Card Games in Hell

Year of the Dragon: Part 3 - What Happened?

2013-02-09T21:11:00.000-08:00

This is it. This is when this blog finally gets to the nitty gritty of what happened to the dragon over time. Hoo boy, this took a long time, but getting to the bottom of this shit was worth it.

Dragons, as my Japanese teacher put it, have been "cutified." We started thinking that they might not be so bad as creatures. The idea of a 'pet' dragon was particularly popular. Dragon-riding became all but a sport in several fantasy worlds. When one looks back on the stories of dragon-slaying and burninating the countryside, it's hard to see exactly why riding a dragon would be a good idea on any level.

So, what the hell happened? While I would like to blame the radical shift on the occasional "Androcles and the Lion" situation, that is not what happened. A colleague of mine actually thinks it started with a certain episode of The Addams Family; while she may have had a point, it would have been a very small trickle before a torrent. What actually happened to cause this shift was the rough equivalent of Twilight for dragons:

Dragonriders of Pern, a series of novels and short stories by Anne McCaffrey, is about humans who have created tame dragons to combat a strange foe on Mars. As one might expect, it was originally written in the 60's. The series is more science-fiction than fantasy, despite involving dragons, and continues to be written by Anne McCaffrey's son, Todd. Apparently the series actually has some literary merit; the first few books have won Hugo and Nebula Awards. This is not about how good the books are; rather, it is about the undeniable dent that the Dragonriders series made in the nature of dragons as a whole.

One thing has to get out of the gate right now: the trope "Our Dragons Are Different" is subtly in effect. Genetically-engineered dragons are still somewhat creative, and are totally foreseeable in the near future. There is indeed creativity around these dragons that McCaffrey cooked up, even if it's subtle how she's twisting them. Whether it merits legacy authorship or not is another can of worms.

Dragonriders of Pern left a mark, for sure. Symbiotic, empathetic, telepathic dragons that can teleport? Who wouldn't want that as a friend? Despite this relative awesomeness, nobody else re-used any of those characteristics except for telepathy. Oh, and getting along with humans.

On one level, I will admit that McCaffrey was onto something. If the dragon is indeed nature's fury and power incarnate, then this descent into an engineered weapon almost makes sense. Over the ages, humans have gotten better and better at harnessing the strange, bewildering powers of nature - things that would otherwise make excellent monsters in any other era. Not only are the forces of nature, well, harnessed, but they're also augmented solely for human use. Although probably not intentional, the correlation between dragons as a force of nature, tamed and the rise of mankind's control of nature suddenly makes sense. It's a logical, yet sad way to go.

So, to recap: the dragon went from being a mythical creature symbolic of a natural nemesis (and, by extension, the slaughtering of that nemesis) or power to a genetically-engineered, intelligent living weapon designed for human use. That's a pretty big change. This is as bad as sparkling vampires, but it was so long ago that nobody of this generation remembers. Fear for the vampires next, guys. Fear for the vampires next.

D&D took the idea of multicolored dragons from Dragonriders and the intelligence of Tolkein's (still otherwise traditional) Smaug and ran with it. Suddenly, dragons could wield any element, live anywhere, and be any character that a RPG setting wanted. There are good and bad dragons, even though the great majority of them are Western-style, 6-limbed, hyperintelligent, scaly behemoths. This unfortunately reached the peak of its stupidity in the frost dragon.

Again, some peace must be said. It's a good thing that people are doing new things with dragons. Ice was the only element not really embodied by a giant serpent. One could almost call it creativity if it wasn't vomited out by a marketing team on a constant basis.

The idea of a frost dragon is designed to sell. Its sole purpose in life is so that fire can fight water, because apparently tsunami-size waves just aren't as impressive as cliche Ice Beam attacks and fire VS fire is boring. I can point to a canon dragon for every element and climate except ice. Water, yes; ice, no. If anyone knows of one, please point it out to me. I would like to know if Brionac and Kyurem have any reason for being except money.

It hurts to liiiivee...

Oh, and then there's "dragon element" or "Dragon-Type." Pokemon in particular has this idea that dragons are supposed to be nigh-invincible save another dragon or being frozen solid. Dragon-Type attacks are usually not resisted. A type that started as being exactly one evolution line ballooned to 9 (Altaria, Bagon, Shelgon, Salamence, Vibrava, Flygon, Rayquaza, Latios and Latias) in Generation III. (I may accuse Gen III of ruining Pokemon later on this or another blog.) One could almost say that they parallel the Almighty element from the Shin Megami Tensei series.

There have also been a lot of recent dragon hybrids. Sunburn (dragon x phoenix) and Whirlwind (dragon x unicorn) from Skylanders come to mind. There are a number in Yu-Gi-Oh! as well, including the dreaded Rabidragon. It's almost as if regular dragons got so inbred they had to turn to other species just to make them interesting. Given that dragons are supposed to be inherently other, that says something. Creative? Yes, but it will get old fast. Showing stagnation in a concept that should be eternally terrifying and awe-inspiring? Yes.

Dragons just aren't different enough anymore. If something that used to symbolize other-ness loses that meaning, then it has no further purpose in life. After that, it's just a shameless whore masquerading as something that was once symbolic. The symbol has died, or at the very least is on its last legs.

Need proof of this? Look no further than the recent rash of highly anthropomorphized dragons. YGO's Stardust Dragon is an excellent example: It's bipedal, has 5 digits on its hands, and is actually a sacred being. It's not that anthropomorphism never existed in dragons - oh, far from that - but it's been taken to such an extreme that the human has become the dragon, and the dragon has become human. When the symbol of the 'other' has effectively lost all 'other-ness,' what remains except its shadow?

I am immediately reminded of a certain scene from Crichton's Jurassic Park. While plotting the park, there is a conversation about the nature of dinosaurs. One of the very smart scientists on the team points out that people do not want to see real dinosaurs. After the manager wonders what this guy is talking about, the scientist points out that this is an amusement park, so people are expecting to be amused, not eaten. Seeing real, live, 100% wild and vicious dinosaurs would dash a few expectations to the floor. I cannot help but wonder if there is a similar case with dragons; if dragons once existed and someone today found one, would they like what they saw?

This concludes these unbearably long and horribly procrastinated articles. Now enjoy the Year of the Snake, which should totally have its own article as well. Thank you for sticking with this piece!

I am open to comments, but do avoid the following:

"According to my D&D manual..." Gaming companies invent their own stuff all the time. The same goes for art books and Dragonology. Cool ideas, but still designed to sell. Selling usually means obscuring the root in this instance.

Dragons are dinosaurs - I'm actually totally open to this idea, but you have to admit that they share a ton of symbology with snakes. In this case, one can simply say that the ancient people who thought up dragons didn't know any better and fused dinosaurs and snakes into dragons.

"You're wrong, I AM a dragon and I'm no snake!" - Bullshit. There was a time I bought into Otherkinism, but so many of the 'dragons' are fakes that anyone who behaves like this will be instantly branded a liar. Sorry if you're part of the rare 1%.

Year of the Dragon: Part 2- What Is A Dragon, Anyways?

2012-12-21T16:16:00.002-08:00

Most of you are probably wondering what made this take so long. Basically, I kept finding more and more fodder for it. Exactly what defines a dragon is very confusing, with a ton of symbolism woven into a tangled mess.

So, here's the tough part: What makes a dragon a dragon? Well, let's see what Wikipedia has to say about this:

"A dragon is a legendary creature, typically with serpentine or reptilian traits, that feature in the myths of many cultures."

Does this really suffice in defining a dragon? At first, it seems so, but if that's all it is, then the modern perception of the dragon has become far too narrow. At the same time, it looks like that definition is slowly being broken.

One would think that "any legendary reptilian" would be a fine definition, but look again. There is almost nothing reptilian about 'dragons' like Lati@s and Reshiram. Even with the generic 'legendary reptile' definition, does that make basilisks and, to a lesser degree, Medusa dragons? Most people would not say so. (Actually, the ancient Greeks WOULD call the most popular rendition of Medusa a proper drakaina-gorgon hybrid. More on that later.)

It is much easier to describe something that is not a dragon rather than to actually describe in detail what makes a dragon a dragon. Gryphons aren't dragons, even though they sometimes have serpentine tails. Nagas as the internet knows them are not usually considered dragons, even though they fill that position traditionally.

Yes, even this is a dragon. Really.

The majority of dragons have some connection to snakes. Western or Eastern doesn't matter. It doesn't even matter if dinosaur fossils were responsible for dragons. They were seen as snakes, not lizards, in the collective subconscious (otherwise we would be calling them "sauroi" or some such). Occasionally, there is also some fish in the mix, but the vast amount of serpentine traits still speak to the original basis.

Don't believe me? The Greek "drakon" is the word for snake. The Japanese "Orochi" literally translates as "big snake." The words "zmey," "naga," and the English "serpent" all speak to the relationship between dragons and snakes. Dragons are commonly depicted with a forked tongue, which is far more common in snakes than in lizards. No matter how much evidence "dragons are dinosaurs" has behind it, the dragon always comes back to "serpent" in the subconscious.

The problem is that most snakes (read: most) are not nearly impressive enough to warrant folktales and art about. Yes, it's great if you can kill a rattlesnake, but most rattlers are tiny. Snakes are also, as Secrets of the Snake Charmer put it, "cowards, then bluffers, then finally fighters" - meaning that a snake would rather run than fight unless a hot mouse is involved. A dragon is, at its core, a valiant, bellicose snake - a creature that reverses the very temperament that people hate about serpents. This reversal means that the mutant snake will put up a good fight.

