Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Link's is Konami's latest video game based on the popular Yu-Gi-Oh franchise
and is now available for both mobile and Steam worldwide.
The title uses a free to play model and offers a meaty single player based on the hit TV
shows, 1000s of cards and online PVP.
Like all Yu-Gi-Oh media in the West, the game has faced various censorship changes when
released outside of Japan.
The biggest of these changes being, of course, the changes made to the artwork of hundreds
cards.
To just give you a rough of idea of the types of changes to expect in-game:
The card Aquamirror Cycle, for instance, was changed outside of Japan so that the character
on the floor no longer looks like she's in pain.
Dunames Dark Witch had her chest covered up.
Harpie Dancer had a lot of extra cloth added to her outfit.
The Emperor's Holiday was given a vest, showing these changes were made to guys too, as well
as having the cross around his neck removed to remove religious references.
The Six Samurai - Kamon had the wooden stick in his mouth removed, due to it possibly looking
like he's smoking.
Thunder Nyan Nyan's had her bust reduced and outfit altered.
Treeborn Frog had its small halo removed, again, to remove possible religious references.
Life Absorbing Machine was given shorts, as well as changing its skin colour and removing
the horns, due to looking too much like a religious demon.
The changes made to the Western Yu-Gi-Oh cards are extremely numerous and changes like these
still regularly get made to the modern cards released today.
Hundreds of cards have had these types of changes made and, like most other Yu-Gi-Oh
media released in the West, the English version of Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Link uses the altered designs.
However, that's not all for the changes made to Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Links.
Aside from the cards' artwork, 2 of the 16 playable characters have had their designs
changed overseas.
The first of these is the popular Mai Valentine from the original English anime.
If you pay close attention to her chest, you'll notice that she has had her bust reduced outside
of Japan.
Bandit Keith has also had a change made to his design, who is again from the original
English anime.
As you can see, outside of Japan, he has the cross around his neck removed.
Now, despite religious references normally being removed from Western Yu-Gi-Oh media,
Bandit Keith was actually depicted wearing his cross in the anime, even in the English
version.
There's one more especially notable change made to the game outside of Japan and this
revolves around, again, the censored card designs.
Like some of the other games, Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Links will show fancy 3D animations when summoning
certain iconic cards.
This means that any of these cards that were changed outside of Japan have different animations,
such as Mai's popular Harpy Ladies.
Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Links is continually being updated with new cards and other content.
It recently, for example, started to include characters and cards from the Yu-Gi-Oh GX
franchise and with this also came new summon animations.
Updates are planned to continue and Censored Gaming will be keeping a close eye on the
game to see how it is changed outside of Japan.
Whilst an update was made to the mobile version of the game recently to allow players to select
Japanese voices, it is not possible to play the game in Japanese and, like other Yu-Gi-Oh
games, use the Japanese card and character designs.
To finish though, let's take a look at some more of the special summon animations that
were changed outside of Japan.
This montage will include all of the changes made to the original English anime's cards.
However, with the recent Yu-Gi-Oh GX update, there are now even more changes outside of
Japan and, with future updates, it is likely that there will also be additional changes.
Until next time, thank
you for watching.