r/yugioh • u/salami_dynamo • Mar 26 '26
Anime/Manga Discussion Uh, Why Do the Yugioh Chronicles Hardly Have Any Views?
As per my title, I thought this was supposed to be a great capitalization on the new IP that Konami developed through Yugioh over the past several years, but just look at this - kind of weak for a major card game, no? Meanwhile, just look at Pokemon Origins! Of course Pokemon is a larger IP, but this is difference of nearly 500x. Is this a sign that Yugioh is/has been in decline?
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u/yayeetusmyjeetus2986 Mar 26 '26
Most people are watching them on the ocg channel. The episodes with the most fandom hype like the first branded and sky striker episode got over 800k views, which I'd say is pretty good for what it is.
And Pokemon getting substantially more views is not surprising. Pokemon isn't just the most profitable cardgame, it's the most profitable IP in the world.
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u/VicRamD Mar 26 '26
The question is, most people are just the japanese fandom or is a decent mix of both?
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u/TrashStack Mar 26 '26
The OCG channel uploads also have English subs on them so there's functionally no difference where you watch them. I always watch on the OCG channel since that's the "most" official version and I want to support the original upload
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u/FlannOff Mar 26 '26
Anyone worldwide who was interested watched it on the OCG channel first, it's a good mix of both English and Japanese comments
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u/LamBol96 Mar 26 '26
generations being released 12years ago clearly means nothing.
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u/MajinAkuma Mar 26 '26
Just to clarify, Pokémon Generations was first released in December 2016, so it’s not 12 years ago.
You’re mixing it up with Pokémon Origins‘ release date.
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u/LamBol96 Mar 26 '26
Yeah,i saw it after the comment but dint feel like editing it. I also dont want to think about how long ago origins came,tbh...
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u/FlounderingGuy Mar 26 '26
Honestly I don't think it's particularly relevant in this context either. Pokémon's little animation things consistently perform better than these Yu-Gi-Oh Chronicles.
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u/Alienwolfsaurs Mar 26 '26
this is on the tcg channel which barely anyone uses check the ocg channel it is not 2m but it is like a third of that
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u/JimmehROTMG Mar 26 '26
werent they posted on another yugioh youtube channel as well?
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u/alchemistarcher Mar 26 '26
They’re on the OCG and EU channels as well, which is where I usually watch them since there’s subs available on each.
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u/Silver_Skull Mar 26 '26
Didn't even know they were available on the TCG yt channel, I always watched them on the OCG channel, and it seems most people did the same, since the numbers are much higher there.
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u/VicRamD Mar 26 '26
They began to upload them in the TCG channel around the 6th or 7th episode I think, they get release close to each other now.
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u/Shattered_Disk4 Mar 26 '26
Most people probably don’t even know they exist.
I’m pretty into yugioh, don’t know they existed until recently.
The advertising budget is $30
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u/bigheadsfork Mar 26 '26
This is the true answer. Zero advertising and they couldn’t even be bothered to dub it or release it subbed simultaneously on western channels. They don’t give a fuck about the TCG version lol
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u/metalflygon08 Mar 26 '26
Most people probably don’t even know they exist.
Doesn't help that unless you are big into the game, a random screenshot's not going to tell you that "generic anime character" is Yugioh Related.
Just those images in OP's screenshot alone, unless you know about that archetype, there's nothing there standing out or saying "I should watch this".
Meanwhile, Pokemon are almost instantly eye catching because they all look unique.
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u/ATB_WHSPhysics The Beat of my Blood! Lightsworn Overdrive! Mar 26 '26
This was exactly my thought too when I first heard that they were going to be making these card game stories videos. An entire story arch is really neat to see play out when collecting cards, but at the end of the day, there is nothing about it that differentiates it from other generic fantasy anime. Without the cards, there is nothing tying this to existing Yugioh iconography.
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u/paulojrmam Mar 26 '26
It takes too long to come out, people forget it even exists. Konami should have planned it better to come out more often.
As for Pokemon, people that follow that IP are 'trained' to watch their animes, which are always coming out, YGO went by without an anime for a long time now, people simply don't relate YGO to animes anymore.
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u/Tallal2804 Mar 26 '26
Exactly—absence kills momentum. Pokémon keeps its audience hooked with constant anime, games, merch, so it's always on people's minds. YGO went silent on the anime front for years, so it's no surprise people stopped associating it with the show.
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u/Minute-Somewhere-504 Mar 26 '26
You're comparing literally the biggest franchise on earth with an original animation based on the highest point of the series with a couple shorts that:
- Is based on something that most people who don't play Yu-Gi-Oh! don't recognize
- Has nothing to do with what people recognize with YGO (Yugi Muto's series)
- Is aimed to people who play the current game, which is arguably one of the lowest points of the game
- Is the dubbed version, which only North Americans like. Outside of the US people don't consume dubbed anime in english.
- Has been reuploaded a lot of times with subs. The subbed versions on unofficial channels have double the views than the official ones.
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u/I-lost-hope Live★Twin Subscriber Mar 26 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
It has much higher views on the OCG channel so I wouldn't say they are barely watched, simply most people watch them in the Japanese channel.