As such, it can be said that snake and dragon symbolism tend to run parallel, often with the dragon representing an extreme in snake symbolism. This extreme can be for better or for worse. If the snake has ambivalent reception, the dragon tends to receive either exaltation (China) or the best/worst of both worlds (Greece). If the serpent cannot be anything but evil, the dragon is almost undeniably so to a much larger degree.

Another very popular theory involves dinosaurs. While I do buy this as a valid starting point for dragons, the symbolism doesn't match up. The presence of fossils does not explain the relationship to snakes at all. Given that the symbolic relationship to snakes is almost homogenous, I wonder what proponents of the idea of dragons as dinosaurs think?

Pokemon shows the distinction between Eastern and Western dragons very, very well. We can find the three "basic" types of dragons - the "Eastern," "Western," and wyvern- in the first generation of Pokemon as Gyarados, Charizard, and Aerodactyl respectively. Are the parallels 100%? No, but I will be sure to point out when they are not.

Gyarados is a typical Eastern dragon, even though it does not have legs. Its story originates from the "Dragon Gate" tale in which a carp jumps over a waterfall in order to become a heavenly dragon. Aside from fish, snakes are also said to be capable of this ascension - an idea which is taken to new heights in the Korean imugi. Yes, D-War sucked; that does not mean that its mythological basis is entirely false. (China has the idea of snakes as baby dragons as well, but they never really play it up.)

Evidence of this blur can be found in the Shin Megami Tensei series. The non-Persona games of that franchise blend the terms "snake" and "dragon" more or less freely. Pendragon, a Western-style dragon, is a "Snake," even though it has limbs; Bai SuZhen, a character that would be explicitly a "snake" to most people in the West, is a "Dragon." The Cardfight!! Vanguard card game also has nagas ("Demonic Dragons") listed as "Dragonmen," showing just how blurry this line can be. It really doesn't make that much difference in Asian cultures.

(I also think Seiobo might be a Bai SuZhen reference.)

Eastern dragons, much like naga and other more serpentine dragons, are usually beings of water - a far cry from the fire-breathing beasts common to Christian lore. A few serpents are noticeably fire-breathing (Kiyohime comes to mind), but by and large, Chinese/Eastern dragons are treated as heavenly beings who breathe steam and command rain. This makes them very important for cultures dependent on wet rice fields, like Thailand, or upon the sea, like Japan. Japan even seems to have several types of dragons, both the "water deity" kind and malevolent, fire-breathing serpents that pop up from time to time (see: Orochi and Kiyohime). The situation is a lot more complex than it looks.

Although Chinese dragons are whored (often improperly), they are nowhere near as corrupted as the Western version. Unfortunately, they are heading that way. The more solid the definition of "dragon" gets, the less variety we will see. As the Western and Eastern serpents both get lumped under the same classification of "dragon," things like this start happening:

So now Mushu's Satan?

That said, moving on to the so-called "Western" dragon:

Who else has one of these, eh? ;)

Charizard is our archetypal Western dragon: a massive, scaly beast that flies, breathes fire, and has a grand total of six limbs. There is also probably some salamander in Charizard's design (as hinted by Charmander), but the salamander is an entirely different creature from the dragon. Go look up the mythical salamander for that; it's kind of neat, but I won't be covering it here.

Although I will use the term "Western dragon," the dragon that usually comes to mind is a four-legged beast with leathery wings that breathes fire. This was not so in much of the Western world for a very long time. Prior to the cultural invasion of Christianity, many local, pagan religions had serpentine dragons associated with water and the earth. (When I say "serpentine," I mean "basically giant snakes.") The Lernean Hydra, for example, did not breathe fire at all; as one might have guessed from the name, the Hydra (capitalized here to note that hydra as opposed to any other) was a multi-headed water snake (drakon) that was toxic instead of fiery. I don't see why movie makers don't go for an acidic serpent; enough people are terrified of snakes that even "giant snake" would be a pretty impressive beast.

I am TIRED of these motherf**ing snakes in this motherf**ing chamber!

Even typical-looking Western dragons such as Y Ddraig Goch were largely associated with pestilence- not something that we usually associate with dragons nowadays. It is actually really, really hard to find a four-legged, fire-breathing, winged dragon outside of post-Christian lore. The closest you will get are the Brazilian boitata, and the Hindu/Buddhist nagas - all described as serpents that can manifest spirit fire. (Japan has a few fire-breathing snakes as well.) "Western" by itself is far from homogenous.

"Nagas" are rarely considered Western dragons, but the Greeks had snake/dragon people just like the Indians did. The Greek drakaina ("she-dragon"), in combination with the Hindu naga, has led to the blossoming of female serpents - half-woman, half giant snake. This style of drakaina was generic- there is no one Greek snake woman that can be properly identified, with the notable exception of Echidna (their Tiamat). The drakaina and other snake-people were common to the point where the divine could be represented that way, so long as they somehow came straight from the earth ("autochthonic").

Silly Clash of the Titans...she doesn't need that bow.

Time for some brief mythbusting regarding drakainai. Medusa did not have a serpentine tail as in Clash of the Titans, but was instead part avian in her traditional mythology. The snake hair was still a very real trait, inflicted as a punishment from Athena, who was herself portrayed as a snake goddess (sometimes with a serpentine cloak). The Greeks probably would not have minded making Medusa more draconic, if only because she would then be the queen of dragons (thus making her head the ultimate trophy). The same case holds for Lamia, whose name properly relates to sharks; the "drakaina" version was popularized by John Keats, and again, the Greeks would probably think that synchronicity very fitting. It's not a bad thing that these two got draconified. There's another look at the Western dragon for you.

So, where did the popular Christian dragon come from? Two sources. One is Satan - hellfire, goat horns, pointy teeth, etc. with some serpentine skin to tie it all together. (I've heard some interesting stuff about Celtic dragons being general elemental spirits; this doesn't change the fact that medieval culture demonized them, and the 'Western' dragon draws heavily from medieval sources.) A few depictions of seven-headed serpent Satan add on a human face for good measure. The other way of making a Western dragon is a bit less obvious, and, honestly, much cooler:

If this image of Bellerophon slaying the chimera, a certain (female) fire-breathing lion with wings, a snake tail, and a goat's head, looks familiar, you are not mistaken. The chimaera is the basis for every fire-breathing Western dragon ever. The salamander may have had some influence, too, but even that looks like a chimaera in mythical depictions. A "Western" dragon is effectively a homogenized lion-goat-snake hybrid. Many people throw eagle in there, too. Awesomeness is not the point; point is that the "dragon" we know and love is an unwitting chimera.

Medieval artists loved the Bellerophon mosaic. Almost every picture of St. George slaying the dragon derives from this mosaic in some way, shape or form. It's almost as if they traced the same pic over and over. If copyright laws had been around in the old days, I would bet money that the Western dragon would never have become popular. It's that plagiarized.

Look familiar? Also, note the emphasis on serpentine elements.

What happens when you fuse a snake with the popular perception of demonic forces? A dragon. What happens when you take a Greek chimaera and successfully blend its parts together into a more homogenous entity? A dragon. It's not that hard to see.

This mish-mashed type of dragon was designed to be the ultimate nemesis. It could fly, breathe fire, and embodied the raw power of nature (again, particularly water and darkness originally). Having four clawed limbs was icing on the cake. Sometimes, just to make things even freakier, they would give dragons mammalian genitalia - a good record of which can be found here. (The gendering of the dragon over time would be another essay in and of itself; I will not dive too deeply into it here.) To conquer the dragon was to conquer Mother Nature. Even China, a nation known for revering dragons, has at least one king known for killing one of the serpents; dragon/snake slaying is alive and well everywhere.

That leaves Aerodactyl. Before anybody gets on my case about Aerodactyl not being a dragon, 1) Lance uses an Aerodactyl, as he does Charizard and Gyarados, and 2) despite being constantly compared to serpents in their "native" land, the Japanese use the word "yokuryuu" ("winged dragon") to refer to both extinct pterosaurs and wyverns. It's perfectly legitimate to say that Aerodactyl is a wyvern, despite being revived from a fossil and all that jazz. The cross was clearly intentional.

Wyverns are by far the most realistic type of dragon and have been gaining popularity in recent years. Although one could make an argument for six-limbed dragons being embodiments of the elements, the wyvern is undoubtedly feral and vicious. This is highlighted in one story where a young lady takes in a young wyvern, only to have it grow too big to handle and ultimately go out of her control. There is nothing sacred about a wyvern. Despite this, it remained popular in heraldry.

The word "wyvern" is related to the word "viper." Instead of the serpentine symbolism being exaggerated, here it is 100% kept in-tact. The wyvern is venomous, a sign of plague, and looks very much like a demonic serpent. Aerodactyl doesn't look particularly friendly, either, which is really what one would expect from being based off a pterosaur. (This reputation is further cemented in the anime episode "Attack of the Prehistoric Pokemon," in which Aerodactyl comes inches away from biting Ash's head off.) Wyverns are unanimously man-eating, poisonous menaces.

Count the limbs.

The wyvern has become the new dragon. In an effort to still use dragons while trying to make them 'strange,' filmmakers have decided to hack off two of those extra limbs. Most feral 'dragons' nowadays are technically wyverns if you count the limbs. Even movies don't think dragons are strange anymore.

And you know what? That's a problem. If we lose the root of the dragon - the serpent made strange - then the creature is incomplete. Whatever a dragon once was, its function has changed to fit the times in a way that medieval scholars could never have predicted. The next part will look at the modern dragon and exactly what has changed from its conception into the modern age.

