Yu-Gi-Oh! was one of my hyperfixations when I was little. I had Duelist of the Roses and Capsule Monster Coliseum for PS2, The Sacred Cards for GBA, and a tonne of trading cards. Needless to say, I played countless hours of this game in the past. In my mid-twenties I've finally developed a fascination with nostalgia, and so I've been returning to certain texts that were key to the development of my tastes. Following this trend, I revisited The Duelists of the Roses some time last year.
I think the most interesting aspect of this game is its uniqueness. I remember being captivated by the baffling aesthetic of early modern European historical strategy meets JRPG and the way the resulting anime characters were familiar yet alien. It struck a balance between the other two games I owned, diverging from the rules of the TCG but not so far as to have to stand on its own like Capsule Monster Coliseum does. I remember having some difficulty with this game, which kept my small mind engaged and grinding to improve.
Upon revisiting, I didn't find the game's difficulty as engaging. I chose the Injection Fairy Lily deck, because the fairies are cute and in retrospect Yu-Gi-Oh!'s fairy monsters and Téa's deck in particular were one of my earliest markedly feminine fascinations. As a child I remember mostly choosing Patrician of Darkness both because Dark monsters are cool and edgy and because I'm sure I intuited it was busted. In any case, this time I had minimal difficulty with the game from a mechanical standpoint. I built my deck around reliable powerful female fusions for attack, Guardian Elf for defense, and buffs. Any opposition I could effectively durdle out with a mix of powerful defenders and choke point exploitation. The gameplay felt relatively trivial in my adult hands, though I'm sure a weaker deck would offer more engagement with the game's decidedly janky mechanics if one wished. There is an element of tedium to the duels due to turn speed, but that's easily glossed over in the emulation era.
The nitty gritty aside, I had fun with my replay! I liked playing the cute fairy deck and beat the Lancastrian route. The aesthetic is still captivatingly idiosyncratic and the gameplay is fun in its own novel way. It's not a classic, but it's worth playing for fans of the series and unique if raw games. I can see myself revisiting this in the future as a comfort game that I can reminisce while I play for a short cozy experience every now and then.
I think the most interesting aspect of this game is its uniqueness. I remember being captivated by the baffling aesthetic of early modern European historical strategy meets JRPG and the way the resulting anime characters were familiar yet alien. It struck a balance between the other two games I owned, diverging from the rules of the TCG but not so far as to have to stand on its own like Capsule Monster Coliseum does. I remember having some difficulty with this game, which kept my small mind engaged and grinding to improve.
Upon revisiting, I didn't find the game's difficulty as engaging. I chose the Injection Fairy Lily deck, because the fairies are cute and in retrospect Yu-Gi-Oh!'s fairy monsters and Téa's deck in particular were one of my earliest markedly feminine fascinations. As a child I remember mostly choosing Patrician of Darkness both because Dark monsters are cool and edgy and because I'm sure I intuited it was busted. In any case, this time I had minimal difficulty with the game from a mechanical standpoint. I built my deck around reliable powerful female fusions for attack, Guardian Elf for defense, and buffs. Any opposition I could effectively durdle out with a mix of powerful defenders and choke point exploitation. The gameplay felt relatively trivial in my adult hands, though I'm sure a weaker deck would offer more engagement with the game's decidedly janky mechanics if one wished. There is an element of tedium to the duels due to turn speed, but that's easily glossed over in the emulation era.
The nitty gritty aside, I had fun with my replay! I liked playing the cute fairy deck and beat the Lancastrian route. The aesthetic is still captivatingly idiosyncratic and the gameplay is fun in its own novel way. It's not a classic, but it's worth playing for fans of the series and unique if raw games. I can see myself revisiting this in the future as a comfort game that I can reminisce while I play for a short cozy experience every now and then.