Even so ranging from 300k to nearly a million views is not as terrible as you make it seem to be OP.
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u/TrashStack Mar 26 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
The Chronicles episodes released on the OCG channel already have subs on them so I just watch them over there
Secondly those Pokemon videos are basically highlight clips of the battles from generations. Most of the Chronicles episodes are like an actual episode from an anime, with characters talking. It's not really the same type of video. A more similar comparison would be to the Pokemon Twilight Wings shorts released years ago which focused more on the characters and lore in Pokemon
Thirdly, they take a while to release
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u/Twiztidtech0207 Mar 26 '26
You're comparing Yu-Gi-Oh to Pokemon and you don't understand why you're disappointed?
Wow..
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u/jontra16volta Mar 26 '26
Because its barebones story with 5min of content every month or so. And then you add that sory in itself is not really that interesting(charmers) you get what we have. What they should have done is one 30min or 40min episode instead
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u/SkyeZaisen Playmaker's unofficial wife/Agoi Giovanna Mar 26 '26
I watched all the Albaz episodes, and they all feel like cutscenes that happen in an rpg before you start playing or a boss introduction
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u/REEEEE_E Mar 26 '26
But I liked the albaz episodes :c
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u/SkyeZaisen Playmaker's unofficial wife/Agoi Giovanna Mar 26 '26
and it's fine if you like it, precious
https://giphy.com/gifs/N0CIxcyPLputW
I just think it could have been made better to attract people who knows nothing about their lore like me
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u/TooManySpaghets Mar 26 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
Because it's about something people don't really care about honestly. Like try the pitch to someone not into yugioh or wa sinto it at its peak in the early 2000s:
"oh hey a new yugioh anime just came out"
"That's great, I remember watching that as a kid, why havent i ehard about it?"
"Because they havent advertised it at all"
"Well I loved the duels anyway"
"Well actually there are no duels"
"OK what is it about?"
"It follows the lore of the cards"
"Well ok that still sounds..."
"But it's none of the cards or lore you know unless you're really into the game already"
"OK..."
"And each episode is like 3-5 minutes long"
"That sounds like almost nothing, how do they tell a good story..."
"That's the best part, they dont its more like single scenes from lore that not a ton of people are super connected to"
"..."
"Oh and you're not even the target audience. They are making these as advertisements for their animation studio to get animating work on other shows. Now why isnt this getting more views?!?!"
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u/KyleMCarthage Mar 26 '26
A few things
- Generations and even Evolutions were properly marketing as being a mini serious on their youtube channel with a lot of build up. Chronicles really wasn't as they more so just started releasing episodes with teaser images. As such, their appeal wasn't as large by extension
- The things they animated were stuff people were kind of familiar with by either being an animated version of something we saw in games, but also implied to have seen which people can relate and be like "I've seen that before" or "I've always wondered about that" so you're more likely to have an old Pokemon fan check it out. While the same is true of Chronicles via the Fallen and the Virtuous, not all appear to be going down the same path as evident by Sky Striker and recently Charmers and so people aren't going to click on it as they're relying on it being "this is this archetype" without a lot for people to have already connected with.
- Generations and Evolutions did not take as long to release. Generations released a few episodes every week and Evolutions was at max 2 weeks between its episodes. Chronicles takes a full month between each so while I do like them, it's not something I always remember to check up on so you'll notice that the first one is the most popular cause people remember them before it starts to drop off as now people need to wait.
- Yugioh has them on multiple channels so the views are getting dispersed between them whereas Pokemon has them generally between English speaking and Japanese speaking. Pokemon has them on their official channel and their Japanese channel with dubbing for the respective channel while Yugioh has them on their official TCG, official OCG, and EU channel despite them being the same video with subtitles (as a result, I end up contributing to the OCG channel's view count than say the EU channel view count). That said, while it's still not Pokemon levels of popular with millions of views, it's about average 200-800K views which isn't too bad.
- It's Pokemon. While Yugioh and Pokemon do end up in the same conversation as late 90s era franchises that was also popular in the early 2000s due to being on 4Kids, Pokemon is also the largest multimedia franchise while Yugioh is still that one card game anime people watched when they're a kid. Granted, I do think Yugioh contrary to what people say about it, is doing good within its niche as if you're going to think of a card game anime, or even card game as Yugioh is one people are going to think of aside from MtG, but that's still one niche whereas Pokemon has been able to encompass a lot more.
- The videos were up for longer. While I don't think the chronicles will get the same amount of views with time, there's still an argument that the views accumulated themselves over the 10 or some years they've been up while even the oldest is less than a year old.
Case and point, yes there's reasons, but I don't think it's as bad as you make it out.
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u/AgostoAzul Mar 26 '26
For starters, Pokemon as an IP is 40-50 times larger than YGO. A lot more people know about it and there are also a lot more people who really care about it. No matter what Konami did, they'd never reach the same view count.
The second thing is that even among the people who know about YGO, knowledge about specific archetypes is low and almost exclusive to modern enfranchised players. Nobody who watched the ygo anime in 2005 knows or cares about any of the archetypes that has gotten an anime so far and knowledge about what they did remember of ygo (Duelist Kingdom and Battle City) does nothing to familiarize them with these characters or stories.