YGO Dueling AndroDisc.

2012-12-02T01:43:00.001-08:00

For those of you who haven't seen this already, it's pretty freakin' sweet:

This is a 3-D dueling app for Android phones. I'd get it, buuuut my smartphone's a piece of crap and would probably break after using this once. Things are still in testing mode as far as I can tell. Still, this is pretty cool, even with all the bugs. :)

My only question is this: WHY are you not funding this, Konami?!

Year of the Dragon: Update + It Gets Worse.

2012-10-22T23:58:00.000-07:00

For those of you who are concerned: Yes, I do intend to continue this "Year of the Dragon" series. I will definitely have it done before the year is out. The more pics and info I have supporting the next two parts, the better. One of these Fridays, the second part will fly up here.

In the meantime, I thought I would comment on a few things.

First off, Pokemon Black and White 2. No, I have not gotten White 2 yet. I'm taking my time and finishing up other games. There will be a full-blown, awesome critique of it once I get done, though. The fused Kyurems are enough to make me flinch, although I will admit that Kyurem needed the redesign. I winced a little harder upon learning that each version got a different shiny dragon egg, plus a Blaxorus.

From Serebii.net. 1337 Bl4x0rz.

Oh, but it doesn't stop there. Noooo. Pokemon has unleashed a set called "Dragons Exalted," complete with Dragon as a new type. While I agree that Dragon has probably needed a new typing for a while, I'm still calling "dragonhumper" shenanigans. They just got a whole type to themselves in one of the most popular TCG's in the world, and are shilling it with a tin promo, Lati@s, and two Dragon-type decks.With this and the cover dragon(s) for B/W2, Game Freak has made sure that Year of the Dragon is in full swing.

Now, I could rant about YGO again. Thing is, YGO's been off the draconic deep end since at least 5D's and shows no signs of stopping. Vanguard, which I really hope encourages Konami to treat the game more soberly, is a whole different can of worms; although it started out advertising "knights and dragons," given BT09's confirmation of upgrades (I hesitate to call "cross-rides") to Dragonic Kaiser Vermillion and Maelstrom Dragon, I'm starting to wonder if they're starting to push the envelope a little. People were already worried that Limit Break was killing the game; were upgrades really necessary? If these two upgrades actually wind up helping the game, I'll retract my uneasy feelings.

Pokemon, YGO, and, yes, even Vanguard have assured me that the Year of the Dragon is loaded with dragons. After this year, I would love if people started shilling wolves. Please? At least wolves are something besides a symbol. We can donate the money to keeping Yellowstone pretty. The only place dragon money goes is to corporations, who then produce more dragons because your money means that there's demand. It's not that I hate dragons, it's that they don't seem to mean anything anymore.

Read: I do like dragons, I just won't buy something because "OMG IT'S A DRAGON!" Seriously, guys, dragons (particularly the "Western" dragon- you'll see why I have issues with that term later) have become so dirt common that they aren't remotely fantastic in the modern world. The fantastic has become mundane. The dragon's last sanction is that it does not exist. Do you see why that is a problem, yet?

But wait! It gets better:

The Greatest Show On Earth apparently features dragons, now. Admittedly, the advert I saw for this show piqued my curiosity enough to look it up. The actual dragon, above, looks much nicer than the dragon in the trailer. The trailer also advertises dragon tribes that value the virtues "Heart, Courage, Wisdom, and Strength." Considering the "Western" dragon was usually symbolic of Satan, I'm amazed that they would approach people with virtues. Also, what kind of power is "heart," anyways?

HEEAAAART!

You know what's sad? I know people who would buy tickets. I'm not just talking about little kids begging to see the dragon. I'm talking about adults who collect anything with 'dragon' in the name. I would expect these people to not only pay to see 'live' dragons, but also preserve the ticket stub.

On the bright side: PETA can't complain about this one. I just don't know how much crazier things can get this year. Again, I don't hate dragons, but how much are people willing to pay just for "dragon?" I mean it- people are paying for the word "dragon" regardless of whether whatever that word is attached to actually resembles a dragon or not.

Year of the Dragon - Part 1.

2012-01-23T19:35:00.000-08:00

Happy Chinese New Year, everyone! 2012 is Year of the Water Dragon, meaning that you should all look up your Year signs and see how this year will treat you. All mysticism aside, it looks to be Year of the Dragon for card games as well.

I was going to mention in my massive gift opening entry that it looks like Target's card game rack has been consumed by dragons. WoW, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and Pokemon all had dragons on their packs. (Alas, that entry remained in draft form largely due to poor timing- look up my YouTube if you're still interested.) After looking into it a tiny bit more, I found that this coincidence was just the tip of the iceberg.

Pokemon is really milking dragons hard, now. The latest Pokemon set, "Noble Victories," has Hydreigon, Kyurem, and Druddigon (*shiver*) as cover monsters. Later, the Reshiram and Zekrom theme decks will be coming out. No doubt there will be tins featuring Reshiram EX and Zekrom EX as well (and perhaps even Kyurem EX). These upcoming new releases are only the beginning.

In honor of the Year of the Dragon, the Pokemon TCG has officially made Dragon its own type. On one hand, it was necessary; it was very weird to have a Rattata doing double damage to Rayquaza. On the other, why? What the hell makes dragons sooo special that they need their own type in the card game? Moreover, what about other types that are completely different from their colors? If you're going to do this with dragons, do it for Ghost and Poison, too. (The alignment of Poison-types in the CCG has been sticky, to say the least.) "Because they're dragons" certainly does not mean that they deserve special treatment. I am sick of hearing that excuse.

In the next part of this article, I will elaborate on not only this mass-watering of dragons, but also on how the dragon has lost its identity. Look at how crazy people got when Twilight made its vampires sparkle; the only reason dragon-lovers aren't freaking out is because we've lost the sense of what a dragon once was. There will be more on this in part two, but at least I'm not the only one sick of dragons.

Yu-Gi-Oh! players - not the omnipresent dragon-collectors in that fanbase - are getting sick of dragon decks. The new dragon deck marks the fourth Structure Deck dragons have had to date. Most of the decks, as decks, have been mediocre at best on their own, but had cards useful when constructing one's own deck (such as Trade-In and Decoy Dragon in one, and common Mirror Force and Dragon Ravine in the other). This new deck is the same way: Backbone of a Chaos deck, some Dragon support cards, some bad Dragon support cards (Lord of Dragons and Flute of Summoning? Why?), some Lightsworn cards, and other things that make it a horrible mish-mash of deck types. I see where they were going with it. Not too sure I like where it was headed.

I admit that I made a rush judgment on how much the two cover dragons might impact the game; to me, ANYTHING resembling Chaos will spell death for YGO. I remember those days. Chaos was why the banlist got created. The banlist remains slipshod, so I fear for the meta after these decks are released. It will also be VERY weird to see the double dragon deck alongside Zekrom and Reshiram decks and/or tins. Talk about being copycats. Live up to your old motto and be creative, Konami!

I cannot speak for World of Warcraft and M:tG. If you are basing off of a standard fantasy setting, some dragons are inevitable. WoW currently has a set called "Twilight of the Dragons." That sounds like a horrible harlequin romance novel...but I digress. It's about time we talked about what a dragon truly is, or at least what it once was.

Dueling Dragons. Again.

2011-11-05T21:16:00.000-07:00

This blog needs more love. Luckily, Konami has done something that irked me enough to make a post.

So let's get this straight: YGO started the "Black Dragon VS White Dragon" thing, did it again in 5D's, Pokemon mooched it, now YGO's going back and doing it again just to be super-special-awesome hip. It's cool that we're getting REBD and BEWD in the same deck (YAY), but really? Reeeaaaallllyyy? The idea is bad on so many levels, especially with how they're doing it.

For starters, dragons have become truly bloated beasts in the fantasy industry. I daresay YGO's popularity helped stoke that particular flame. Counting this new dragon deck, the game has now had 4 Dragon-themed Structures in its history (not counting Seto Kaiba decks).

I'm not going to go into dragon aesthetics anymore. After trying the process out for myself, I have become convinced that they are just stringing random words together and putting "dragon" on the end. To 5D's' credit, the whole series had a Meso-American theme going; new dragons have no excuses for looking as twisted as they do. The new cover dragons suck in every sense of the word, unless the common supports somehow blow them out of the water.

The deck also has Chaos Sorcerer in it. While that particular Chaos monster has been off the banlist for a while, its presence in this deck and the recent unbanning of "Black Luster Soldier- Envoy of the Beginning" are worrisome. If this is indeed a Chaos Dragon deck, then Chaos Emperor Dragon will either be in the deck or come shortly after. We're all screwed.

On the plus side, existing dragon decks will now have a spare Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon and several other cool reprints to play with. Hopefully things like Totem Dragon will get reprints, too. Consider it a silver lining to the cloud.

(Tangent: I can't believe they made Rescue Rabbit a Secret Rare. I realize it's a good card, but making good cards THAT rare is bad for the game. Up to your old tricks, I see.)

Marvel...BAKUGAN?! + Damn You, Nintendo.

2011-10-08T10:00:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to update with something. Here's something.

Marvel VS Bakugan.Yes, that is a real thing. Discuss below. :)

Also, someone please get me this and/or the new Serperior Tin for Christmas. The cute little sculpted figures in both packages are SUPER-detailed. I particularly like how he box set shows Reshiram's wings working; they're segmented at the digits (no, Reshi is likely not feathered), sort of like Avatar's Banshees. I've really been digging that segmented wing style as of late, so sorry if I come off as begging, but...please?

