Memes / Yu-Gi-Oh!

"I fail to see the problem."

Memes for the original series Yu-Gi-Oh! Those pertaining to other series can be entered into their own series subpages.

Spinoffs with their own pages:

• Yu-Gi-Oh! GX
• Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds
• Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL
• Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
• Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS

Anime

Duel Monsters Anime

• "You've activated my trap card!" is probably the series's biggest.
• "It's time to D-D-DD-DDDDDD-DUEL" from the dub's intro is another popular one.
• Exaggerated facial expressions are the basis of many a meme.
  • Kaiba's chin from episode 200. Heck, just the episode itself for its Off-Model animation.
  • Dark Marik's crazy facial expressions, especially his infamous Nightmare Face at the end of episode 140. Characters from later series eventually do the same.
  • Joey's (and Tristan's, on the occasion Joey was unconscious) "Creepy Chin" facial expressions in the anime. The facial expressions in question were inspired by Japanese wrestler Antonio Inoki, who's well known for having a large chin.
• AIBOOOOO! ^ExplanationYugi's soul is stolen during the DOMA arc, and it was partially the Pharaoh's fault. The Pharaoh...does not take it well. The scene where he screamed "AIBOOOOOO!" [his nickname for Yugi, meaning 'partner'] rapidly became a meme.
  • "IT SHOULD'VE BEEN ME, NOT HIM! IT'S NOT FAIR!" ^ExplanationThe English dub version of the aforementioned scene. This has become used in certain videos in order to show envy/jealousy towards someone else's fortunate situation, especially if it's something sexual the user would enjoy even if the character doesn't. Ironically, the actual context of the line is about the Pharoah referring to an unfortunate situation he feels he deserved more than Yugi. (Losing his soul to the Seal of Orichalcos after the Pharoah himself played the card)
• In Japan, the green hairstyle of Seto (first anime only) and Noah is compared with and even referred to as a cabbage. A few examples ...
• What does Pot of Greed do again? ^ExplanationPot of Greed is an iconic card and was a staple before its ban in the real life card game, so many different characters in Duel Monsters and GX have it in their decks. It's also one of the most simple cards in the game (its effect text, verbatim, is: "Draw 2 cards."), but the series' tendency to explain the effects of most every card played quickly made it descend into As You Know territory. Demonstrated in this video. Fans like to joke that nobody actually knows what the card does as a result.
  • Ascended as one of the subscription emotes for the Twitch Marathon is the artwork of Pot of Greed.
  • Then, in one of Konami's scripted duels between Jaden and Aster, after Jaden uses Pot of Greed and explains the effect, Aster shouts "THAT'S what it does! I had NO IDEA!"
• According to the Japanese fandom, the Pharaoh is pretty much obsessed with silver.
• A 4chan frequenter had a habit of making "If my post number ends in 5" bets accompanied by pictures of Dark Yugi from Season Zero and consistently winning (or if it were funnier, losing). He was then dubbed the "King of GETs. Apparently when they meant "King of Games", that includes forum games.
• SAY GOOD-BYE TO EXODIAAAAAAAAAAA! ^ExplanationA reference to what Insector Haga/Weevil Underwood said when throwing the five Exodia cards off the boat to Duelist Kingdom
• "The Dignity of the Retarded" ^Explanation An infamous mistranslation of Heart of the Underdog from the Hong Kong subs.
• "DORO! MONSUTA KAADO!!!" ^ExplanationFrom the anime, during a Curb-Stomp Battle between Yugi and Weevil, via the Japanese dub's use of Gratuitous English.
  • From the same episode, after Anzu stops Yugi from continuing his move long after he defeated Haga, his "HANASE!" ("Let me go!") is stylized on the comments for this clip on YouTube as "HA☆NA☆SE".
• Enemy Controller, along with characters shouting commands, has become the basis of a few dance mix videos.