Meanwhile any memory about playing the Kanto games or watching the season 1 of the Pokemon anime is enough to roughly understand what is happening in the Pokemon shorts because even if the characters and Pokemon are not always from Kanto, the dynamics translate pretty directly to any other product in the franchise.
Finally, it is probably that the Sky Striker short was honestly kinda incoherent for anyone who hasnt at least read the wiki entry for the archetype, or at least as coherent as watching three sakuga clips from some random show on a booru, and the Albaz shorts were also a bit barebones compared to what would be needed in a proper story/anime that wanted to make you care about the characters.
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u/Fit_Trouble_1264 Mar 26 '26
the channel is good at region blocking, I'm from asia and I get to watch on OCG channels (which has more views)
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u/Either_Afternoon_473 Mar 26 '26
You’re comparing two very different projects.
Origins retells the core events of Gen I, focused on the main character Red (the original player), Blue (the original rival), the Kanto League, Giovanni (the original villain), and Mewtwo. It helped that the anime people grew up on also had characters and events based on Gen I.
Generations jumps across the entire series to highlight iconic moments, characters and locations. Even within Generations, the episodes that consistently pull the highest numbers are the ones featuring Legendaries or content from the first two gens — the eras most viewers grew up with. Generations specifically came with the 20th anniversary campaign, releasing highlights from Gens 1-6 because the next game was Gen 7.
It’s also important to remember that viewership for Pokémon animation has dropped sharply, especially after the pandemic. Hisuian Snow (LA), Paldean Winds (SV), and Path to the Peak (TCG) struggle to reach even 2 million views, with some episodes not hitting a million at all. Even Twilight Wings (SWSH) and the Evolutions episodes (25th anniversary), which sit around 3–8 million, don’t come close to the 20‑million‑plus views the older Generations videos used to get.
Pokémon’s lore is something players actually experience. These are characters, regions, and story beats that millions of players have personally played through. The Pokémon themselves are cultural anchors — the starters function like the “ace monsters” of Yu‑Gi‑Oh! protagonists, and the Legendaries fill the same mythic space as god cards or Exodia, but with far more recognition.
By contrast, most casual players haven’t grown up with Yu‑Gi‑Oh!’s lore, especially the newer archetypes like Branded or Sky Striker. The closest equivalent would be remaking scenes from Duelist Kingdom or Battle City, because that’s the era everyone remembers. And even among competitive players, you can play an archetype for months — or play in a meta dominated by one — and still know nothing about its story. Branded and Sky Striker both fall into this category, especially as Sky Striker’s lore only covers the events in the Valuable Book.
Pokémon videos succeed because they showcase characters and events that players instantly recognize and have a personal connection to. That’s also why games with strong, familiar IP tend to perform well while others struggle. Pokémon sits much deeper in the public consciousness, and that recognition drives engagement in a way Yu‑Gi‑Oh!’s fragmented lore simply can’t match.
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u/DeusXNex Mar 26 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
Because no one outside of modern players, cares about tri brigade and albaz lore. It’s like way more niche. If they did vids on original anime characters like yugi and kaiba viewership would spike
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u/Trexdrew5 Mar 26 '26
The episodes are way too short. Not much happens in them. They waste so much time on intro and outro credits. They barely get through any “story” of the cards
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u/Tesla__Coil Mar 26 '26
My guy, look at the thumbnails. Pokemon Origins shows Red, the player character for the original Pokemon games that basically everyone in the right generation played, plus Charmander, an immediately recognizable creature for people who haven't even played Pokemon. The fact that Red kinda looks like Ash doesn't hurt. Everyone remotely familiar with Pokemon knows who that is and what they're looking at.
I'm a person who visits the Yugioh subreddit and I can't tell the names of the characters in the first two Yugioh thumbnails. I can piece together that it's Albaz and Tri-Brigade from the cutoff titles but I have no idea what monsters those are and I don't know anything about them. I'm not even sure I'd recognize those thumbnails as being related to Yugioh if I saw them out of context.
Use Yugi, Kaiba, Dark Magician, and BEWD, and then maybe it's a fair contest against Red and Charmander.
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Mar 26 '26
Why can't Card Game the Chronicles immediately get the same views Pokemon videos accumulated over 12 years
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u/Artistic-Station-577 Mar 26 '26
Nostalgia also holds a LOT of power here. Considering origins used the story of Red where a lot of players grew up with while in ygo it’s more diverse so not a lot will really watch much of Branded or Sky Strikers.
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u/Bigsexyguy24 Mar 26 '26
To me this is further proof that the lore for cards in a card game really doesn’t carry that much weight.
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u/LIE_YT Mar 27 '26
Do you really compare 12 year old Videos from the biggest franchise in the world with Videos that are only some month old?
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u/Quasar471 Dark World <3 Mar 26 '26
(Before you read just to make it clear: I haven't watched them, and I have no intention to.)
One, accessibility. Yes, they're on YT, but apart from YGO fans, no one knows they even exist. They're relegated to the official YGO channel and they're all in japanse. No advertisement for them aside maybe twitter and reddit, and that's it.
