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NEWS: Yu-Gi-Oh! Sevens Anime Reveals April 2020 Debut, Staff, Cast

That being said, goodness, are we gonna embrace another debate that is basically Pokémon Sun and Moon 2.0?

I will say though, I feel ZeXal did a better job of targeting a younger audience while still feeling distinctly Yugioh.

Zexal was generally noted for being the title with the most fanservice/violence/dark themes since the original Duel Monsters which was why it was so popular. Never came off as "targetting a younger audience" to me. If any series besides this would be called that, I'd go for ARC-V.

So all the theories it would be a reboot, a crossover, or have a female protag have just been thrown out the window. I’ll still likely watch it but I won’t lie that this feels kind of anticlimactic after how much they hyped this for the anniversary of Yugioh. I’m also confused that it’s no longer being made by Studio Gallop? Vrains wasn’t that bad was it?

For me I was hoping an anniversary series would be something that would celebrate the franchise as a whole. If not a reboot which was always a stretch, maybe a crossover series with the various lead characters teaming up, which the ending to Vrains honestly did seem to be hinting at with the revelation that spoiler[Link Vrains was now connected to different worlds and Yusaku's disappearance].

I'm not sure what to think about this,personally. My assumption is that Yugi's usefulness as the face of the series (despite his name being in the title) is now null and void. It wasn't always about a card game but rather the (at times rather violent) life of a lonely high schooler who loved games in general. But alas,since the card game proved to be more profitable,the focus shifted to that. Furthermore,why continue to call it "Yu-Gi-Oh!" now that they're no longer using Yugi as the main character? Shouldn't they just call it "Duel Monsters" from now on to make things less confusing?

VRAINS as an actual show was fine, in my opinion. A step up from ARC-V. But it had numerous production issues which has plagued the franchise for years now. I don't know the actual budgeting numbers but it seems like Zexal was the budgeting peak. It had really nice animation, the best of the franchise in my opinion. After that there was a steady decline. People attribute the budgeting issues of ARC-V to them focusing more on Dark Side of Dimensions at the time, and maybe that's true. But VRAINS had numerous clip show episodes, sometimes 2 in the same cour. It also ended up having to end earlier than previous series for whatever reason. YGO series usually end in April when the next series starts, VRAINS ended this September. 7 months. Not a good sign. I'm not entirely sure why it had issues since the card game still sells well, but perhaps it was an issue with Studio Gallop, or perhaps TV Tokyo, and a new studio is also a result of that. Now that I think about it towards the end Zexal did shift timeslots. That might have been a factor as well.

The art style is a biggest disappointment to me for this series. It was great how every new series emulated Kazuki Takahashi's artstyle, even the later series and characters he didn't design. This basically abandons that and makes it look more like Buddyfight or Battle Spirits and doesn't fit in with the previous YGO protagonists. The Rush Duels are lame, but it's not surprising given how successful Duel Links is.