• Seto Kaiba, the most autistic man in the universe.^ExplanationAfter Yu-Gi-Oh! The Dark Side of Dimensions, /a/ concluded that his obsessive nature, genius intellect, and blunt personality were all signs of Autism, and similarly concluded that his Awesome Ego meant that he had made it into a superpower.
• 'Duel me Yugi' ^ExplanationKaiba constantly hounding Yami Yugi for a duel, up to trying to resurrect him in Darkside of Dimensions, though he doesn't say this actual line in the show much.
• "Damn it Yugi, that's why nobody wants to play with you!" ^ExplanationIn reference to the Deus ex Machina that favors Yugi, a popular Spanish meme has him going against a lot of other characters from other franchises and "cheating" against them, and they complain in response.
• "As President of Kaiba Corp, I declare this invalid!" ^ExplanationAn altered version of the line Kaiba says when he suddenly shows up to disqualify Zigfried from the KC Grand Championship (the original line was "I declare this match invalid!"), originating from the "Kaiba Screws the Rules" series of YouTube Poop videos. In the fandom, he's such a Memetic Badass that he can negate anything just because he's Seto Kaiba. It also serves as a "canon" variation of Abridged Kaiba's Screw the Rules, I Have Money!)
• Next episode, Jonouchi dies! ^ExplanationAfter the On the Next narrator (Anzu) begging Jonouchi to survive and win the duel, before announcing the aforementioned title. The Japanese fandom loves to poke fun about it by making fake episode preview for other characters.
• "EXODIA IT'S NOT POSSIBLE"^ExplanationA relative newcomer from the Fountain of Memes that is the (second series) anime's pilot, but fast-growing.
  • In a variation, Kaiba's Defeat (usually "adapted" as a four-screencap set) has become its own template for all kinds of online comebacks.
• "I can still hear his voice..." "gay gay homosexual gay" ^ExplanationA picture◊ of Yugi and Yami Yugi that went viral, somehow. Many people took to replacing the two characters with characters from other fandoms.
• Tomato Subs.^ExplanationEpisode 30 of Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL is a famously oddball one, being focused on a guy obsessed with tomatoes and an I Do Not Like Green Eggs and Ham plot. Because of this, it's fairly common to take the subs from the episode and transplant them into other episodes, particularly dramatic ones. It got even more traction in the ARC-V fandom, due to it also boasting a tomato-related meme.
• Fandom gets a lot of mileage out of "deck" being similar to a slang term for male genitalia, and how often the mostly male characters throughout the series will compare their decks and boast about the superiority of their deck.
• "Your X doesn't deserve a spot in my Y, but it might make a good coaster for my drink!" ^ExplanationOne of Espa Roba’s lines in the dub, popularized by The Abridged Series.
• "That's right, I'll sacrifice God!"^ExplanationTaken from the one scene where Kaiba tributes his Obelisk for a game-winning play against Ishizu. The line, out of context, can be invoked whenever someone willingly enters Fandom Heresy or Fandom-Enraging Misconception territory. Also used by Master Duel players who dismantle high-rarity cards from archetypes they're not using (like the Egyptian Gods) to get the resources to build their own deck.
• The usage of Duel Disk from Duel Monsters to engage a duel is widely popular.
• "Shadow Realm" has become a go-to nickname in other fandoms for their series' darkness-themed Hell dimensions. Similarly, "Sent to the Shadow Realm" as a Deadly Euphemism for "Go to Hell."

Twitch Marathon Chat Memes

On October 23, 2017, Twitch began a marathon of the entire original series. Much like Twitch Plays Pokémon and the RWBY marathon before it, these were bound to happen.

• BANNED ^ExplanationWhenever someone uses a card that is or was on the Ban List,
• VAC ^ExplanationWhenever any character cheats, such as Pegasus using the Millennium Eye or Bandit Keith using 7 Completed from his wristbands.
