#proleague

What counterfeits.

Kaiba only allowed GHOULS to do anything in Battle City out of a warped sense of pride. They basically made it clear the Kaiba Brothers and their staff immediately flagged the members of GHOULS for counterfeiting and falsified IDs, et al. with Seeker's Duel against Yugi.

They could of immediately killed the Duel Disks involved and only didn't as to draw Marik out into the open to get his Egyptian God Cards.

I2, Kaiba Corp and Schroeder Corp have an effective Triopoly over Dueling and the only way to play in non-table top games is through their EXTREMELY centralized systems that they have proprietary systems.

In DSOD, it's explained you LITERALLY need a Duel Disk and a Deck to live in Domino City and to get any form of legal employment, as Kaiba owns the government as it's a company town.

By 5D's, the central authority for Dueling's infrastructure, Kaiba Corp, is controlled by the government of New Domino City as Dueling has literally become a power source to keep society running.

Are you going to want to risk your ability to Duel when the authority of Dueling is the same people who controls your pensions and your government IDs?

In SEVENS, it's made clear Goha Corp is basically in dictatorial control of the government and Dueling, and Yuga's format literally required actions from a major programmer/designer who is implied to be a fucking time traveler, as well as the rebellion of the system admin who allowed a rogue type of card (Maximums).

Kids are literally banned from trading their cards in SEVENS without Goha approval or they'll get banned from Dueling.

The consistent theme is that in the YGO Franchise, Counterfeits don't work or immediately get smashed or noticed. You live in a cyberpunk dystopia. Dueling is property of the literal government in many of these shows, and in DSOD, you need to be able to Duel to get a job and a home.

You're a hamster. You're in a box. And there's no escape from the jam jar.

You have to play nice with Sponsors, firms, and the government or major corporations. In several of these series, Dueling is required for citizenship.

Kaiba Corp/Leo Corp/SOL/Goha can literally shut you down outside of extremely fringe cases. Many of these companies have kill switches, and the authority of government or copyright law.

Honey, they blacklist people from competitions for all sorts of shit. And they could.

The Pro Circuit isn't a wealth gap thing even, it's a 'you need to be tied to a talent agency', without the agency, you ain't getting fuckin' nowhere, darlin'.

From the way YGO's shows structure it, you don't just join into the Dueling Circuit, the one where the actual Names are. By paying in.

You have to get invited. You need to have managers. Sponsors. Financial backers. Have an entire identity created for you.

What, do you think in the anime, this works like your YCS circuit?

No, the way the show's made it clear is you get hired, and there's a cartel system similar to a Medieval guild where if you ain't in, you ain't in, which is why people go to Duel Academy, to get in with the agencies and companies involved

And most of the tournaments in the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime, are also Invitation Only or you have clear through a filter.

This entire conversation is devolving into moving goalposts.

The whole point is the world Takahashi-sensei constructed is a hyper exaggeration of 1990s Magic the Gathering where there were these nightmare near unpullable foils that Rare Cards are like.

And the anime, from how its extended universe has structured it, is that being a Professional Duelist is less of a Professional Gamer, and more to do with Idol Culture, Japanese Voice Actors, or Johnny's, resulting in a less pre-planned version of Wrestling.

Where the companies get to dictate who gets to have a career. There's no breaking into the industry without getting one of those firms to sign you on.

And as I said, the counterfeits in Battle City, of what I recall, were only allowed because Kaiba LET them be allowed, as if you don't pay attention, Battle City is basically a roach motel for GHOULS, a trap designed to draw them in so Kaiba could crush the entire organization and get the Egyptian God Cards for himself.

Also the cards in Yu-Gi-Oh! are made of some weird environmental resistant stock, possibly sharp as steel if you know what you're doing, with microchips included.

The production might inherently cause some mild scarcity issues. No neverminded magic cards exist, with the Egyptian Gods being the least weird variant of those.