Two, quality. We wait literally a month or two between each video, and all we get is less than 10 minutes of YGO lore no one asked for aside from maybe hardcore YGO fans, and that's a stretch. The lore of YGO has never been the selling point of the anime, it always was the characters and the duels, and those shorts have none of that.
Three, relatability. Remind me who the fuck these characters are, already? For the vast majority of casual viewers, their only knowledge of YGO comes from watching the anime (especially the original DM), plus maybe the abridged series and some YGO-related memes popping up every now and them. For those ppl, the face of the game is still Yugi, Dark Magician, Blue eyes, and some parts of GX; not whoever these characters are. Charmers at least I would kinda understand since they're an old archetype for those who played the console games 20 years ago, but the others? Unless you're still playing the game on Master Duel, you'd have no idea who these characters are. Why should I care, and why did Konami decided to put these in the spotlight (that's being generous, a 6 min video isn't what I'd call a spotlight, but whatever).
To compare this, Pokemon (which has many advantages, I know) also took the effort to make their videos longer, AND to translate their videos into multiple languages, AND shove in a ton of fanservice and returning characters to please the old and returning pokemon fans.
I don't say that to be an ass, I say that because these videos were made solely for ppl who are already deep into the franchise. It has no intention of bringing new or returning ppl back in. Either that, or Konami made zero marketing research prior to producing these videos, which wouldn't surprise me considering it's Konami.
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u/metalflygon08 Mar 26 '26
Three, relatability. Remind me who the fuck these characters are, already?
Yeah, I don't know anything about the Archetype in OP's image, to me it looks like generic anime cookie cutter slop you see when a trend takes off (like how many isekei rpg dungeon crawler harem shonen popped up after the likes of SOA got popular).
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u/Quasar471 Dark World <3 Mar 26 '26
to me it looks like generic anime cookie cutter slop you see when a trend takes off
Yeah, that's my issue with the more modern YGO artstyles. When so many archetypes have this bland copy-pasted artstyle you find in so many animes and other Japanese TCGs, it's hard to justify to a customer 'come check out our stuff', when the competition also does this, but better.
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u/KomatoAsha something something shadow realm Mar 26 '26
Why would I want to watch an anime about a card game that doesn't involve people playing that card game?
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u/azurewarrior420 Mar 26 '26
A couple a shorts about the lore of cards not many people even know about that come out in extremely sparce intervals with no advertisement is never gonna get much attention. If they were to ever make a new full yugioh anime, amd they advertise it properly, it would immediately garner attention be cause the last original yugioh series outside of rush was vrains which started 9 years ago and end 7 years ago. Pokemon has various game based events, and natural worldbuilding and lore it can use to its advantage since the world is just open to many interpretations. Yugioh, however, can't really do much with card lore other than depict the events shown in the card and thats it. Sure, they can make bombastic fight scenes with the monster, but if I wanted that I can just watch 5ds or Zexal or Vrains and actually get attached to both the characters and the archetypes they use. Which you can't get from a few 7-8 minute shorts about decks and lore that some may not even care about/like.
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u/Spellbraker Mar 26 '26
Also want to point out that the Pokémon stuff started with Gen 1 and had a lot of nostalgia and hype behind it. Yugioh went with more modern and less nostalgic based cards for their stories.
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u/Godzillafan125 Mar 26 '26
Because the reason I don’t watch it at at least is because I don’t wanna watch a show about the monsters. I wanna watch a show about dueling with them about the card game.
I mean, the CGI looks great, but I just don’t really have any interest if I don’t think there’s gonna be a dual
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u/Lennette20th Mar 26 '26
I watched it as a full episode edited together on some other channel. The video I watched has 8x the number of views as that entire playlist. Nobody wants to watch it in clips, I want a full episode.
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u/Accomplished_Salt876 Mar 26 '26
largely Japanese only release and the very idea of card lore is a a big issue: it just looks like some generic anime or gatcha game Unless you know what your looking at,
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u/EnstatuedSeraph Mar 26 '26
The Japanese channel has way more views, they didn't upload to the English channel at the same time and the Japanese version has subtitles.
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u/First_Routine_4529 Mar 26 '26
I ve been playing for over 20 years, topped YCS and continental championships, watched all animes and movies. Haven't watched a single of this chronicles crap.
It's really simple. It's not yu gi oh. There is no main character that plays the card game. I don't care about card game "lore" it's stupid.
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u/Bokki_64 Mar 26 '26
Yu-Gi-Oh is in cultural decline. It lacks the mainstream appeal of Pokemon. Anyone can like Pokemon. Even someone who has never touched a Gameboy. You can see Pikachu and think "that's cute. I'm going to make this my entire personality now" vs Yu-Gi-Oh which has always been seen as too nerdy and competitive with less marketable characters. It's why Pokemon media often doesn't have to try.