PokeDream: OH GODS NO.

2011-09-11T10:11:00.000-07:00

Possibly as revenge for playing DQIV yesterday instead of training my Pokeymanz, I had a horrible, horrible dream related to the franchise that almost made me wake up screaming.

The 3DS has a scrolling side-bar for apps and the like. In my sidebar were two programs I had never seen before...with good reason.

Each program had a box featuring either Latios or Latias that looked like it had been drawn in Paint. The little box with Latias sad 'please be my boyfriend!" in scribble font above the image. The Latios one said something along the lines of "I'm emo." I did not click into either of them, just WTF'd and woke up.

This little dream essentially proves my theory that, after Gen III, Pokemon became a hotbed of furry wank. For those of you who have not seen the Pokemon Heroes movie, Latias was indeed interested in having Ash as her boyfriend...or at least a "friend who happens to be a boy." It was open to interpretation, but really, the sheer amount of Lati-wank leads me to believe that the relationship was very deliberately planned on Game Freak's part.

Good GODS, how much has being in the furry fandom scarred me?! Hell, the little Lati pics even LOOKED like they had been drawn by furries. Someone please kill me before Nintendo makes this idea real.

Can't sleep...furries'll eat me...

I'm Going Digital!

2011-08-09T13:55:00.000-07:00

One day, I was looking on eBay for deals on Pokemon White for my friend. The 3DS drive was a success in that I managed to scrounge up almost enough in gift cards to buy the system. This meant I still had to gift my friend in another way. Still on the hunt for that Pokemon White, guys.

While I did find a few good deals on Pokemon White, I also noticed a suspicious amount of deals on Pokemon. Not toys. Not cards. Actual little bits of data for your Pokemon B/W game. The main creatures up for grabs were (likely cloned) event and shiny Pokemon. Others were selling literally ANY Pokemon you could ask for with a certain price. Some came with attached Master Balls if one paid a certain amount. They were cheap and came with free shipping, but the idea of selling data (let alone HACKED data) over eBay still made me WTF inside.

Alas, I had seen this trend before. Yu-Gi-Oh! has it even worse. People will actually pay decently high amounts for Pot of Duality in the YGO online game. Sure, the shipping's free, but am I the only one who feels a little leery towards the idea of selling data on eBay?

Comment below. Vote on the upcoming poll. Peace!

NCS Aug. 7th - Kuro Loves Hidden Arsenal.

2011-08-08T18:06:00.000-07:00

Yes, I have a confession: Along with tins, I love Konami for Hidden Arsenal. I love the shiny. I love the art. Hell, the themes in HA are actually PLAYABLE. Although the packs are slightly overpriced for having less cards, it's forgivable, especially with the new 3-pack Special Edition box. Three packs of awesome and promo cards that gel with it? Count me in.

For starters, HA has some of the coolest themes I have seen in a long time. Flaming dinosaurs, ice dragons, awesome thunderbirds, and animal-plant hybrids, and mythological beasts abound in sets full of foil. Every card in these sets is geared towards an effective, aesthetically-unified theme. Said theme may or may not be supplemented by cards in bigger sets. One pack of Hidden Arsenal has more trade potential than a normal pack of YGO cards by virtue that someone, somewhere, will actually be looking for these cards for their own themed deck.

SPARKLE SPARKLE, CHARLIE!

And if they aren't? The spare cards are still useful simply because they are shiny. A useful foil, some supplementary HA cards, and a LOT of commons makes for an excellent lot if you know how to sell it. I've seen "Reptile Decks" marketed with Worms and a few common Reptiliannes. Kids love shiny cards, a fact that nets people amazing trades every day. One can use packs full of shiny cards to one's advantage.

Keep doing these, Konami. YGO's main selling point is its art. Mix awesome art with playable foils and a lot of sparkle and I will keep buying.

Pokemon HG/SS Reverse Holos Thus Far!

2011-08-07T13:37:00.000-07:00

I'll let the pics speak for themselves:

5.5 pages' worth of awesomeness, and still not even halfway to getting all 123 cards in the set! I have the Legend cards already as well as all the Primes for the first set (from what I can tell). A BIG thank you to eBay user sephir08 for sharing his accumulated holos with me in exchange for shiny Legend cards he was after. There were over 30 in the lot!

Want a deal like that? Trade in your HG/SS base set (ONLY base set) reverse holos for something cooler! Rares like that really expensive Ninetales take priority. Offer MUST include nine or more HG/SS base reverse holos. I am also interested in the holofoil versions of the special HG/SS Energy cards with Johto Pokemon on them. You could get a great deal by helping this collection reach completion!

If you are interested in contributing to the collection, please send me an e-mail (ShadowKuroKarasu@gmail.com), G+ message (ShadowKuroKarasu), or Tweet (@kurokarasu) with the title/message "HGSS Collection Project." I will get back to you ASAP.

In regards to my DS issues: The 3DS will a price slash on August 12th, so I will be trying for that on the one day it is off. My friend will still get his copy of Pokemon White. I will be starting breeding projects like crazy, so if you missed out on Dream World Eeveelutions or want a female Droughtpix/Rainywag, keep your eyes on this blog. Each one of those will be GUARANTEED to have at least 1 IV in 31 and test as "relatively superior" all around (any lower will be GTS food). More great deals coming your way VERY soon!

July 28th NCS - Meh + Green Tornado Project.

2011-07-28T20:59:00.000-07:00

The video says it all, really. What it doesn't say is exactly what the Green Tornado Project is, so allow me to explain that here.

Pokemon has an amazing variety of foils and allows one to foil one's entire deck without spending obscene amounts of money. In YGO, a foil version of a card can be up to five times as much as its common counterpart. Getting such cards usually involves scaling and/or ripping off little kids. Pokemon does not have to do that.

So I started a project to "bling" the Green Tornado Starter Deck. That is, every card in the entire deck, down to the last energy card, will be coated in shiny foil. Cards that are already foil, such as the cover Serperior, do not need replacing.

Thus far, I only have a few of the necessary commons. Any RH Snivy-family cards would be appreciated regardless of what version. ;) That DS drive is still going on, but people give up cards easier than money.

Pot of Duality...WOW. + Thoughts on the latest JPN set.

2011-07-20T14:40:00.000-07:00

So I was clicking around ShriekTCG randomly when looking at what I could possibly get from Gold Series 4. There were a lot of comments about "Pot of Duality" that must have been posted before the set was released. "Pot of Duality, Pot of Duality, Pot of Duality" kept coming up.

So I finally looked up "Pot of Duality." Good card. Secret Rare. Worth 70 bucks or so on eBay.

*Facepalm.*

Did you not learn your lesson from Mirror Force, Magic Cylinder, and Crush Card Virus? Making good cards like that so very hard to get is why people don't like you. At least you had the sense to reprint Pot of Duality decently quickly, and Mirror Force is now easy as pie to get.
Can't believe I'm going to binge on a Leviath Dragon Tin for Pot of Duality and Dark Simorgh alone.

Speaking of, I did not expect that I would like the latest set from Japan NEARLY as much as I do. I officially want to make a Blue-Eyes White Rabbit deck FOR TEH LULZ (Rabbi-Dragon will get its own blog entry soon). The Evols look like they might be a fun theme to get used to Xyz's with, and I dig the DNA helix in all their tails. The shadow lizard thing and Light Serpent must be mine. Looking forward to seeing this set in English, as well as my own Leviath tin at some point.

Quick, GET THE HOLY HAND GRENADE!

Oh, and please don't hesitate to donate to my ~~3DS~~ collector's White DSi fund. In short, I had a change of plans due to 1. shortage of funds and 2. a desire to see one of my friends get Pokemon White. Help me and a friend by pitching in! See you all again when stuff starts happening!

July 11th NCS - POKEYMANZ and Card Sleeves.

2011-07-11T19:35:00.000-07:00

Yeah, not the best pack set the coin has ever chosen for me...but also not the worst. It really bites because there were other bundle sets with HG/SS packs in them, and I kinda needed the RH's out of those. Ah well; my other RH's came in from Texas, so expect pics of my expanded collection very soon!

Also, even if YGO does use clip art a bit too much, said clip art makes for badass sleeves. I wish they had Ra sleeves. Ra seems to like me (see? I'm part of the Illuminati already). Start putting these sleeves in tins so that we have more of an incentive to play the game, Konami.

July 8th NCS - I Really DON'T Know How to Quit Yu.

2011-07-08T19:21:00.000-07:00

I thought I was done with YGO. I really did. Then I saw the Pyramid boxes and could not resist, for some reason. Nostalgic love, perhaps? Plus FINALLY getting a cool playmat? (They chose the mats really well; besides my BEWD one, there's a DMG one, then one with Dark Magician + BEWD.)

By the way, The Zone finally came to its senses and started stocking Pokemon. You know what I'm getting every other day of the week in thanks. :)

Crazy Little Projects.

2011-07-02T06:50:00.000-07:00

I love shiny things. Really, I do. That goes triple for shiny, shiny trading cards with cool monsters on them like Pokemon. The reverse-holos included in every pack are why Nintendo owns a chunk of my soul, still. (Eff you for not doing the same, Konami; it is so good for TCGs/CCGs on so many levels.) Go figure I would think up a few projects to do with them.

Project 1: A collection of the HG/SS base set...in reverse-holo. So far, I have 19 of the RH-print cards, including all but 1 Prime, as well as a snazzy binder reserved juuust for this project. Kinda pathetic seeing as I don't know anyone around who plays the game. Will create a new entry when a bunch of HG/SS RHs I traded for come in.