• REEEEEEEEEEEEEEE ^ExplanationHappens whenever an ad break occurs. This eventually spawned many clones that are too numerous to list.
• SEASON 1 RULES LUL ^ExplanationHappens whenever someone summons a 5 star or higher monster without an offering or when a monster wins by the "type advantage" rules used in the video games.
• Using proper card names ^ExplanationIn Season 1, the names of many cards are slightly different due to the actual card game not having been localized yet.
• HAZAMA ^ExplanationDuring the first Virtual World arc, the Witty Phantom is dressed in a trenchcoat and fedora. People instantly made the connection, especially those who watched the RWBY marathon and were referencing BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle.
  • FEDORA PEGASUS ^ExplanationIn-universe, the Witty Phantom's personality is based on Pegasus, and he even shares the same voice actor. Viewers instantly made the connection.
• LINK ^ExplanationUsed whenever Celtic Guardian is summoned.
  • ZELDA ^ExplanationOriginally used whenever Mystical Elf was summoned, but as she became less prominent in the series it started getting used sarcastically in the same manner as the Celtic Guardian meme.
  • HEY! LISTEN! ^ExplanationViewers instantly made the connection between the fairy from the first Virtual World arc and Navi from OoT
• KIDS SHOW ^ExplanationUsed whenever any implications of death or worse are made.
• ACTUAL MURDER ^ExplanationUsed whenever a character loses a Shadow Game.
• 18+ ^ExplanationUsed whenever any content that could be considered sexually suggestive yet is somehow innocent enough or is plot relevant to what is labeled as a kids' show occurs.
• CENSORED LUL ^ExplanationIt's a 4Kids show. Thanks to Twitch chat, noting scenes that were edited or cut was bound to happen.
• RARE CARD ^ExplanationUsed sarcastically whenever any card that hasn't actually been released in the real game is used.
• ?????????? ^ExplanationSimilar to the Season 1 rules meme, during Battle City there are many instances where despite the change in rule format there are many cards that do not operate in the same manner as their real life counterparts, such as having effects or resistances that don't exist in the actual card game. Thus, the question marks are used to express visible confusion.
• RESET ^ExplanationAfter airing 16 episodes, the stream resets from the first episode shown in the set, in cycles of 3 repetitions per day. Also used sarcastically whenever the next set of episodes is shown.
• MADA MADA ^ExplanationDuring the Dungeon Dice Monsters episodes, this was used whenever Yugi's Strike Ninja did anything. Afterwards, it was used whenever Kaiba tossed one of his cards dramatically, as it looks like he's throwing a shuriken.
  • I NEED HEALING ^ExplanationUsed whenever any ninja-esque monster is destroyed.
• OH YES ^ExplanationA very common Phrase Catcher in the dub, used whenever anyone says "OH NO".
  • I JUST DID ^ExplanationAnother common one, used whenever someone says something to the effect of "YOU CAN'T DO THAT". Originally said by Seto Kaiba after fusing the Fang of Critas with Crush Card virus. ("You can't fuse a monster with a trap card!" "I JUST DID.")
• BILLIONS/TRILLIONS DEAD ^ExplanationDuring the Battle City finals when Slifer and Obelisk Double KO'd each other destroying TV screens all over Domino, the unleashing of Duel Monsters upon Domino and the initial Leviathan attack in season 4. This reappeared from Twitch's earlier Power Rangers marathon
  • MILLIONS OF SOULS REVIVED ^ExplanationUpon the defeat of Leviathan and ensuing release of the souls collected by Dartz
• NOT MY MAI ^ExplanationIn Season 4, Mai's voice was changed. This phrase is used whenever a flashback involving Mai happens wherein her classic lines are redubbed.
  • NOT MY MOKUBA / SHUT UP NEW MOKUBA ^ExplanationIn Season 5, Mokuba got the same treatment.