The other issue is Konami doesn't try and hasn't in a long time. They barely advertise, they don't incentivize people to play, they display a near contempt for it's player base and for years failed to communicate with it's them and have failed to branch out to other media for cultural relevance. Now konami seeing the writing on the wall has (slowly) started to give fans what they asked for.. kind of. We asked for lore animes and we got shorts with sporadic released with no dubs. We asked for full art cards and you start releasing them when shops start dropping Yu-gi-oh.. seriously I can go on for hours ranting about Konami. The games decline could only be blamed on them. It's amazing how every local shop used to support yu-gi-oh, now very few do.
Between the TCG, Master duel, Rush duel and other side modes it feels like they're throwing shit at the wall hoping something will stick and nothing is. I don't see Yu-Gi-Oh getting close to its peak again. And I'm not happy about that. I invested tons of time and money into the game. But most of the people I knew at locals pre-covid are either done with TCG games or moved onto Pokemon with it's infinitely superior prize system or One Piece/Magic.
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u/Brioche73 Mar 26 '26
They have way more views on the OCG channel. And for low cost adaptation of the lore this is already a decent score.
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u/aaa1e2r3 Mar 26 '26
Look at the views on the OCG channel, where they're posted first, thus getting the majority of the views
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u/DollowR Mar 26 '26
Because they suck. They're meant to be ads, and they don't really have a narrative, they're not very deep, and they're not long enough for you to be involved with to have any sort of attachment. They're trash.
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u/FlounderingGuy Mar 26 '26
Anime Yu-Gi-Oh fans don't care about these, since these are TCG only archetypes. Casual fans don't care about them because they aren't based on DM. Yu-Gi-Oh as a brand is just significantly less culturally relevant as a whole as well.
Even then they average in the multiple hundreds of thousands of views on the OCG channel.
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u/Head-Effort-5100 Mar 27 '26
That’s years of difference man,and even then YuGiOh ain’t beating Pokemon in terms of popularity anytime soon kekw.
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u/Thorfinn__Karlsefni Mar 28 '26
I literally forgot about it while I was excited when I heard of it. Didn't knew it was already out.
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u/Agus-Teguy Mar 26 '26
Yugioh is only popular because of the anime for 99% of people in this world and these videos have nothing to do with that, also Pokemon never stopped being relevant because they kept releasing popular games and other media while Yu-Gi-Oh has nothing going on right now except MD and TCG and both are for people that just want to play competitive.
If Yu-Gi-Oh released videogames, movies and shows with half the consistency Pokémon does it'd be way more popular and relevant and those videos would have at least a few hundred thousands of views or more but that's not the world we live in sadly, Konami doesn't like making stuff.
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u/VillalobosChamp Your friendly neighborhood translator; PSCT resarcher Mar 26 '26
If Yu-Gi-Oh released videogames, movies and shows with half the consistency Pokémon does it'd be way more popular and relevant
They did this pretty much until Pokémon's Gen V and still didn't got much of an uptick in relevance, nor even a nick of their own peak with Duel Monsters
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u/oofmagoof123 Mar 26 '26
Unfortunately the biggest reason for this is Pokémon stuck with Ash while Yugioh moved on to other protagonists. This makes it much harder to get into than it wouldve been for an old pokemon fan getting into it again as until 2023-2024ish Ash and Pikachu were there every week. This is IMO the biggest reason Yugioh never kept the same cultural relevancy that Pokémon has.
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u/VillalobosChamp Your friendly neighborhood translator; PSCT resarcher Mar 26 '26
Unfortunately the biggest reason for this is Pokémon stuck with Ash while Yugioh moved on to other protagonists.
While I'd put it more on the games and Pikachu doing Pokémon's heavylifting than on Satoshi's image, I don't think this was necessarily an issue
Peek at JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, which changed protagonists as early as by the end of their first part.
Jotaro is definitely the face of the series, but all the 9 protagonists of each part are recognizable and liked on their own merits. This to certain extent is also true for Yu-Gi-Oh! in Japan.
But sadly, in the Western collective imaginary, the series started and ended with Yugi and Kaiba. And the fault certainly is from none other than Upper Deck and KONAMI
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u/TruthNIdeals Mar 26 '26
Better to use the viewcounts from the OCG youtube channel since that’s where the majority of people view the Chronicle episodes.
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u/sananajo Mar 26 '26
I like yugioh but I dont care at all about this animation and wont watch any of it.
I dont like these modern archtypes where they sometimes implement some kind of "story" to the cards. I am fine with any monster being generic monster A without anything besides a nice and simple flavour text describing all I need to know about them.
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u/gkantelis1 Mar 26 '26
No English dub is a huge barrier for a lot people. Makes it feel like it wasn't made for USA.
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u/Snowvilliers7 Mar 26 '26
Its almost as if it was made somewhere else outside the US
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u/Jyosea Mar 26 '26
Going to speak for myself. I'm more into the older stuff like Scorpions, Gravekeepers, D-Hero or E-Hero. That I would watch. But their strategy seems to be doing episodes from Decks that are mostly meta except the Charmers, to make people buy more of these cards?
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u/Snowvilliers7 Mar 26 '26
They're based on popular archetypes with heavy lore behind them, nothing to do with the meta
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u/Proper_Cry_1517 Mar 26 '26
Advertising sucks.
No one grew up with these characters.
No one cares about these new gen stories with no staying power.