Project 2: Bling your deck! In Pokemon, it is theoretically possible to have a deck composed entirely of shiny cards. The goal of this one is to make a copy of the "Green Tornado" deck entirely out of foil cards - even the Energy cards will sparkle! Started yesterday when I was tempted to put up a lot of B/W RH's, only to realize that hrrrrm, I could make a deck of 60 shiny cards.Again, this is kinda pathetic because my game store is too stupid to pick up a multi-billion dollar franchise with a much better game than YGO.

Plus, it looks great on this blog. Now I actually have something to do on it besides open card packs and bitch about how dragons are ruining the world!

Of course, the 3DS is still more important at this point. I never want to be on a long flight/road trip without Pokeymanz again. Plus, it's another means of accessing the interwebs, and seeing how both of my comps are sick, I could use as many of those means as possible. In all likelihood, the DS repair guy is gonna say my old system's gonna need like...100 bucks' worth of repairs, at which point I best get a new system anyways.

Also, I have no idea how texting charges work. So much for using the 'net on my phone.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Pokemon Black and White.

2011-06-22T11:38:00.000-07:00

Now that I've been deprived of my DS for more than a month, it's probably about time that I posted a piece I've been working on ever since school started: A thorough critique of Pokemon Black/White. I did not post it at first due to not experiencing everything I wanted to in Black, but I may as well post it since a new friend of mine so kindly asked about the games.

Here goes.

Zekrom and Reshiram appear by *Cachomon on deviant ART

Pokemon Black/White: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

This past March, Pokemon Black and Pokemon White hit game stores around the world. Many were salivating for one reason or another: Improved graphics, unbreakable TMs, whatever new Pokemon have you, Dream World, or even the new evil bishounen, N. As more and more information leaked from the Japanese games, they began to sound better and better.

But were they really worth the hype? We (i.e. a few friends and I) played them ourselves to find out!

The Good:

Improved Graphics: The graphics are pretty good for a Pokemon game. We were probably expecting more (watch, Pokemon Gray/Sepia will improve it by MILES), but, for now, the visual style has improved. B/W really is trying to work in the third dimension. Whether it succeeds or not is up to you.

Along with this, the Pokemon are now more animated. Instead of just moving when released from their balls, the Pokemon move all the time in these two new games. It took you long enough, Nintendo, but at least you did it.

Better Story: Team Plasma is not out to take over the world from the get-go. Instead, they resemble PETA - without saying too much, they believe that Pokemon should be free instead of trapped in little balls and forced to fight. This is far more sympathetic than the usual “world domination” gimmick and answers some objections that people have had to the franchise.

But that fashion sense is soooo 1500's.

The need to see two sides of the story gives people a reason to get both games. Subtle differences in areas and Pokemon help further the effect. These games really are two sides of the same coin!

Better Characters: It is obvious that some work went into the characters this time around. If I had to guess, a lot more work went into the characters, graphics, and story than any other areas. The rivals are not generic douchebags; one is a trainer searching for the true meaning of strength, the other is Luna Lovegood as a Pokemon character. N is the tool of an evil mastermind, not an evil mastermind himself. I am also particularly fond of (!non-loli) Caitlin and Shauntal, but more on that later.

The Two New Fossils: An Archaeopteryx and an Archelon? Many of the other designs easily fall under “the ugly,” but these two really deserve praise. Bless you, Nintendo, even if you are stealing from Fossil Fighters. (The less said about the third fossil, the better.) There are a few other cool designs (I really like Reshiram, too!), but these two struck me as being especially praiseworthy. It’s always cool to see fossil beasties besides standard dinosaurs, and the more people that know about prehistoric wildlife, the better. Also, the Archelon is an easy way to get Shell Smash, one of the best stat-boosting moves in the game, into your Water-type breeding projects. :)

Serperior: Just...Serperior. It is stunning that Nintendo made a snake Pokemon that not only looks good, but plays well, levels at a decent rate (unlike Seviper) and gives Grass a new option. Argue all you like that it’s a rather gimmicky Grass-Type (which will come up again later); snakes needed a boost, and Serperior was that classy, insane boost. It is easily my favorite Pokemon ever after cleaning out a whole Gym full of dragons. Good work, Nintendo.

Even the bad CGI cannot stop Serperior from looking like it means business.

A Few of the Dub Names: Nintendo's favor towards dragons aside, the “ein,” “zwei,” “drei,” in the new psuedo-Legendary line's name is kinda cool. After a while, Snivy also grew on me (for being an accurate translation).

New Abilities: Sturdy got a new modification: if an attack would OHKO a Pokemon with Sturdy, it retains 1 HP. Moxie is also pretty cool (kill something and get an attack boost). Contrary is broken. Overall, the new abilities and the modifications to old abilites are cool.

EVIOLITE: This boosts both defenses of a NFE (not fully evolved) Pokemon. It makes Chansey and Dusclops fierce foes, even in OU. Dragonair finally has a reason to be besides evolving into Dragonite! (Think about this: A Dragon-type with raised defenses and a chance of healing every turn? Mmm. ) Give not fully evolved Pokemon a leg up? Yes please!

Wi-Fi options: Probably THE BEST THING about these new games is that, to trade or battle, you do not have to switch out your current team. You can pull them onto the internet straight from your PC Boxes! No more awkward team mistakes!

The Random Battle feature is also sweeeet. Although you can only use three Pokemon (as in the Battle Tower or Subway) it is JUST AWESOME to be able to battle someone in Japan or Italy that you have never met before. You don’t know what to expect. Neither do they.

Seasons: The Pokemon you can find vary with the seasons. Pokemon is getting more and more realistic. Honestly, this is a really cool idea. MAJOR props for keeping time and day/night as well.

Non-Linear Elite 4: There is no “order” to the Elite 4 in Black/White. You can pick who to fight first, second, etc. This leaves you with some options: Level up your team on easier members first, OR take the hard ones first and save the easy ones for when your Pokemon are exhausted. Eat dessert first or save it for after dinner. Your choice.

Unbreakable TMs: Yes, you can now use TMs over and over and over. For those of us that want a lot of things with Earthquake and Stone Edge, this is a proper blessing. For those of you who liked earning Game Corner TMs (which will likely still be hard to get for anyone not in Japan), sucks to be you; the benefits of reusable TMs outweigh the bad points. Earn a TM once and have the right to use it forever. Sweet.

The New EXP System: Long story short, weaker Pokemon gain more EXP from fighting stronger opponents, and stronger Pokemon gain less EXP from fighting weaker opponents. This makes a lot of logical sense, even if the result IS crazy EXP gain. It almost compensates for the obscenely high evolution levels of some Pokemon. Almost.

Cynthia: Sorry, I’m a fangirl. Seriously, though? Her team makes more sense now that Togekiss has been replaced by a badass eagle. Plus, she helps get your team to Lv100 - never a bad thing!

Dream World: Dream World takes patience, but is otherwise pretty cool. Old Pokemon, new abilities, and more entries for your Dex. There is no way that introducing Sunny Day teams into lower tiers than Uber could possibly be a bad thing.

The Bad:

No Partner Pokemon: For all of you who enjoyed this feature in HG/SS, it’s gone now. Pokemon can no longer walk alongside you. It’s a shame; keeping partner Pokemon would have served the game’s plot well.

Trainers Are Not Animated: Even though the Pokemon are.

No Berries: Except in Dream World, one cannot plant Berries. Even R/S kept Berries after they had been introduced. Isn’t removing agriculture sorta sending players back into the Stone Age? At least they cannot remove Fire-Type Pokemon or the wheel (or Flame Wheel, for that matter).

PokeShifter: In order to transfer Pokemon to B/W, you need three things: One, a B/W game; two, a Gen IV game; three, another DS to communicate with. After that, Pokeshifter makes you ‘shoot’ transferred Pokemon with Poke Balls in a certain time frame. This is harder than it sounds. Hunting them in Pal Park was bad enough. Now we have a time limit and hand-eye coordination to deal with. We also cannot send any of our items over from the old games. Nice, Nintendo. Nice.

Obscenely High Evolution Levels: So, I like the Mienshao’s design (even if it DOES look a lot like a Digimon). The bitch of the matter is that the base form, a creature not unlike the “Badger Badger” badgers, has to be raised to Level 50 to evolve. That is a long time, although some would say that its stats justify the effort.

This is not the only instance of needing an extremely high level to evolve. There is a larval form of a giant, fiery moth that needs to be raised to Level 60 to really get anywhere. The Pseudo-Legendary this Gen does not reach its full potential until it gets in its 60’s, either. This is not cool, Nintendo. Even with the new EXP mechanism, not cool.

Some of the Designs: Honestly...they wasted three slots on a snow cone Pokemon designed by an American. Ice was not that desperate a type. The gear monsters are uninteresting in every single way. Also, that Garbage Pokemon is just that: Garbage. At least that last one carries Black Sludge.

No New Eeveelution...or Support For Previous Generations: Luvdisc could use something to do with itself, like evolving into that heart sunfish. There’s a transfer system, but as the PokeShifter point says, it sucks. This game does not even want you to transfer items over. Granted, there is a reason for this (some items, such as Soul Dew, were supposedly deleted), but it still bites.

Pokemon Musicals: Musicals with humans are already adequate laughing stocks (see High School Musical for details). What made you think that it would work any better with Pokemon? It would, however, be awesome to see a Serperior playing Elphaba in Wicked.

