Joshua Y.
Yu-Gi-Oh! Mall Tour
Aventura Mall
Florida
January 31, 2004
Tons of people
I get there around 9:30 AM and walk in to find no one at any of the playing areas. I’m like “Ok, no one’s here, I don’t have to wait in line.” Of course that’s too good to be true. Some chick on the event staff comes up to tell me that I have to go to the other side of the mall to register and get a time card to play in the 4-person tournaments. I head over there and find a huge line with about 100 people in it… great.
Here’s a picture of everyone behind me in line. If I could have taken a bigger picture you would see that it curves around and is twice as big as you see here. That’s a bit of an incentive for you people who want to go, get there a little early to wait in line.
I see some people I know in line, but suddenly an event staff guy tells 3 guys to go to the back of the line for cutting, so I decided not to test my luck and just head to the back of the line like everyone else had to do. After about 45 minutes of waiting, I finally get up to the registration booth. They gave me a bag containing the mall tour schedule, a Shonen Jump magazine add, a “Duel Tools” book, and a horrible common card. They also gave me a big ID card thing with a hologram of Joey and Pegasus on it, and on the back they wrote your name and your new 9 digit number that replaces your old YU-#. I am a Lvl 1 judge so I just gave them the 9 digit number that I got for becoming a judge and they wrote that on their instead of giving me a new one. That actually turned out to be a good idea because some UpperDeck employees knew that if your number started with 300 then you were a judge, so whenever some UD employee looked at my number and saw that I was a judge they treated me really nice. Anyway, they attach your ID card to a black necklace and have you put it around your neck. Then some lady ran by and slapped a tiny sticker on me with a color wheel on it, so if there is any pictures taken of me by the UD staff, I can go to some site on the Internet and see them. I get my time card for the 4-person tournaments and head over to the main playing area.
My time was at 10:30 AM, and it was only 10:00, so I walked around and found some people I knew. Selling is not allowed, and if they catch you they kick you out of the mall, so naturally most of the people I knew were there only to sell cards. One guy had like 7 Vampire Lords and so many Exodia pieces I’ve lost count, and he was there only to sell cards. I don’t know if he wants me putting his name out on the Internet, so let’s call him… Joel. I don’t know how he did it, but he walked out of there with more money and more cards than he walked in with. He could have beaten all of the Millennium Puzzle Duelists with his eyes closed, but he probably didn’t want to waste time playing cards when there’s money to be made.
I passed by the Mellennium Puzzle Challenge area and saw the deck types of the 6 puzzle duelists. There was a Machine Beatdown (Jason), Exodia (Ken), Skill Drain Beatdown (Julia), Warrior Beatdown (Phil), Newb Beatdown (some guy who didn’t know half the cards and was being taught how to play when I walked by), and a Control deck (Brandon?).
Across from the Puzzle Duelist’s area, there was a stage where two guys would stand up and give the Basic Gameplay Show for Yu-Gi-Oh to small children. Also, if the children answered questions correctly, they got a booster pack. Although you had to be 15 and under in order to get a pack L I’m 16.
I went to Area B and got in the back of a 20-person line, but someone from the event staff asked me what my time card was, and since it was almost 10:30, he told me to go straight to the front of the line, cool. I spend a couple minutes talking to the fine looking girls who let people in to play the 4-person tournaments, and then finally I get to sit down and play my first match.
It was against a girl named Tiffany, 15 by the looks of her. We talk a little and then start playing. She didn’t have all of the greatest cards, but she still knew what she was doing. I played Delinquent first turn, and then set a Tomato and Imperial. Next turn she plays Graceful, I chain with Imperial. She attacks with a monster, I get a Spirit Reaper. My turn I Change Of Heart her monster, tribute for Jinzo, and attack for 2700 and she discards Monster Reborn randomly. Her turn she sets a monster and ends. I play Exiled, blow up her Sangan, then attack for 2700 again, and I coincidentally discard the Cyber Jar she just fetched. She couldn’t draw any more monsters and I quickly won the duel.
My next duel was against some kid with beatsticks like Harpie’s Brothers and La Jinn’s, so I knew he wouldn’t be that much of a problem. All he did was, well, to quote my friend Abe, “Grunt. Bigger rock smash! Grunt. Grunt.” In other words all he did was attack blindly. I used all of my hand control cards to get him top-decking by the fourth turn, and he only had 800 LP left. He sets a card face down, then ends. I draw Ring, set it, and then play it on my Tribe during his turn for game. I won both of my duels no problem. I got a slip to get into the Millennium Puzzle Duelist Challenge so I walk over there and wait in line. Also, because I won I got to sign the wall of the booth, whoopee.
This is a picture of the little wall you get to sign. She’s pointing at my signature, which will soon be worth hundreds of dollars. Why? Because I said so.
Two guys I knew (let’s call them… Brian and Victor) played each other and Brian won, so he wrote “Brian Beat Victor” on the wall to rub it in Victor’s face that he beat him. So later on when Victor finally won in the 4-person tournament he did a little editing to Brian’s message. He put and “s” on the end of “beat” and “Victor” and wrote “meat” after Victor… you do the math. It was quickly noticed and crossed out, but it was funny while it lasted.