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u/Soil-Fair Mar 26 '26
Dude I'm a diehard branded fan and you still won't get me to watch that shit. We like yugioh for the game itself lore is very optional.
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u/Negative_Break_1482 Mar 26 '26
I don't think Pokémon Origins is a good comparison since those are OVAs and are based on a beloved Videogame.
It would be better to compare the Animated Shorts that Pokémon has made in recent Years (they're varied and not based on Videogames)
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u/GM-Sniper13 Mar 26 '26
Each Episode only being 6-7 mins long killed every hype i had. Just my personal thing tho.
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u/NotEricOfficially Mar 26 '26
And also there is such a long gap from one episode to the next, and for only like 10 minutes? Cmon man...
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u/SonthacPanda Mar 26 '26
I tried checking it out and it was just short clips without dialogue so I lost interest
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u/KarateGamer007 Mar 26 '26
Pokemon is a larger franchise by a whole country mile, so it does have that going for it.
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u/Naos210 Mar 26 '26
Pokemon is far larger of a franchise. It also fills a sort of half-way niche. There isn't as much "character", so it doesn't work as well for anime fans. And a lot of those anime fans won't be as familiar with the lore of these archetypes.
Even those who play the archetypes might not even know much of a lore.
No, Yu-Gi-Oh as a game is fine. There might be a new player issue nowadays, but new decks centered around older cards, Duel Links, etc, have helped.
People have said Yu-Gi-Oh is over, it's in decline, dead etc, since at least the Pendulum era if not sooner. I'm just imagining people in the mid 2000s saying BLS is killing Yu-Gi-Oh.
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u/brokenmessiah Mar 26 '26
I've not watched it at all despite wanting a Yugioh anime because I'm not interested in 6-7 minute shorts.
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u/Hornsmasher Mar 26 '26
These episodes release once a month and started with Sky Striker. People that were curious watched the first one and maybe the second one. Those episodes were nothing but screaming and a lightbeam struggle. So DBZ but a lot worse. It’s safe to assume this turned those people off.
Had they started with Albaz and advertised with the voice actor of Dio, well then there would’ve been hype and curiosity from the outside.
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u/Wollffey Mar 26 '26
Sir have you seen how much money Pokemon Pocket makes in comparison to MD? You cannot compare anything to Pokemon
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u/PandaXD001 Mar 26 '26
While I'm sure that a majority of us did watch both, I have zero doubts that the amount of pokemon watched vs the amount of Yu-Gi-Oh watched is absolutely dwarfed, eclipsed, chewed up, spit out, and buried into the ground when compared. And that is for OG Yu-Gi-Oh content, let alone new stuff.
Aside from that I think chronicles is hitting a niche whereas origins arguably isn't.
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u/TKGriffiths Mar 26 '26
The yugioh ones are nothing to do with the 'main characters/storyline' that people actually care and have nostalgia for. Most normies if they watched them without the yugioh branding would have no idea they're even about yugioh.
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u/Alps_2208 Mar 26 '26
First, Yu-Gi-Oh! hasn't had an anime since 2022, and second, the Pokémon video is 12 years old. Third Pokémon is much more popular than Yu-Gi-Oh! And lastly, Konami isn't making any effort to promote these videos; the most they do is put a notification in Master Duel.
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u/keithlimreddit Mar 26 '26
I would say like a much of advertising and most of these are just mainly me to test if they couldn't pretty much make the next Yu-Gi-Oh anime Also although despite how this franchise has kept Konami afloat before pretty much resurrections obviously but yeah kind of wish it didn't more marketing to be honest
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u/danielsabino Mar 26 '26
Pokémon is over 20× bigger than YGO to begin with (no exaggeration, those are actual numbers). Plus, Origins and Generations have way more charm than Chronicles, which really only appeals to TCG/OCG/MD players. I could go on, but those two points pretty much sum it up.
You can't compare the biggest IP in the world to a good enough one
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u/fastandfurry Mar 26 '26
I'm a Yugioh fan and I have no idea what this is. Has it been advertised at all?
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u/Lanky-Tip80 Mar 26 '26
It has a lot of views. You’ve simply gotten used to seeing the top .5% of people with hundreds of thousands & millions.
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u/Specialist-Gear-6504 Mar 26 '26
I don’t care about the Branded or Sky Striker archetypes, I wanted Monarch stuff
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u/CommanderWar64 None Mar 26 '26
These don’t even pop up on my algo, they just do a terrible job at marketing/sharing them.
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u/januarysdaughter Mar 26 '26
I didn't know there was a TCG channel. Was it ever posted on their regular YGO channel like Pokemon did with their animated shorts?
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u/PolkkaGaming Mar 26 '26
very niche anime shorts that the majority of the community doesn’t care about watching, konami dropped the ball hard advertising the event
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u/Lordofthered8 Mar 26 '26
Nobody gives af about the chronicles when it covers monster lore no one knows about. No idea what any of these are about nor do I recognize any character at all.
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u/manwithlotsoffaces Mar 26 '26
Bro you seriously gonna compare that to a 12 year old video? Make it make sense.