• GERMAN PEGASUS/BUDGET PEGASUS ^ExplanationThe instant Siegfried was introduced, viewers instantly made the connection due to his extremely effeminate mannerisms and appearance.
  • HACKERMAN/GERMAN HACKERS/GERMAN SOMBRA ^ExplanationSiegfried's very first action is to hack Kaiba's computers. "Russian hacker" jokes were imminent.
• TOXIC ^ExplanationA Kaiba-exclusive meme, as his entire characterization is that of an edgy tryhard who makes it his goal in life to do nothing short of making his opponents hate him by crushing their spirits and then insulting them. Later also applied to Priest Seto when he started having ambitions of power and began targeting potential criminals to extract their monster spirits.
  • NOT TOXIC ^ExplanationUsed whenever Priest Seto does something contrary to what Kaiba would do.
• NOAH WHO? ^ExplanationUsed sarcastically in reference to Leon. He shares the same voice actor as Noah, and as soon as the duel between him and Yugi begins, his personality and tone immediately shifts to a more serious one, making him sound and act exactly like Noah. Both characters even fit the same archetype: forgotten scions of a rich family.
• DISNEY DECK ^ExplanationLeon's deck consists primarily of fairy tale cards. Disney built a reputation off of adapting fairy tales into animated movies.
  • DISNEYLAND ^ExplanationGolden Castle of Stromberg resembles a golden version of the theme park.
  • DISNEY ORICHALCOS/LITERALLY BANNED ^ExplanationGolden Castle of Stromberg is actually banned in-universe due to being a promo card, much like The Seal of Orichalcos in real life. Also like Orichalcos, it is completely indestructible and very, very broken. The only difference is instead of taking a duelist's soul, it takes Kaibacorp's, by completely destroying the company with a virus.
• NAZGUL ^ExplanationUsed to refer to the servants of Thief King Bakura, all of whom wear ominous Black Cloaks and so called because of Yami Bakura's affiliation with the Millennium Ring. Thus, they are Ringwraiths.
• JOJO REFERENCE ^ExplanationThe opening for the Memory World arc, considered the final season, features sound effects. The jokes were inevitable.
• QUICK MAFFS ^ExplanationMany of the characters tend to do math out loud when dueling, but since most cards deal with numbers ending with 00, the math tends to be easy and quick. Emerges again when Season 2 of 5D's happens as that show likes to actually show the math during Synchro Summons.

Card Game

Gameplay and Meta

• "MST Negates." ^ExplanationIn the good old days of Yu-Gi-Oh!, people were confused over the wording of some of the cards. Mystical Space Typhoon, a Quick-Play Spell Card that destroys Spell and Trap Cards, was one such case. When the players of the game realized that "destroy" is not the same as "negate" — specifically, that using it in response to an opponent's activated card to destroy it doesn't stop the effect from going off — and that new players continued to retain this misconception, a meme was born. That said, it does work on Continuous Spell/Traps and similar cards that need to stay on the field to resolve properly, on top of a few niche Normal Spells that also must do the same, so there is an ironic bit of truth to it that a new player isn't aware of.
  • "MST your backrow." "Concede." ^ExplanationInfernity was a popular and powerful deck whose many effects are dependent on you not having any cards in your hand. This led to some unscrupulous players illegally emptying their hand by setting their monsters into their backrow, and the opponent could not confirm if the backrow was indeed legal or not unless they tried to take it out, at which the cheater would concede immediately rather than get exposed. Funnily enough, this method of cheating would later become the central (legal) mechanic of the Artifact archetype.
  • Infernity Judge Call ^ExplanationWhile you can't get a judge to check your opponent's cards for no reason, you can do so if you reasonably suspect something's wrong. Given that people will rarely concede if you simply MST a face-down, calling a judge on Infernity players that scoop to backrow removal is, as the fanbase will have you believe, by far the most common instance of this.