I talked to some girl in line who plays light monsters and fairies, but I wasn’t interested in her deck… She gets to play the guy playing an Exodia deck. I end up playing Jason, a guy who has a Machine beatdown deck, which is cool because I’ve never played one of those before. We start the duel and I go first. I set Witch and end my turn. His turn he summons a Reflect Bounder and attacks my Witch. I end up spending 2 or 3 mintues deciding on what monster to get because I have never played against a Reflect Bounder before. I asked him what he would get, and surprisingly he said Tribe, so I got that and he set a S/T and ended his turn. I go and draw Painful Choice. He gives me a Sinister and then Jinzo, Heavy Storm, Forceful, Vampire Lord all go to the graveyard. I knew he knew I had Tribe, so I decided to play it safe and set a monster. He goes and summons a TP1 Mechanical Chaser and attacks my Fiber Jar (FJ Count: 1). We reset and he sets one S/T and ends. My turn I Heavy Storm his Ring, Graceful, discard Jinzo and Scientist, Premature Jinzo, summon Yata and attack for a first blood. His turn, no draw, he Snatch’s my Jinzo, sets a monster, and attacks me. My turn, gain 1000, set Fiber Jar. His turn, he flips his own Fiber Jar (FJ Count: 2). We reset, he summons Reflect, and attacks me for 1700. My turn I set Tomato and Waboku. His turn he Change’s my Tomato and attacks, I Waboku, he ends. My turn I switch Tomato to defense, and set a monster. His turn he summons Mechanical Chaser and attacks my face down… Fiber Jar, again (FJ Count: 3). It’s not that I have a bad hand; I just want to keep him off balance. He sets 2 S/T’s and ends. My turn I play Pot, MST one of his S/T’s, which turned out to be an MST, and then I attack with a Tomato which gets Mirror Force’d. I set one S/T and end. He summons and attacks with Reflect Bounder, I Mirror Force. My turn I use Painful: Jinzo, Heavy, Vampire Lord, Robbin’ Goblin, and Forceful Sentry. He gives me Jinzo, which is what I wanted him to do, and then I attack with a Witch and end. His turn he sets a monster and ends. My turn I Change his Cyber Jar and tribute it for Jinzo and attack. His turn he uses Dark Hole and attacks me with some machine. My turn I set a monster and 1 S/T, and end. His turn he summons another machine and attacks my face down and I reveal… FIBER JAR (FJ Count: 4)! After we reset there is some more back and forth attacking and destroying. I have him with two cards in his hand and nothing on the field. I summon and attack with Spirit Reaper and he discards some magic card. I play the Mirage I drew, and end. His turn he summons X-Head Cannon and attacks my Reaper. My turn I draw 4, then MST my Mirage. I set 3 S/T, switch Reaper to defense, and then end. His turn he plays Pot, I play Imperial, he summons X-head and ends. My turn I flip Call and bring back a Vampire Lord that I earlier used Painful on. Then I summoned Yata, Ring’d one of his X-Heads, attacked his remaining X-Head with Vampire Lord, attacked with Yata, and then he gave up with hardly any LP left. That duel took about 20-30 minutes. Mostly due to the 4 Fiber Jar’s we flipped, but also due to the constant friendly taunting and jeering we said to each other during the duel. He swapped my black necklace for a red one that says “Millennium Puzzle Winner” on it, and he also gave me a necklace with a tiny little millennium puzzle on it.
That’s me on the right with the Green Lantern shirt on. Jason is on the left. All of the puzzle duelists were wearing suits, but I guess that Jason thinks he’s too cool to wear the jacket, ha ha.
I got to sign “The Book Of Duel Kings” after beating
Jason. I also wrote my SN for Realms in
there, I wonder if anyone saw it and is going to PM me.
Later on I watched
Victor play Jason’s machine deck. Just
when Victor thinks he has it won, Jason plays X-Head and attacks Victor’s
Tribe, Victor’s just like, “ok”, but suddenly Jason chains two Limiter Removals
to his attack and takes out all of Victor’s life points out of no where. The look on Victor’s face was priceless, ha
ha.
I stayed around and
traded for a much wanted 1st Edition Reflect Bounder and I finally
left at 5:30 PM when my family came and dragged me out.
Mall Tour Day 2
March 1, 2004
I get there at 10:30
AM this time, and of course there was another huge line to wait in. I coincidentally got in line behind someone
called [FD]Swordfish that I met on Realms the previous night. We quickly figured out who we were and
talked a little. She had a huge binder
full of all the complete TP sets except for TP4. She did a ton of mad selling and trading in line with a bunch of
people. I was in awe when she made like
$80 in 5 minutes. Some of the puzzle
duelists were walking around the line greeting and talking to people. I talked a to puzzle duelist named Ken, who
plays an Exodia deck using the Elma combo, and I found out that Melissa
([FD]Swordfish) didn’t like him that much because of some quarrel they had at
last year’s mall tour. But seriously,
how could you hate this guy:
Ha ha ha, I only
hope he reads this and gets to see my wonderful photography skills.