THOSE GODDAMN MONKEYS: At first, I thought the three elemental monkeys, Pansear, Panpour, and Pansage, were going to be like Eevee - that is, extremely rare in-game, so raise yours well. Nope. They can be found in the wild, have a male-favoring sex ratio, and everyone and their mother has one, if not all three, in-game. They would be tolerable if they were rarer; when, oh, hey, another trainer has a mutant Aipom or three, they get annoying fast.

Sure, they look cute now, but then you fight them over...and over...and over....

DRUDDIGON: There is one Pokemon that embodies EVERYTHING WRONG WITH THESE GAMES: Druddigon! It’s a dragon, it sucks (high ATK, but slow), and it looks like something drawn by a six-year-old. It feels like somebody at Game Freak said, “hey, Sugimori? We need another dragon Pokemon for the Opelucid City Gym!” so Sugimori asked his son to design a dragon on the spot.

The English name bites double; it not only sounds bad, but the Japanese name did not even reference this Pokemon’s status as a dragon. If you were going to do that, Nintendo, there would have been a million classier ways to do it.

Think the idea of a dragon-gargoyle is cool? Think again.

(Druddigon/Crimgan: Clearly a product of Pokemon INbreeding.)

Ash Still Exists: Because if you’re going to start the anime series for your brand-shiny-new games in a new region with all-new Pokemon, you just have to bring the oldest character in the series and his Pikachu along for the ride. People in Isshu are stunned by Ash's Pikachu. Probably could have saved the animators some work by just designing all-new characters.

The Ugly:

Zorua and Zoroark: Oh, wow...where do I begin? These were only two Pokemon we knew about for a LONG time, and they’re both event Pokes that require another DS and a super-special Legendary to encounter. (These Legendaries ONLY being available at GameStop at first just added insult to injury.) The new foxes got the Movie treatment just like Lucario did, complete with full support from the furries.

While Zoroark is a very fun Pokemon, it (in the case of the event, she) is also undeniably furry bait. They are also undeniably useful in-game (but slightly less useful in PVP). The people who have those Shiny Beasts are going to be rich just from breeding Zorua for the deprived furries. This was not a good use of two Pokemon. Zoroark, I love you, but I really wish Nintendo had not handled you the way that they did.

We Were Expecting Better: The graphics in B/W are only slightly better than in Generation IV. They do new things, but in general, the quality is only slightly improved. The main silver linings are the animated Sugimori drawings, which have never been done before in a Pokemon game and thus have no precedent to worry about. It’s more like teaching an old dog new tricks than an actual improvement.

Nintendo Has Become A Copyright Stickler: Back in September, Nintendo wanted PokeBeach and Serebii to remove all of their official images. This was probably because the sites were using sponsored links, thus making money off of Nintendo’s work.

While this is understandable, really, Nintendo? Are you sure that you want to target privately-owned news sites as opposed to bootleg merchandise made in sweatshops and colored using child labor and lead paint? Those are probably stealing more of your money, and they’re killing people. Priorities.

Many of the Designs: Without being outright horrible-looking, many of the designs fall into the nowhere-mire of “this could have been cool, but...” Much of it resulted from working backwards - case in point, the three djinn monsters (we wanted a pure Flying-type, so we got one). Some of them are also clear Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s references, which is also kind of sad. (Reshiram, for example, has very similar wings to Stardust Dragon...if a bit more plausible. The Nazca line Pokemon speaks volumes.)

What is REALLY ugly, though, is the rift that Nintendo has created between those of us that loved Gen I and II and the new players, who may not experience the same dislike of the new Pokemon. I have never seen so many people both in favor of and against the new designs. Maybe it’s the usual “Old VS New” rift, but it feels more intense than that. I am honestly split this Gen. There were some designs I loved and some that I HATED, so I can see where both sides are coming from.

Power Creep: Making this gap even uglier is the sheer power of the new Pokemon. There are Pokemon with better stats than ever before without half the effort. B/W Pokemon make all of the older Pokemon we know and love worthless. Sure, our old friends can do new things, but numbers talk; the new Pokemon completely outclass Pokemon from even one Generation before.

Dragonhumping: Dialga, Giratina and Palkia were the last cover trinity, and they were all dragons. They were also poorly-drawn, barely looking like dragons...or much of anything, really. Reshiram and Zekrom look considerably better, but some of the other dragons this Gen look like they were drawn by 6-year-olds. I do not care HOW much you like dragons. That cave dragon (Druddigon, Crimgan, whatever) and Kyurem have no excuses for how horribly they were drawn, but people will want them just because “OMG DRAGONS!” (On a cultural note, it is also very weird for a dragon to be considered “yin” in a yin-yang pairing.)

Gimmicks: Yes, the Dream World Serperior is powerful, but its only real strategy is to spam Leaf Storm. Nobody is going to use Triple Battles ever, even if you give us cool new moves to use with them. There are a lot of things in this generation designed to work exactly one way, which will suck until Nintendo brings out some new move tutors.

Isshu/Unova: It’s set in New York. Seriously, what? Sure, it led to a bunch of North American animals getting the spotlight for once, but there was not much need to stray outside of Japan (let alone to a wildlife-deprived part of the United States). There are still a few Japanese aspects left in, like shrines and dream-eating tapirs. Were you trying to please Lady Gaga, Nintendo?

Then again, I'd like to please Lady Gaga, too.

The New Dub Names: For the first time ever, Nintendo has changed the name of the new region from “Isshu” to “Unova.” Presumably, this is a portmanteau of “United States” and “nova (Latin for ‘new’)”, but that does not make it suck any less. “Pansear” and the names of the other monkeys will be lost on most people. At least “Snivy” is a fairly accurate translation of the Japanese name. “Servine” is a blasphemy to the English language; it sounds waaaayyy too much like "cervine," which means "deerlike." Some of them have grown on me, but others have not.

Too Many Things in Threes: Three is a magic number. This Generation sports three Legendary Trinities total, three mutated Aipoms, and two different styles of three-on-three battling. No matter how magical the number three is, I am quite sure it knows when it is being unnecessarily whored. Have I mentioned the monkeys? Yes? Okay.

This Is How It Is Going To Be: Nintendo seems to have disowned the previous four Generations. They are not allowing any Pokemon from any region except Unova in the 2011 Championships. Expect very little support for all the Pokes you know and love. They better make a new Eeveelution or two in Gen VI.

Does it need another evolution? Not really, but it shows you care, NIntendo.

Ruby and Sapphire Remakes?!: The new games have a lot in common with Gen III. The thing that really screamed “I’ve seen this before” to me was Route 17/18, which has a ton of annoying jellyfish and swift currents of water that tell you where to Surf. They also have a bay with a few Dive spots and a perfectly useless pink fish. This is going to get problematic and/or interesting if Black and White are indeed set in the future (how will Hoenn have changed?).

Double Talk: First Nintendo says that they will not put any old characters in the game, then they put Cynthia and the Magikarp guy from Kanto in. Dream World’s whole selling point is catching older Pokemon, and you need a Johto Legendary to get Zoroark, an extremely helpful Pokemon against the new Elite Four. What happened to “all new” and a “fresh feel?”

I am personally worried about Caitlin, no matter how much I like her; the age difference compared to Caitlin in Platinum and HG/SS implies that years have passed between Gen IV and Gen V, which opens a whole new can of worms. Some have told me that B/W take place ten years in the future. That seems a little much, but some time has definitely passed.

What happened to the Battle Frontier? Did Sinnoh get ~~hit by a giant earthquake~~ nuked? How about Oak? Did he CEASE TO BE? Is he an EX-PROFESSOR? If so, it might explain why he is not in these games...

For a game that’s supposed to be all new and fresh, Nintendo is blurring the lines a lot. Either make it super-shiny new or acknowledge that a lot of old stuff will show up. Cut the BS.

Freemasons?: The background for Black and White is a checkerboard. Combine with the brainwashing N went through from a young age and one has a conspiracy theory in the works. That is, of course, if you believe such things.

Overall Verdict: 8/10. Famicom was exaggerating - these games are far from perfect.. If you can wait for Gray or whatever the Ruby/Sapphire remakes will be (...please don’t make them if you can help it, Nintendo), hold out. If you just have to get at least 6 of the new Pokemon, by all means get Black/White. Otherwise, you can probably wait. Stick with Gen IV games if you can. Gen V looks better than Gen III, but that is not saying a lot.

Reshiram tin + Aiming for a 3DS.

2011-05-01T21:38:00.000-07:00

Yep. I'm still alive. Barely. Was taking advantage of my new Toshiba (going with me to Rome) and got a new card tin at Target, so up it goes on my card game blog.

For starters, I am sorely disappointed in ALL of Reshiram's arts for the first Black and White set. The tin promo looks like crap (but I love Reshiram), the first Reshiram (let's call it Reshi 1) looks a lot like the promo in a different pose, and the super-shiny premium art is put to shame not only for looking like something Sugimori would draw, but also for not looking as nice as, say, Primes, Lv. X's, or Ex's. I don't usually like the CG look that those cards have, but the graphic design overall is that much better. Hell, the Neo Destiny Shiny Pokemon and YGO Ultimate Rares would look more epic than that Reshiram. What a disappointing premium!

Hell, THIS looks cooler than any of the Reshiram cards so far.

The tin yielded a Zoroark and Emboar. Not too bad, there!

Second order of business: My DS has been spazzing out again. Since I'm not one of those types who ALWAYS gets the latest and greatest tech, I'm up the creek without a paddle for a bit. I do not know when/if DS-tan will recover, so, in tow with the keeping up with the times that I have been doing recently, I am looking for donations for a shiny new 3DS. If you are feeling generous, please click the button below:

(Just a rough guesstimate: If 25 people donate ten bucks each, I will have enough to afford the black 3DS. Any excess money will go towards making sure awesome people receive cool card game-related merch.)