• "After that Cubic shit, I'm not surprised." ^ExplanationA YouTuber named MegaCapitalG made a series of videos which are duels involving an archetype called "Cubics." Another video related to this, After That Cubic S*** I'm not surprised, came out and then became a meme, somehow.
• Children's card game ^ExplanationThe game's marketed towards children, but is so complex with so many intricacies involving Exact Words and Loophole Abuse, that mastery of the game is often beyond a child's capabilities. Made popular with The Abridged Series often using this label, and has since become sarcastic.
• "And with no monsters left on the field, I summon Dark Magician and attack for game." ^ExplanationFrom the advert for Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links. Dark Magician is a Level 7 monster, so requires 2 tributes, just so you know. Combined with the fact that the player summoning it had no monsters to tribute, and that this was from an official advert of the game, it quickly went memetic. (Note that the actual quote is "I summon Dark Magician and declare a direct attack.") Became ascended 6 years later in Duel Links after all versions of Yugi got a Skill that allows him to summon Dark Magician without Tributing, allowing you to do exactly what was shown in the ad.
• All I know what to do anymore is... ^ExplanationThe opening line for a copy-pasta. The source depicts how centralizing the Zoodiacs had been in their prime by humorously describing them taking over the user's life. The post is commonly edited to suit different metas of different card games.
• 1 Monster + 1 Monster: Full Orcust Combo ^ExplanationA two-panel meme, with the first image being two innocuous things and the second being something scary or dangerous. Meant to emphasize how any 2 monsters can lead into an incredibly strong board because of the powerful Knightmare and Orcust cards.
  • 1 Monster —> Full board of negates ^ExplanationA variation of the above, except with only one picture, as certain monster cards can start a long combo that ends with multiple negates and a bounce.
• At least it's good in Duel Links! ^ExplanationAnd similar variations are a common snark bait amongst the community. The joke is that since Duel Links doesn't have the same mechanics, and more importantly release timing that corresponds to the TCG, a lot of otherwise underwhelming cards are significantly better in Duel Links, often times reaching Game-Breaker level. This is often said with regards to an archetype that is fairly weak in the TCG being released in Duel Links far ahead of the Power Creep level of the game (due to the smaller deck size limit) resulting in an extremely dominant deck in Duel Links that does nothing of note in the TCG such as the Fur Hire archetype.
• Yu-Gi-Oh! players can't read ^ExplanationIt's rare for duelists in all the Yu-Gi-Oh anime to read an opponent's card for Rule of Drama, barring some exceptions. There's also an alarming amount of real-life players, usually new, overconfident, or inattentive, who never bother to read a card to see its effect, resulting in a lot of punishing misplays. More extreme cases of failed literacy, especially in Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel which automates and properly enforces all interactions, involve players failing to read their own cards or forget their lingering effects and complain of a "glitch" preventing them from making their intended play. Even worse, it's in the rules to let an opponent read a card from the field and graveyard to prevent You Didn't Ask scenarios.
• OriCa, which are fan-made cards. The artworks usually take the form of sexy lolis.
• *Insert new extra deck monster here* looks great! It's sure to see a lot of pla- oh wait, Links. ^ExplanationThis phrase, or at least some variant of it, was a common response to the leftover extra deck monsters that came from the ARC-V era being printed once it ended, with many pointing out that several of them would be useful if it weren't for the VRAINs era being just on the horizon at the time. Now has died out following the April 2020 Master Rule 4 revisions.
• "'Insert crappy archetype here' can be fixed if they get a good enough field spell." ^ExplanationKonami has made a habit of revisting old, near unplayable archetypes to give legacy support to. Nine times out of ten, this support includes a field spell, several of which are really overpowered in some way to make up for the rest of the archetype's lack of power. Naturally, this has caused players to proclaim that, no matter how unplayable the archetype is, a good enough field spell is the solve all solution to any and all of the archetypes weaknesses/lack of power. They seem to have realized this, with both the TCG and OCG Limiting the Field Spell searcher Terraforming and giving Ancient Fairy Dragon an errata to only be allowed to search Field Spells of a different name than ones that were destroyed to activate its effect, both of which limit the ability to spam multiple copies of a Field Spell.
