Hopes for Yu-Gi-Oh! in 2025

2024 was a year of ups and downs for a lot of Yu-Gi-Oh! players, but 2025 is already looking bright. Let's dive into the last year of product releases, ban lists, and card design and also look ahead at the sets we know are coming and anything else we're hoping to see!

Below you can find our long Yu-Gi-Oh! video of the week. If you still crave more content, make sure to check out our shorts on YouTube!


Looking Back and Ahead

It's a brand-new year with the same old game. Watch the video to discover what we can expect from Yu-Gi-Oh! in 2025 and read more about the Yu-Gi-Oh! of 2024 below!

A Brief 2024 Retrospective

2024 was a year of ups and downs for Yu-Gi-Oh!, and sadly, the year really started off on a down. The 2-Player Starter Set was a product many fans were excited for. There was hope in the community that a product such as this would be the entry point for new players that the physical card game has needed for many, many years. Alas, it did not really deliver on that promise. Failing to convey a realistic expectation of what modern Yu-Gi-Oh! looks like is excusable for a product aimed at brand-new players, but it also failed on its main mission of explaining the rules clearly and concisely. At least we got some hilariously tiny cut-out tokens in the back of the booklet, right?

On the other end of the spectrum, we have the game-changing main set: The Infinite Forbidden. This set saw the release of powerful cards like and the Fiendsmith engine led by the mighty . This set was truly what sent 2024 into a new era of Yu-Gi-Oh!—turning Snake-Eyes from the best deck on the block to one of the best decks in the history of the game. Thankfully, the September ban list addressed Snake-Eyes pretty well, and it did so less than two months after INFO came out. Could it be that Konami is changing their strategy, and will reign in these powerful decks more quickly upon their release? We can only dream …

Last but certainly not least, we have what could be one of the best products of the entire year: Quarter Century Bonanza. With cards in every rarity you could dream of plus a gigantic pool of 200 nostalgia cards, Konami knocked it out of the park with the most fun to open set of the entire year. Whether you're looking for modern staples like and , old-school favorites like and , or something in between and , this set has something for everyone. If shiny cardboard is your thing, then look no further than Quarter Century Bonanza!