There's something in it for you, too. I have seen people selling Pokemon -not games, not toys, little bits of Pokemon game data - on eBay. With too much excess stock from my projects, it makes sense to offer them as thank-you gifts for donations. :3

Donation gift Pokemon:

First of all, I do not hack. All of the Pokemon up for grabs are legitimate. I do, however, know a few people with Action Replays, so if you would like a special item (such as an EV-reducing or pinch Berry) it's fine to request such. Repeat: Pokemon below are legit, but Nintendo can be a DOUCHEBAG when it comes to things like Berries.

Current Breeding Project Extras:

(Male) Riolu with 31 ATK and/or Speed.
(Male) Zorua with 31 HP, SATK and/or Speed. A select few of my males have 31 in all 3 stats.
(Either sex) Pichu with 31 in HP, SATK, or Speed.
(Either sex) Mienfoo with 31 ATK or Speed.
(Mostly female) Bellsprout, some of which have 31 ATK or Speed.
(Male) Snivy with 31 ATK, DEF, SATK, and/or Speed. Yes, I bred a LOT of Snivy and will do more until I get two-three perfect snakes.
Feebas/Milotic. A lot. I mean that; there are several dozen on my Sapphire (enough to occupy three boxes). No guarantees, but if you want to get your hands on an easy female or easy Milotic, consider it done.

Future Projects (i.e. the sooner you donate, the sooner I can get cracking):

Drought Vulpix - High chance of getting a female, guaranteed to have Hypnosis and at least 1 IV in 31. Comes with a free Fire Stone.
Drizzle Poliwag - Can't make any guarantees yet, but I have some good Water stock to work with.
Eevees - Soon, I will be working on an Umbreon strain with 31 in HP/ATK, if not 4 stats in 31. After that, Leafeon. Espeon/Jolteon-friendly Eevees will be next.
Growlithe with Close Combat and/or Crunch. 31 in ATK and/or Speed.
Misdreavus, IV's uncertain.
Absol with 31 ATK and/or Speed. Speed doesn't matter much when one has Sucker Punch, but still.
More Snivy. Yep.

NCS 1/17/10 - A friendly message.

2011-01-17T16:27:00.000-08:00

Steelix Prime was my main good pull this time. That, the promo Latias and the coin will pay for the pack. Knew I could count on you, Raikou!

As a friendly reminder, starting today, the Shiny Entei that unlocks the Zoroark event will be available at GameStop. This Entei is Adamant-natured and comes with the moves Flare Blitz and Extremespeed, essentially making it a super-powered Arcanine. Now to soft reset like crazy and make sure that Kan'u has awesome stats. (A shame that I did not have my Diamond with me - then I could have gotten two.) Go get it if you have HG/SS, Diamond, or Plat!

Speaking of Pokemon...I FINALLY BEAT THE HALL! Breeding obscenely strong Salamence finally paid off! Now for a female Umbreon...*Evil laugh.*

P.S.- Love Day chocolate rocks. Ghirardelli FINALLY did strawberry chocolate!

Jumping the Shark - err, Dragon.

2011-01-16T10:59:00.000-08:00

Congrats, YGO:5D's. You have officially jumped the shark. You have also proven that, by doing so, YGO is in fact a Glass Canon.

For those of you not in the know, there were, pretty much from the get-go, supposed to be only 5 Signers. 5 Signers, 5 Dragons - thus 5D's. Pictured above is the sixth Signer.

As of January 5th, Leo/Rua, brother of Luna/Ruka (the Signer connected to Ancient Fairy Dragon) is also a Signer himself. He bears the Heart of the Crimson Dragon on his arm (yeah, apparently birthmarks conveniently appear and reappear in this universe) and his signature card is the long-awaited 5th Dragon, Life Stream Dragon.

Wait a sec. Wasn't Black-Winged Dragon supposed to be one of the five, too? Crow has a Signer mark and everything. BWD participated in at least one ancient battle. It was, on all counts, a legitimate Signer dragon.

Now, just to be clear, there were a few hints that Leo could have been a Signer. There was a moment early on in the series when Luna said that Leo was a Signer just to cheer him up. He also had traces of his sister's magical powers. Power Tool Dragon even looks very similar to Life Stream Dragon.

Life Stream Dragon was legit from Day 1, so why the extra mark? If anything, Black-Winged Dragon is extraneous. It's like a sixth digit on a human hand - unsightly and unnecessary. It does not look at all like the 5th dragon seen in flashbacks, even though it had a few flashbacks of its own. The series is called 5D's, not 6D's. If another Signer had died (for good), this would not have been so disappointing.

Konami, do you realize what you have done? You have given fanfic writers a blank check for madness. Now that you've made the Heart of the Dragon a viable mark, what's keeping people from using the lungs or spleen as fanfic fodder?

Does this thing even HAVE a heart? Or a spleen?

Whatever faith I had in 5D's just got shattered. Ra help us all. I'd trust Mega Ultra Chicken before THAT abomination.

"BAN IT!"

2011-01-07T09:58:00.000-08:00

With Pokemon Black and White coming out this year, players (particularly the group Smogon) have been buzzing about the soon-to-be tournament scene. A lot of new Pokemon, abilities, and moves have come out to talk about...and possibly ban.

This is getting annoying.

First off, Smogon, although a fine resource on the competitive battling scene, is a fansite. That means that none of its information is official. Nintendo has, however, taken a few leaves out of the battling community's book and added Ubers - Legendary Pokemon with an obscenely high stat total and occasionally Pokemon with very good abilities (namely Tyranitar and Wobbuffet) - to official tournament restricted lists. This is their way of saying "our bad for making overpowered things that are only supposed to get you through the game."

One of their latest plots has been to ban two abilities: Drought and Drizzle. These set up sunny and rainy weather respectively. Prior to B/W, they were only found on two Pokemon: Groudon and Kyogre.

Kyogre in particular has been dubbed "the most powerful Pokemon in the game" thanks to its ability. It has monstrous SATK and an attack called "Water Spout" that does massive damage when Kyogre is at full HP. It's a beast, especially with rain set up.

Surf's up!

Gen V's Dream World brought with it two new Pokemon: Ninetales with Drought and Politoed with Drizzle. This gives Sun- and Rain-based teams a chance to shine without requiring an Uber to get off the ground. That was an ingenious move on Nintendo's part. Here, Nintendo; have a cookie:

Drizzle is not an inherently broken ability. It can benefit many a Rain Dance team, ubers or no. Same for Drought, although Drought has even less of a reason to be banned; what, are you really afraid of Fire and Grass Pokemon taking over the world?

Clearly a criminal mastermind.

If anything, Nintendo should be doing more instant field effects. Instant Hailstorm is nasty since only one type is immune; why not give it to another Ice Pokemon to curb Dragons further (darn you, Kyuremu)? A Trick Room from the get-go would stop the flow of Sweepers that came out this Gen. (Play your cards right and Mr. Mime might end up being useful - hint, hint.) Instant abilities are not a bad idea in and of themselves. There is no reason to ban them. Just ban Kyogre.

The other thing that Smogon is trying to ban is ANYTHING that inflicts the Sleep status. Before you start saying "DURRR you've never been hit by a Sleep move!", that's not true. I get hit by them all the time in the Battle Tower. There are no Full Restores to save me. Sleep moves are legitimately annoying and game-winning.

But y'know what? Sleep has been a part of Pokemon since Generation I. Jigglypuff used to be one of my favorite Pokemon because its lullaby attack on the TV show was amusing. There are abilities that can block Sleep if you are that worried about it. It's good, but the sparse amount of Pokemon it can come on and general low accuracy of such moves compensates for how good it is. Freezing is much worse a status. Don't tell me you're planning on banning Ice Beam just because it can freeze, Smogon.

The sad thing is that this is happening with Pokemon. I'm used to this sort of talk from YGO players. Since the ban list was first born, there have been 'banlist babies' screaming "ban it!" at any remotely powerful card that Konami released. Some cards, like Fiber Jar, were worthy of the ban. Others such as Brain Control were not so deserving. It is still a common complaint in YGO, in part because the game is inherently broken. Pokemon is not as broken, and does not merit removing whole game mechanics.

That is just silly.

Legendary Cats...Dogs...Shishi.

2010-12-29T13:32:00.000-08:00

Sparkledogs ahoy! Go to any good fansite and they will tell you how to get these shiny, shiny critters. Raikou's going to be appearing at your local GameStop from Jan 3-9; Entei from Jan 17th-23rd; Suicune from Jan 31st to Feb 6th.

Ever since Pokemon Gold, Silver, and Crystal came out, there has been a huge debate over whether the Legendary Trio of Gen II - Raikou, Entei, and Suicune - are cats or dogs. This is probably because these two are the only carnivorous groups that many people formally recognize. (What if they're procyonids, related to aardwolves, synapsids or the last remaining carnivorous marsupials? Ever think of that?) This debate has led to them jokingly being called the "Legendary Hamsters."

Even Nintendo has no firm say on this one; although the old official player's guide outright calls Entei a cat, the recent Pokemon TCG tins have doglike adages attached to them ("every Pokemon has its day" and "every tin is a trainer's best friend"). If they had a stance, they've either forgotten it or are preying on the rift in the fanbase.