• Konami hates Synchro ^ExplanationCommonly used when new Synchro/Tuner cards are released because of the seemingly "overbalanced" design of those in comparison with the blatantly broken design of Xyz and main-deck based cards. Not helped when the OCG banned Level Eater and limited PSY-Framelord Omega, basically killing what was the only meta relevant, and rogue tier at best, Synchro deck in the last few years. Any Pendulum Tuner monster is especially notable in this regard; without fail they tend to have restrictions. Has died down a bit in the SEVENS era due to the advent of several Synchro decks thanks to Crystron Halqifibrax during its time in the meta before its banning, along with other Synchro decks becoming meta without the use of Halq such as Swordsoul. The meme came back with the April 2024 banlist which saw Baronne de Fleur and Borreload Savage Dragon both becoming banned to hit Snake-Eye, which lead to many Synchro players complaining about being caught in the crossfire.
• The mythical turn four ^ExplanationBecause of the Power Creep from the ARC-V to VRAINs eras, the speed of the game has gotten so fast that it's rare for most games to last more than three turns. As such, many people have made jokes about the fourth turn being some sort of mythical event spoken of only in legend, and saying that you had a game last for four or more turns being the Yu-Gi-Oh! equivalent of saying that you saw Bigfoot.
• "Alright, I figured out how to fix the game. First, we ban all the Tuner monsters." ^ExplanationA quote from Rank10YGO. One of the most notorious cards in the game is Crystron Halqifibrax, who can Summon a Tuner from the Deck, leading infamous combos that leads to Link-Climbing to boss monsters by itself or Synchro Summoning many strong bosses. Rather than hit the problem card, Konami has banned five Tuners for being used by Halqifibrax, and thus this quote comes up every time a target is banned instead of Halqi. It would take until the October 2022 Forbidden/Limited list for Konami to actually ban Halq.
• X days since Volcanic Support ^ExplanationOne internet user, Payne96 (you can instantly recognize him if you spot a Captain Magma profile picture in the comments section of any Yugioh-related YouTube video), became somewhat a celebrity in the card game fandom for his dedication in waiting for Volcanics and quite vocal at that. Since Volcanics is a neglected archetype, based on monsters that are both FIRE attribute and the much rarer Pyro type, support for it is almost non-existent. Due to the meme, many players salute and even join in clamoring for the cards. Now anytime any FIRE support is shown and released without being Volcanic or Pyro support, expect his name to pop up. The meme finally came full circle with 2023's Duelist Pack: Duelists of Explosion OCG set, which announced new Volcanic cards after 1504 days of waiting.
  • X days since Generic Pyro Support ^ExplanationOver a year after the above meme, a card, Blaze Cannon, was released. It is technically Volcanic support, since it also counts as a "Blaze Accelerator" card, and Blaze Accelerator cards are a key part of Volcanic support. However the card itself has absolutely nothing to do with Volcanics, and instead is exclusively support for the god card "Winged Dragon of Ra". Other internet users noted how this card was almost deliberately made to troll Payne96, who then became a lot more specific in his count.
• PEND BEST DECK!^Explanation One of the catchphrases of Youtube channel Trif Gaming, who's known for his hammy personality and his dedication towards Pendulum decks.
  • Yo! I got banned from events, and here's how it went down.^Explanation Quote from the now infamous video of Trif Gaming banning from official Konami events. The video was memed so heavilly that it become a copypasta.