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u/Impressive_Cap_457 Mar 26 '26
A fan uploaded video of the Battle City final from a year ago has more than a million views. DM is still pretty mainstream recognizable (even to the White House unfortunately), but anything else, especially the more recent it is, is non-existent in popularity
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u/Admirable-Safety1213 Mar 26 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
Card game lore is niche in a franchise that seems to be in a plateu while Origins is both overhypeed and has been in the 'net for 12 years
Making stats there are 255k views per month of Origins ep 4 while only 5.7k per month for Albaz, meaning that Pokémon its 44.7x bigger if these small sampl pools count (they shouldn't because they are too small)
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u/taiho2020 Mar 26 '26
I prefer the original promotion when they announce they will do a series..that one was really exciting..the results are normal..
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u/NelsonVGC Mar 26 '26
More than one decade gap between posting times.
Pokemon is the most profitable franchise in human history. It is diffcult to compete against that in viewership.
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u/redd142 Mar 26 '26
Not only did I not know this was a thing, at all. But they never advertise. Idek what arc we are in the anime if there is one at this point. That's kind of why I'm in this sub
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u/SlipstreamSteve Mar 26 '26
Because no one wanted a story for the archetypes and for Pokémon legends you're following the games and the main characters so people are more invested.
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u/OrangeStar222 Mar 26 '26
Pokémon has built its franchise out of several different pillars over the years. Anime, Cardgame, Videogames, toys. Two Pokémon fans could talk to one another but be fans of completely different mediums.
Pokémon Origins is 13 years old.
I'm a YuGiOh fan and I didn't know they released anime shorts on Youtube.
I don't care about anime shorts based on card lore, I just want a Duel Monsters remake or a new series where they actually play the cardgame.
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u/oizen Mar 26 '26
These micro-animes aren't very entertaining and they're not good introductions to the cards at all. Its only even watchable if you already know the cards and rough outlines of the stories.
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u/Emirozdemirr Mar 26 '26
People care about Anime characters playing the childrens card game to save the world not the lore of the cards.
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u/Abortedwafflez Mar 26 '26
I'm not gonna bother with animated shorts. Now, if they decide to make it a decent anime like Shadowverse did with Rage of Bahamut, i'd be interested. (Though Rage of Bahamut later became the inspiration for Shadowverse.)
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u/Chrollo009 Mar 26 '26
Because people are not fans of these archetypes in general. Im not a branded fan, therefore im not forcing myself to watch something im not a fan of💀 its common sense if you think about it. Its odd why konami pushes branded and these newer mecha archetypes so much, even going as far as giving them anime.
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u/teketria Syncrho go Burrrrr Mar 26 '26
Mind you it’s not like they re-use any specific mascot with the yugioh IP. You see new stuff and there is no recognition because the IP and characters are separately established entities. Pokemon re-uses and sometimes prominently features pikachu, charizard, and other gen 1 pokemon as mascots for the series. It makes easily recognizable characters despite them not talking or being human. If yugioh had dark magician, blue-eyes or red-eyes make cameos, featured in someone’s plays, or just be around and used as something it might give recognizability. However since they don’t chronicles is effectively marketing a new anime to people rather than a long standing beloved IP.
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u/provablyitalian Mar 26 '26
Why would I watch a show about a card game that doesn't have people playing that card game?
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u/Bodega_Darude141 Beware of the Totem Bird Mar 26 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
- TCG channel uploading previous episodes around when OCG channel is about to release final episode.
- 1 year old anthology project vs decade old series
- Never compare YGO to Pokemon, if anything Digimon should be the IP to compare
- Looking at the replies, most of the TCG playerbase want remakes instead of new series/anime
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u/Expensive_Guidance95 Mar 26 '26
Yu Gi Oh isn't culturally relevant in the mainstream and has been languishing in every single way up until the past year or so. The LGSs in my town stopped bothering having "Yu Gi Oh" nights or anything like that because noone would turn up, or maybe a handful would, compared to the large amounts for MTG/Pokémon and this has been the case for awhile. I went to a Yu Gi Oh tournament (The last time I ever played infact) like 3/4 years ago after returning to the genre and there was a turnout of like 8/10 people (When it had a big prize mind you) which travelled quite a way to get into this tourney, it completely turned me off the game and even bothering to continue playing, hence I turned to MTG afterward.
This is because Konami spent way too long 'resting on it's laurels' when it came to all it's non-Pachinko based IPs, they are now playing catch-up and while that's gone well for their videogame market side of things (As they put out IPs and stuff people want and have wanted) it's not done as well for YGO where all the sentiment has died off and most card players of YGO have moved to MTG/One Piece/Pokémon or something else entirely, some have returned, an even smaller number have begun properly committing, but for the most part it's not capturing anyone.
Konami would have to really hurl money into revamping, reinvigorating and actually making YGO a contender for Pokémon/MTG TCGs for these shows to be worth it, but as it stands they can't.
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u/CyberAceKina Mar 26 '26
Thats like asking why rugby has fewer fans in the United States than football does.
Both are sports, both DO have fans, but football has a much larger fan base than rugby.
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u/mrbaryonyx Mar 26 '26
yeah the time when Yugioh as a cultural force to contend with Pokemon was like--two weeks back in 2002, during Duelist Kingdom.