After an hour and a half
we got through the line and got our blue time cards to go duel in the 4-person
tournaments. I went off to do some
trading and got a Heavy Storm for a Kaiser Glider. I also dueled a little in the open dueling fields and I lost
twice in a row, miserably I might add, to a guy I knew named Mike. He just plays a tough beatdown, I don’t know
how I lost so badly, he always beats me!
My time came around
for the 4-person tournament, so I left the dueling fields. I was looking for my blue time card and I couldn’t
find it, so I sprinted back to the other side of the mall where the dueling
fields were and I found my card on the floor, phew! I had one minute to get there for my time, so I ran like crazy
and got there just in time. I saw
Melissa and stood with her in line until it started. We watched some guy playing with 1 Morphing Jar and 3 Needle
worms in his deck beat some guy with a really good Control deck. I have no clue how it happened, especially
when the guy was also playing 2 Magic Drains, 2 Jammer and 7 Tools that he
NEVER activated even when the situation called for it. My first duel was really easy and I won no
problem. The second one was against a
guy who looked like he was really good, but I shut him down and pulled off a
Yata-Lock by the 4th turn. I
get to sign the wall again, I get a slip, and me and Melissa (who won also) go
wait in line to duel the puzzle duelists.
She plays Jason with the machine deck and I get to play Phil with a
warrior deck.
My duel was really
weird. I had him Yata-Locked for one
turn and he gave up, but earlier I had played Mirage and he forgot about it, so
being the honest guy I am, I pointed out Mirage and we continued the duel. I ended up discarding Yata, thus breaking my
Lock on him. I don’t draw an MST for
like 5 turns, leaving me with 3 cards in my deck. He top-decks a Raigeki and plays it. I go and set Call and a Sinister (2 cards left in my deck). He goes and passes with nothing to
play. I call Jinzo and attack him for
2400, brining him down to 3000 (1 card left in my deck). He goes and passes again with no playable
cards. My turn, I draw my last card,
not a monster! I have only Heavy Storm,
Painful Choice, and MST in my hand, and Jinzo and Sinster on the field. The most damage I can do is 2700, and he has
3000. If I had attacked him with
Sinister a turn earlier I would have been able to win. I couldn’t believe everything that just
happened. After taking him apart piece
by piece and him actually giving up at one point, I was about to lose from
decking out. I just attacked for 2700,
leaving him with 300; he drew and ended, I LOST. I tried to get him to give me another chance, but he stuck by the
rules and made me go back and start from scratch.
I get another blue
card, wait in line, play 2 guys, beat them both horribly, sign the wall again,
get another slip, and head back over to the puzzle area all within 1 hour. I get there and request to play Phil again,
who was more than ready to accept my challenge.
Me and my awesome Green Player’s Choice Holographic card sleeves versus
Phil and… his… er… self.
I go at him like
something that goes at something when it wants to beat it in a card game. At one point I draw Painful and try to dump
Mirage, but he mockingly picks it so I will be afraid to use it in fear of
decking out again, but I play it anyway, and it turns out giving me a winning
hand. I use my new cards to destroy him
and bring his life points down to zero.
He was a really good sport about it and didn’t mind losing to me at
all. For the second time I was given a
red necklace, a millennium puzzle necklace, and I got to sign the book of duel
kings. Then I met the rest of the
puzzle duelists and they were all a nice bunch of people, and I even got to sit
down and play Ken for fun because there was no one in line to play him, I won.
Someone I knew named
Johnny played Ken’s Exodia deck. I went
upstairs and watched from above.
Ken is on the upper left, Johnny is across from him playing a
machine/beatdown deck. Julia, sitting
next to Ken, is the puzzle duelist playing the Skill Drain beatdown. She is really good.
Johnny really wanted to see himself winning a red necklace, but all he
saw was…
EXODIA! Ha ha, tough luck
Johnny.
After spending 16+ hours at the mall tour over a span of two days, I was finally ready to call it quits. Overall I had a great time and I met a lot of new people. I’d definitely go again if I had the chance.
+Props+
+Meeting people on Realms there
+Beating the puzzle duelists twice
+Trading for a Reflect and Storm
-Slops-
-Waiting FOREVER in all of the lines
-One kid I played who tried to get me DQ’d by whining to a judge that I wasn’t allowed to pick up a Sinister… seriously, it’s just a game, grow up
-Losing to Phil by deck out
Here’s what I left with:
Here’s all of the stuff I got at the Mall Tour: 1st Ed Reflect Bounder, Heavy Storm, 2 Mellenium Puzzle Winner necklaces, 2 black necklaces with a tiny puzzle on them, a holographic badge, and 2 carrying bags. Not a bad haul.
Here is a revolution in displaying your cards. I find my digital camera very useful in showing things, so why not my deck? I give to you my “Digital Deck List”.
Ok so my shiny sleeves make it kind of hard to see, but I have a feeling that you will all live through it.
Feel free to e-mail me at josh_a_y@hotmail.com with any tips, comments, or suggestions you may have. Also, if you saw me there then send me an e-mail to say hi. You can find me on Realms as sTaRsCrEaM.