  • So I got banned from my old video I made, Where I jokingly made a video- I jokingly, JOKINGLY, told, the world, that, I stalled for time. I DIDN'T STALL FOR TIME! Anyone with a BRAIN, would realize it was a JOKE! It was a joke, that was- it was a good joke at the time! The new time rules were going on, "Oh, Ha Ha Cowboy for Game". It's a JOKE! It's just like Firewall Pass. It's a JOKE! ^Explanation The most iconic part of the Trif Gaming ban video.
• There's an art trend on Twitter known as the OCG Academy. The tag has artists drawing characters from the card game as if they were in high school. No one is safe from this trend, as seen by the many characters. If you want to search it, the tag is OCG学園.
• Secrets of Eternity was released in January 2015. This set introduced the Infernoids, a series of monsters that can Special Summon themselves to the field by banishing other Infernoids from either the hand or graveyard. Notable cards in set include Farfa, Malebranche of the Burning Abyss, Qliphort Monolith, Uni-Zombie, Nephe Shaddoll Fusion, and a card that would bolster Satellarknight to combat the Burning Abyss Shaddoll meta, Stellarknight Constellar Diamond. ^ExplanationThe introduction opening of Secrets of Eternity episode of Cimoooooooo's Progression Series. This particular intro was repeated on stream by MBT Yugioh during a react stream and have since been a popular copypasta, especially when the viewers used it as a Bait-and-Switch on MBT. Became acknowledged by Cimo himself when he reached this set in his History of Yu-Gi-Oh series, and he re-recorded this intro without changing a word (but you can hear him come close to laughing).
• Playing Yu-Gi-Oh! is scary ^ExplanationYu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel (among other non-horror games) is amusingly labeled as a Psychological Horror game on Steam, and is, as of this edit, the third most upvoted tag for the game on the Steam Store despite there being absolutely nothing remotely scary about it.
• The next Zoodiac.^ExplanationA phrase popularized by Youtube channel Lithium2300, who often claims that certain newly revealed archetypes that show promising results during playtesting will be just as strong, if not stronger, than Zoodiac, one of the most powerful archetypes in the game's history at full power. These claims are mostly laughed off due to all archetypes he's described as such, such as Magical Musket, ending up as either flops or So Okay, It's Average once they're released in the TCG.
• "Negate!"^ExplanationA popular soundbite from Youtube channel Dkayed that lampshades the ubiquity of the ability to negate opposing plays.
• "BA NEVER DIE!"^ExplanationThe Burning Abyss archetype is notorious for being a competitively strong archetype that has managed to evade getting hit by the banlist, seeing repeated occasional competitive play all the way from its debut and going into the start of the Link era.
  • "Farfa, why does the BA no die?'^ExplanationBurning Abyss Main Deck monsters destroy themselves if there's a non-Burning Abyss monster on the field.As explained in this video, there are a variety of ways for Burning Abyss to prevent this effect inside and outside the archetype, which leads to the deck being built with those prevention method in mind, which can be rather confusing., 'BA DIE? HOW"^ExplanationOn a similar note, there are just as many rulings involved with the Burning Abyss self-destruction effect that aren't readily obvious.
  • "Chain Link One, Cir Target Dante. Chain Link Two, Dante Target Cir'^ExplanationOriginally known as a part of the the Cir Dante loop. Cir Special Summons another Burning Abyss monster when it's sent to the GY, and Dante allows you to recycle another Burning Abyss monster from the GY to your hand when sent to they GY. This interaction creates a "loop" where Cir would repeatedly summon Dante to wall up with it, and when Dante goes down, it can recycle Cir to repeat the setup next turn if uninterrupted. The meme in question was done in response to Dante effect detaching Cir effect resolution.
  • 'It's been 8 Years.' ^ExplanationYoutuber and Twitch Streamer FarfaYGO is infamously known for going back to the deck every so often since its release on 2015.
• The Link-1 that searches the Field Spell^ExplanationSome of the most prominent Link-1 monsters are those that search their respective archetype's Field Spell (Such as Dark Infant @Ignister, Striker Dragon, Salamangreat Balelynx, among others), while often having one other inconsequential effect, with this card design often considered to be Boring, but Practical by the player base.
