xDĬlick to expand.You do realize that the Magic and Wizards card game (Duel Monsters) became an important fixture during the portion of the manga Duel Monsters anime was based on, right? Granted, it doesn't take it to ridiculous proportions like in the anime, but at least the second anime felt a bit closer to the manga aside from trying to make itself look epic and fail (see: Duelist Kingdom). It would have been impossible for it to continue because what happens in it contradicts what happens later in the manga, much like it's impossible for NAS to adapt the first seven volumes in their current universe because it contradicts what happened before volume 8. And this is the reason why "season nothing" is looked down upon by fans. The second anime had its fair share of the same problems in lesser proportions, but at least it had character models that ( kind of) reflected the original work (even though it didn't really matter since the animation was horse skeet most of the time, and the height difference between Yuugi and Dark Yuugi/Atem never existed in the manga). Not to mention, the animation was pretty bad for an anime that aired in the 1990s. Some of it made sense when it came to censoring, most of the changes didn't make sense at all because there's no reasoning behind them.
They skipped a ton of chapters and rearranged/changed most of the existing ones to fit their nonsensical original ideas.
Plus, Atem sounding like a woman just didn't work for me.Ĭlick to expand.Pardon my language, but are you ****ing high? o_o The Yuu☆gi☆ou series done by Toei was more unfaithful to the manga compared to the second anime. The first few volumes of the manga that I have read seem pretty good, but this adaptation doesn't seem enjoyable. The first few episodes were interesting since they were new, but the whole routine of someone picking on Yugi/one of his friends and then Atem defeating the villain of the week with the game of the week got kind of stale pretty fast. I have seen the first Yu-Gi-Oh! series and it honestly didn't seem that great.
Considering that it doesn't promote the card game like the other series does and all of the contradictions it poses for the Duel Monster series, it wouldn't really make sense to license it and dub it.
There also would be some legal issues in trying to do so between Toei and TV Tokyo, the company that produced Duel Monsters. I believe that Toei prevented the series from leaving their control after it didn't do well in Japan. I don't think that 4Kids' attitude towards the series is why it was never dubbed. Instead of continuing on with that continuity for the Duel Monsters manga, they decided to end it and just restart the series with the Duel Monster storyline, adding in some events/references from the first few volumes, but not exactly how they were in the first series. It was called Yu-Gi-Oh! and it was produced by Toei. I don't think that it did well, possibly because of the changes they made from the original manga. The first series was based around the first seven volumes of the manga. So, seeing this series would not help people to understand the events in Duelist Kingdom and onward. Why does Kaiba act like Yugi defeated him the first time back in Duelist Kingdom when Yugi beats him twice in this series? Why is Tea's flashback to her time working in fast food different here than we saw during Duelist Kingdom? Why is Mio part of the group here, but never appears after this series? Why does Shadi appear early on in this series, yet neither Yugi or Atem recognize him when he appeared after Pegasus' defeat? Why does Atem not recognize the evil spirit version of Bakura in Duelist Kingdom when the last few episodes of this series are spent fighting against him? Why are the events in this series never referred to and always different in Duelist Kingdom.
In fact, there are a lot of contradictions if you try to connect these two series. This series has no connection to the Duel Monsters series at all.