (despite being full of convenience and protagonism is very good), forgiving that weak and mediocre duel they had at the beginning. But the bow of Bakura is what made me like this anime so much, because it contains by far the coolest battle in the whole anime, has no protagonism in abundance on the part of Yami Yugi and quite surprising (seriously, there were times when I thought : Everyone will die, fuck!) They managed to create a fucking scary monster (The Zorc) and an epic and scary scenario.

The anime doesn't have a noticeable or above average animation, on the contrary, it's below average and doesn't have such realistic features, becoming even crooked and strange at times. But you can forgive, since the anime is relatively old.

The sound quality is not good either, it is full of squeaks. But what is really annoying is when the sound is muffled (happens regularly throughout the episodes). Probably the audio is so because the anime was not released on Blu-ray or DVD, being fully recorded from TV.

Final Thoughts: The anime is very entertaining and unpretentious, bringing some moments of distress and involvement with the plot. I recommend watching to see what Yugioh looked like when he was animated by Toei, and to see the evolution that anime has undergone to the current bows.

Don't bother watching this, just skip to the Duel Monsters anime. Stomps this anime in every regard.

Seriously even for Yu-Gi-Oh fans the novelty quickly wears off since most of the episodes are predictable filler that have nothing to do with the main story.

Production Values: Art(4) Animation (4) Sound Direction(4) OST(4) Voice Acting (5)
The art direction & animation for this series is very inconsistent. Rarely does it ever go beyond sub-par quality, even then it's not by much. It does have it's own "aesthetic" but not in a good way, tries to create atmosphere by contrasting dark & bright colors but it ends up being very ... irritating (a lot of 90's animation tried going for this, HBO Spawn for example). Very limited OST that gets recycled at nauseum, with only the Yami Yugi transformation theme being halfway decent. Sound direction is nothing to write home about either, nothing memorable. Voice actors worked with what they had, not bad but not great either.

Story: Plot (8) Characters (7) Pacing (4)
When the actual Yu-Gi-Oh story gets to shine, it shines bright. Very interesting premise and likable characters. Unfortunately due to the pacing & fillers it rarely gets any spotlight in this series making it very frustrating to watch.

Going back to Duel Monsters after giving this a chance felt like a breath of fresh air, seriously the quality is night & day difference.

It was a decent season of Yu-Gi-oh!, from here on onward Yu-Gi-Oh starts. Disappointed that there were not many duel battles in the series, but other types of games were introduced a lot during the season. The character development was decent, art style and animation was also decent as it aired in the 90s. I liked some episodes and others were also decent, I enjoyed the MC and his friends. This series aside gaming shows us the importance of friendship.
What I liked about the series is the MC and the duel game which is played and his smartness also.
I give this series 6/10.