YU-GI-OH! RAGE OF THE ABYSS and Other Fairly Recent News

In October, Konami released the latest core booster set for the Yu-Gi-Oh! trading card game: Rage of the Abyss. The set has been one that many duelists have been hyped for.

There’s new Mimighoul support which is actually pretty good, Mulcharmy Fuwalos, Heart of the Blue-Eyes for Millennium decks, a new Max Metalmorph archetype, and more.

Honestly, it’s a really good set. Thankfully, Konami was kind enough to send me a box to open which you can watch at the bottom. I know a fair number of Yu-Gi-Oh! sets have not been great lately, but in my opinion they have been pretty consistent with core sets being at least “decent.” Also, it’s not even a green set! What are your chase cards from Rage of the Abyss?

Now, there have been a ton of other pieces of Yu-Gi-Oh! news that I have failed to share until now that I want to talk about. First, I know a lot of us duelists are psyched for the new structure deck! St

ructure Deck: Blue-Eyes White Destiny is set to release on February 7, 2025, with an MSRP of $11.99 and will include 51 cards centered around the Blue-Eyes White Dragon.

Unfortunately, it does not appear that Dragon Master Magia is getting reprinted in it, but fans are hoping the new cards help bring Blue-Eyes back to the meta scene.

The three main new cards (Maiden of White, Wishes for Eyes of Blue, and Blue-Eyes Ultimate Spirit Dragon) are all Ultra Rares with a second copy of one of the three in each deck at Secret Rare (or even Quarter Century Secret Rare if you’re lucky).

Honestly, I was half expecting Konami to do the scumbag move and break up the deck in some side set which is something they’ve done before so I was pleasantly surprised when they announced the structure deck.

Other news that I am very excited about is in regards to the Yu-Gi-Oh! Early Days Collection. This is a collection of several Yu-Gi-Oh! video games and now we know that it will launch on February 27, 2025, on Nintendo Switch and Steam with physical copies including a Quarter Century Secret Rare version of Harpie’s Feather Duster in one of two artworks.

We still don’t know all the games that will be included, but in October, more titles were announced. The full list of currently announced titles is as follows:

• Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (1998/GAME BOY)

• Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters II: Dark Duel Stories (1999/GAME BOY, GAME BOY COLOR)

• Yu-Gi-Oh! Dark Duel Stories (2000 JP, 2002 US, 2003 EU/GAME BOY COLOR)

• Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters 4: Battle of Great Duelist (2000/GAME BOY COLOR. Includes online battles support).​

• Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Monsters 6, Expert 2 (2001/GAME BOY ADVANCE)

• Yu-Gi-Oh! The Eternal Duelist Soul (2001 JP, 2002 US, 2003 EU/GAME BOY ADVANCE)

• Yu-Gi-Oh! The Sacred Cards (2002 JP, 2003 US, 2004 EU/GAME BOY ADVANCE)

• Yu-Gi-Oh! Reshef of Destruction (2003 JP, 2004 US and EU/GAME BOY ADVANCE)

There are some great takeaways here. First, at least some of the games will have online support which is fantastic! Second, all the titles so far come from handheld systems.

In the copy, it does note that the Early Days Collection, “brings back iconic Yu-Gi-Oh! digital titles originally released between 1998 and 2004.” I want to hold out hope that console titles such as Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories, Yu-Gi-Oh! The Duelists of the Roses, and Yu-Gi-Oh! The Falsebound Kingdom will be included, but I don’t think it’s worth holding my breath anymore (although maybe a second collection could launch with console titles?). That said, they have said that there are more games to be revealed and so if we stick with handheld titles, there are still a few games that I would love to see included in the criteria we have. Yu-Gi-Oh! Dungeon Dicve Monsters, Yu-Gi-Oh! Destiny Board Traveler, Yu-Gi-Oh! 7 Trials to Glory: World Championship Tournament 2005 do all technically fall in the criteria of handheld games released before 2005 in at least one country. Of course, I would love it if other Yu-Gi-Oh! video games were included such as Yu-Gi-Oh! GX: World Championship 2008 and the Tag Force games, but I don’t think that’s very likely at all. What games do you hope are included in the Early Games Collection?

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Finally, the final Yu-Gi-Oh! Speed Duels product has been delayed by a few weeks. Speed Duel: Battle City Finals will now release on December 13, 2024, with an MSRP of $29.99. I’ve always enjoyed these Speed Duel box sets and am really hyped for Joker’s Knight (it’s a pet deck of mine) to be included and am very interested to see what happens as Maxx “C” is also included in the set.