The Legendary Beasts have been causing confusion since G/S first came out. They should not be; their lineage is obvious enough if you can see oriental mythology beyond the dragon. The Beasts are both cats and dogs while also being neither. Yes, really:

You have probably seen this creature somewhere before. It might have been at a Chinese restaurant, a home deco store, or even in front of a classy hotel. They usually travel in male-female pairs, looking majestic and intimidating regardless of what sex you are staring into the mouth of. They are so common in Eastern decor that many people just shrug them off as dogs, even though they are an entirely different creature.

The (catchable) Legendary Pokemon of Johto all derive from oriental mythology: Although Lugia looks more like a sea slug than a dragon, its contrast with Ho-oh and overall position in the lore of the Pokemon world say that it should be a ryuujin (lit. "dragon god"), a kingly serpent of the ocean; Ho-oh is, a bit more obviously, a houou, the Japanese version of China's multicolored fenghuang. Logically and aesthetically, the Beasts should also fit with some oriental motif.

(Much thanks to Google Image Search and Bulbapedia for the six pics used. No animals were harmed in the making of this image, but some people might find their souls broken.)

They do. They all resemble, in some way, shape or form, the Chinese Fu Dogs (a misnomer), guardian lion-dogs, shisa, shishi, shizi, Tibetan snow lions, or whatever else you would like to call them. Although varying slightly by area, the basic function of an Asian lion is to ward off evil. Stationary shishi are usually placed alongside doorways; dancing lions (also called shishi) chase away evil spirits more actively. Shishi statues can be found outside of shrines and homes in Japan, Korea and China. Although they look like dogs to most Westerners, they are supposed to be lions.

China does not have wild lions. They have tigers, leopards, and pandas that should have been Darwinized out of the system ages ago, but they do not have lions. The tiger is the king of beasts over there, expressed both by one of the most masculine signs in the Zodiac and the "king" character derived from the tiger's forehead marking (pronounced "wahng," not "wayng" - stop laughing). The ruler of beasts, even in mythology, is either the tiger or a creature called a qilin. For the longest time, the Chinese did not have a clue what a lion really looked like...so they made one.

There is a story that a monk first heard of apotropaic lions in a spiritual vision, but did not know what they looked like. Being told that it was the real king of beasts, he took all the magical or lucky animals he could think of and made a 'lion.' That mishmash included dogs, which were afterwards bred to look even more like 'lions.' Real lion pelts were also probably thrown into the mix, but that's as far as the similarities go.

Get in the car?

Chinese lions have different rules from real lions. The sexes of lions used in lion dances are not distinguishable by mane or size. The sexes of stationary shishi can be distinguished depending on what the beast has beneath its paw (the female has a cub, the male has a sphere) and, in Okinawa, by whether the mouth is open or closed. You will find things like "the female has her mouth closed, as she should" or "the male has his mouth closed to keep the luck in." Sexing does not matter for the Legendary Beasts; the point is that, like Ho-Oh and Lugia, they are just barely based off of real animals. Lions are mythical in China.

Why three of them, then? Although stationary shishi usually come in pairs, the dancing lions can often be divided into threes (or fives). The most common colors are golden/yellow, red, and black/green - in that order. (Sometimes, the other two elements -there are five total elements in Chinese mysticism - are added in other ordering systems.)

This should sound familiar. Although Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres follow the same elemental/color pattern as the Eeveelutions (Water/Ice/Blue, Electric/Yellow, Fire/Red), the Beasts follow the traditional order of shishi, with yellow coming first (then red, then green/black). These colors have different stories and meanings, but it is widely thought that the black lion is the youngest - and, therefore, comes last in line (but first when dancers are starting out).

The order seen in the Legendary Beasts - yellow, red, blue - is common in lion dancing. The golden lion represents either liveliness or the warrior-emperor Liu Bei, the oldest of three 'brothers' from Romance of the Three Kingdoms; the red lion, courage or Guan Gong AKA Guan Yu, the middle brother; the black lion, friendship or Zhang Fei, the youngest brother. (The element of water can be represented with black in feng shui.) If the new cave Legends are the Three Musketeers, Romance of the Three Kingdoms is fair game. Everything weird about the Legendary Beasts makes sense in the context of Chinese lions.

But they didn't even start the fire...

Arcanine is a more obvious tribute to shishi (or Okinawan shisa) than the Legendary Beasts. There are hints that, like Ho-Oh and Lugia, it was designed to be a Legendary Pokemon. (The most obvious of these is in its species designation as "Legendary," but there is also one bit in the first episode of Pokemon ever: Arcanine is pegged as a Legendary alongside Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres at a Pokemon Center.) It, like Lugia and Ho-Oh, was based off of a mythical creature from oriental folklore. (This is why Arcanine is called "Chinese" on the HG/SS trading card.) Instead, it was made into an evolution of Growlithe, the Puppy Pokemon; the Legendary Beasts stole its thunder in Generation II. Arcanine did not retain its Legendary status, but the ambiguity is still there.

After Arcanine was axed from Club Legendary, three new members with a similar basis took its place in Generation II. The new shishi, Raikou, Entei and Suicune, formed a trio that contrasted with the Legendary Birds in Generation I. They, like Arcanine, had both feline and canine in their blood. Despite having "canine" right in the name, it is obvious that Arcanine has some catty characteristics as well (such as the coat). People are not afraid to admit that Arcanine has traits of both cats and dogs; why so split with the Beasts?

The three Legendary Beasts are lions based on dogs based on lions. It is just as silly to debate over whether the Beasts are cats or dogs as it is over whether dragons are mammals or reptiles. There. You both win. Happy, or do we have to start looking into mammalian dentition rules?

What...the...?

2010-12-14T22:53:00.000-08:00

Am I the only one who's scared?

That image is the first peek we have had at Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL (pronounced "ze-a-ru" - the X is silent, apparently). We do not yet know what the series is about, but the lead character's name is "Yuma Kyuujyuukyuu (or some other reading of "99")," the blue spirit thing is called "Astral," and the last character has the kanji for "god" in his (her?) name. If I had a better scan, I could tell you all more.

I swear there is a reason for this Digimon.

For now, I am afraid. Very, very afraid. The huge X and the protagonist's hairstyle remind me of Shoutmon, the lead character's partner Digimon on Xros Wars. Xros Wars is, itself, a mediocre member of the Digimon franchise. It's really sad that YGO has had to resort to not only possibly putting the series in outer space (only slightly more dangerous than card games on motorbikes) to stay in business. It is sadder still that it cannot give the anime a break, but that is a topic for another entry.

But a Digimon mooch? Ra help us all. *Kisses her Winged Dragon of Ra like a rosary.*

Hologram Duels, Anyone?

2010-12-07T22:57:00.000-08:00

Happy Duel Transer and Hidden Arsenarelease day! For those of you who do not keep up with YGO releases, Although I do not own a Wii (I know, shoot me), there was something about the Duel Transer game that got my attention as soon as I heard about it. (You already know that I'm all for HA3.)

Duel Transer was supposed to be released alongside a new piece of hardware: The Duel Scanner. In short, it was a small machine that you put cards in. It would scan them and you could use them in-game. It saved the cards and added them into the player's card pool, essentially removing the 'code' part of customizing a virtual deck. In theory, it transferred one's whole deck into the game.

In theory.

In practice, there were a LOT of limits on what can and cannot be used in this device. Promo cards, for example, were right out. There was a whole list of cards that could not be used in the Duel Scanner, and it was not at all pretty.

There were so many problems with the Duel Scanner that it went kaput. It is no longer being released today; Konami has not given any clear word on when its next scheduled release. Now we don't know when it is coming out, but Konami says that they are fine-tuning it. (Pun not intended, by the way.)

Why is making the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game into a viable game using virtual monsters and real cards so hard for them? Not only has Japan had arcade-style terminals for ages (hell, Digimon had them before YGO), but somebody has already beaten them to the technology to make awesome virtual summons possible:

For those of you who do not already know what this video is, a while back, Sony made a card-battling video game called Eye of Judgment. It was made in 06-07, finally dying in '08. It flopped because it was way too easy to cheat with just the PlayStation Eye watching. Plus, people were probably agitating the monsters too much; if you poked an EoJ monster, it would react. Sweet; now bring it to a game that actually works.

If Konami could somehow make YGO work with this technology (maybe a 'retro edition' to limit the amount of monsters it would need to render), it would be the best card game in existence. It would also conflict with the Duel Terminal cards as they are (the coding's on the back, apparently), although a combination of both types of technology would be beyond awesome. It would be just like Kazuki Takahashi intended.

OK, throw in Wi-Fi Duel Disks. THEN it would be just like Kaz intended. (C'mon, Konami! YOU CAN DO IT!)

Until next time...YOUR MOTHER PLAYS CARD GAMES IN HELL!

NCS 11/29 - FUCK YES!

2010-11-29T19:55:00.000-08:00

Two words: YES! YES!

I had been flopping like a fish about whether I should give Konami another chance or not. I thought "eh, one pack couldn't hurt" since I had a dream about YGO last night/this morning. Flipped my British pound coin until it approved of a pack, and check out the result! (For those unaware, the Secret Rare of the pack, Naturia Beast, is worth twenty bucks upwards.)

The other reason I gave Konami a chance is because of something that will be coming out December 7th. More on that when it happens, but let's just say that Duel Disks are getting closer and closer.

Did the same thing with Pokemon. That little binder is cool; I love the Legendary Beasts so much! It's also getting to the point where I can feel whether a pack will have a holofoil or not. Love the coin and a personal little secret of mine. Hint: It's not a pocket scale!

Also got my brother the Marik deck. I don't know why his wife will not let him spend money on one of Konami's better moves, especially since the whole family is hooked on games. Mirror Force needed to be a common a LONG time ago.