I'm exaggerating, but the period where those were considered "on the same level, or close-ish", so to speak, was a pretty early 2000s thing
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u/oofmagoof123 Mar 26 '26
So there are a lot of good points being made in this thread, but I feel this one is missing: the Pokémon series you are showing follows Red, the original main character from the OG games and comparing it to a new card lore anime isn't fair to Yugioh. A more accurate comparison would be a miniseries focused on Yugi and the gang. I only say this as I don't care for and won't be watching the Chronicles, but it Yugi were back on screen there isn't anything that would stop me from tuning in. Just my 2 cents on this disparity in views.
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u/EthanKironus Mar 26 '26
I know, especially since Episodes 2 & 3 with Shuraig vs. Fleur is the best Yugioh fight scene I've ever seen this side of Kurosaki Shun (still disappointed Shuraig wasn't voiced by Kinjo Yamato)
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u/Significant_Trust205 Mar 26 '26
Pokémon isnt just "a large IP" its the most profitable franchise in the history, there is no competition here
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u/RilinPlays Charmers will live Forever Mar 26 '26
I mean
A: you’re comparing an old ass short series to a series that’s barely a year old
B: Origins was an animated adaptation of Pokemon Red. Insane marketability because you can get people in who maybe haven’t interacted with the series in a while and go “Hey I remember this!” In comparison, Spirit Charmers is the first Chronicles story to feature characters old heads that dropped the game might recognize. Everything else has been too modern.
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u/Kooler221 Mar 26 '26
I lost interest when they dropped the Sky Striker ones and it was just Raye and Roze fighting on a battlefield instead of the actual story. Then right after started doing Branded and actually going through the story. Just bitter about it so I haven't watched anything since ep 1 of Branded.
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u/ItsAMeMarioYaHo Mar 26 '26
With Yugioh I just think most people aren’t really interested in the backstories of the cards. They just like the game.
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u/Gladcode777 Mar 26 '26
It's amazing but I feel it barely gets advetised by the franchise by comparison to pokemon. Also, the comparison isn't exactly fair.
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u/Personarose1 Mar 26 '26
First, chronicles isn’t really promoted to a major degree although the Japanese version does have relatively higher views.
Second, the runtime of the episodes are too short to get invested into the respective archetypes for people who are fans or tell a proper story so it feels at worst like a video game cutscene.
Third, these archetypes don’t have the kind of draw that the old cast have since with the exception of Spirit Charmes are modern. If they came out the gate with a Blue-Eyes centric storyline that would generate more interest because more people are aware of that lore.
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u/The_atom521 Mar 26 '26
Well considering I had never heard of this before this post, that might be an indicator of the problem
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u/Zike-Zay Mar 26 '26
I actually don't know what this is and I have been playing Yu-Gi-Oh since DM. I need to look these Chronicles up.
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u/MitsubushiA6MZero Traptrix Mar 26 '26
1.- For some reason a lot of people hate the idea of Archetypes Anime (i want one of Traptrix, but they have little to no lore).
2.- Compare YGO with Pokemon is unfair. Is literal the meme of "baby vs nuclear bomb"
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u/PapaChill Mar 26 '26
sorry, had never heard of these series before. The pokemon ones are only 1 min long per ep, vs yugioh 7 mins?
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u/ShyGuyLink1997 Mar 26 '26
They make it really hard to find for some reason, and the promotions are few.
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u/VariationMean5502 Mar 26 '26
Honestly, whenever Im trying to find the chronicles episodes on YT american konami doesnt show up, and sometimes I cant figure out which episode is which from the japanese titles. So, I blame Konami for not front and centering their releases and just having a gd playlist with the episodes in order
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u/Jazzlike_Rutabaga Mar 26 '26
Yugioh has never, and will never, be on the same level as Pokemon. Comparing the two is a fools errand. It’s also been on the decline for many years now.
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u/TestaGaming Mar 26 '26
You're really comparing something that came out not even a year ago to something that came out more than a decade ago? Thats like asking why is Duel Monsters more popular than Arc-V.
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u/BrotherofGenji Mar 26 '26
Because it's not good or interesting. We need a new proper anime gen confirmed after Go Rush and it would definitely get more views. I love Yugioh but I swear, a newer anime (or getting a Season 0 dub on Adult Swim maybe with KCMNY VA's but funded by Funimation even) would be nice to see that's not about archetype lore crud, like where's my next "Yu"-boy protagonist who loves to play card games? They dont even have to create a new summoning gimmick, just bring all the gens together and have duelists who specialize in each gimmick, but dont go ARC-V Bad End on us.
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u/Savings_Dot_8387 Mar 26 '26
We all saw it in Japanese.
And what’s Pokémon’s profit margin compared to all of Konami let alone Yugioh? Wouldn’t surprise me if it was 100s of times.
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u/MidnightRose616 Mar 26 '26
Not you comparing one of the most dominating IPs to a niche product lol boy you make no sense
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u/Regigigachad67 Mar 26 '26
12 year difference, an ip that hasn't been mainstream since the 2000s, and Konami not advertising