Stats                : Enraged Muka Muka is an interesting card.  It is Level 5, which means that if you have any reason to run it, then you enjoy having something you can use Metamorphosis on to get some handy Monsters.  It is Earth, which isn’t as good as being Light or Dark (Chaos Food), but still have some nice options.  The Type is one that recently got a boost: Rock.  Again, not the best, but not the worst.  Next is where we begin to worry: the ATK is just 1200!  The only real bright side is this can be searched by Sangan and Special Summoned from the deck by Last Will and Giant Rat.  The DEF is an even lower and more pitiful 800.  Since this is supposed to be an underrated Monster, that better be one great effect, huh?

 

Effect(s)            : For each card in your hand, this card gets a 400 point bonus to both ATK and DEF.  This is an 'okay' effect.  It isn’t stellar, but it’s not too bad: obviously not something good when you have no hand, and pretty sad with just one card in hand, but at two cards in hand, it’s at least strong enough to suicide a Vampire Lord, and most duelists try to keep at least two cards in their hand.  If you have three cards, which isn’t unreasonable, you have a very solid 2400/2000 Level 5 Monster, and anything higher is gravy.

 

There is a small downside though: it will make it a bit painful to play cards since that will lower this Monster’s attack.

 

Uses and

Combinations  : Some are probably already thinking “even if this card ends up being any good, why not just run the original Muka Muka?  It only gets 100 points less per card, and is a level 2, so I can protect it with Gravity Bind and Level Limit-Area B.”  That is a very good question, and one I have asked myself.  Fortunately, I have an answer that actually gives us a reason for using Enraged Muka Muka.  First, for either of them, you want a way to increase your hand size.  Given Yu-Gi-Oh’s rather limited pool for this, your best bet will be some elaborate combo.  My preferred method is using Shien’s Spy or Creature Swap to give my opponent a Sasuke Samurai #3.  Suicide something with less than 1000 ATK into it and you will end up with a hand of seven cards… which pumps Enraged Muka Muka up to 4000/3600.  Now, you can still get a respectable 2700/2400 using a normal Muka Muka with that trick, and you can protect it as mentioned above.  Indeed, it is a good idea to do both.  You also want to include Giant Trunade.  Simply build up the small, disposable Muka Muka, use Giant Trunade to clear the field of Spells and Traps… and increase your hand size.  Now Enraged Muka Muka is free to play as well.

 

Ratings

 

Traditional       : 1/5-Too much effort makes it very impractical.

 

Advanced        : 3/5-This is in a deck built around it and the original Muka Muka.  Such a deck looks fun but isn’t especially practical, though I could be wrong.  After all, it focuses on giving the user both an extreme hand advantage and strong field presence.  Oh, and it’s not an automatic perfect score in its own deck since such decks can also use the original Muka Muka.

 

Limited            : 4/5-Of course, this assumes you have a decent lead.  If not, then it’s basically a dead draw.  But if you do get it into play, eventually you’ll find it pointless to summon more Monsters at which point this will just keep growing stronger.

 

Summary

I don’t here people talk about this card much, and I never really considered Enraged Muka Muka until I started working on a legalized version of a Strings character deck.  It is about as close to Slifer as we can get, and all though it’s very combo sensitive, it does excel by doing what is “common” sense for this game: finding ways to get a large hand size and a strong Monster in play.