• FIRE monster with 200 DEF ^ExplanationRekindling is a Spell Card that is effectively Soul Charge but for an incredibly specific classification of monsters, being FIRE attribute monsters that have exactly 200 DEF. Unsurprisingly, since it was printed, Konami has printed monsters with this exact statline on a number of FIRE decks to make Rekindling playable and boost the viability of those decks, with Rekindling even seeing a stint on the banlist due to enabling a Shooting Quasar Dragon turbo strategy in Lavals. As of 2023, the similar "Level 1 FIRE" has been picking up steam due to the advent of Diabellestarr the Dark Witch and the Snake-Eye archetype, which can be played as a Level 1 FIRE monster support engine and can quickly get combo starters on the field.
• Just draw the out.^ExplanationA term often used to mock people who try justifying not banning a broken card because a niche counter exists; doubly so if there's no reliable way to search for it. In a more modern context, people have started using it to derisively refer to how handtrap-reliant the game has become, with several games being decided on your opening hand and its ability to disrupt the opponent.
• Ok guys, but with all due respect. How are you not prepared for mine at this point. It’s a little ridiculous to not have a well thought out plan when entering a tournament. ^ExplanationMystic Mine is an infamous field spell card that can negate monster effects from anywhere and prevent the opponent from attacking. With the modern game being largely centered around the use of monster effects, this card can basically shut down a game and is very painful to experience.
  
  The quote originated from a twitter post by popular competitive player Jesse Kotton, following the conclusion of YCS Rio. This called out players who want the Mine banned rather than choose to adjust their deck lists to counter Mystic Mine. This spawned discourse within the player base, between those who adapt to deal with the powerful card versus those who call for bans; the former camp brings up various "outs" that are commonly overlooked due to players overly focusing on putting out and dealing with monsters, while the latter camp sees the quote as dismissive of their frustration, boiling it down to "just draw the out".
• Cancelled by the Ghostrick Community ^ExplanationMBT's Ten Minute Testing video for Ghostricks brought him to the conclusion that Ghostricks are so gimmicky that almost all of their main deck monsters are unplayable, but they had a respectable Extra Deck lineup that made for a decent advantage engine and could end on a fearsome (if somewhat generic) boss monster. Cue his list which is a generic Rank 3 engine for the purpose of going into the few good cards of the archetype, while filling the rest of blank space with handtraps and a supplementary Adventure engine. This led to backlash where he got "cancelled by the (comically small) Ghostrick community," but also brought into question whether a Deck can be considered an [archetype] deck when a majority of it is just generic good stuff.
• Tear Zero^ExplanationThe Tearlament archetype combined with the unrelated Ishizu retrain cards created one of the few tier zero formats in late 2022, with some people referring to said format as "Tear Zero" because of it being a Punny Name.
• Waifu tax ^ExplanationSeveral archetypes are popular just because they feature cute girls in the card art. Naturally, demand will drive up their cost in the secondary market even if they are not as influential on the metagame (and if they are, the price tags go through the roof). Thus the "waifu tax", the additional cost to build a Deck featuring cute girls, especially when alternate art is involved.
• Dragon, Waifu, Robot ^ExplanationPlayers have noticed that the Deck Build Pack series introduces three archetypes that follow a trend (usually judging off the cover art) — one "waifu" archetype that features cute girls, one archetype that has a mechanical boss monster, and one archetype that has a dragon (or vaguely draconic) boss monster. For Deck Build Packs that deviate from this trend, players jokingly shoehorn the archetypes into the categories.
• The TCG increased the rarity of several Kashtira cards, leading to people calling the archetype Cashtira or Ca$htira.
• "Teach the fish to Synchro Summon!" ^ExplanationOriginates from MBT, first from a Ten Minute Testing focused on a Fish Synchro deck featuring Coelacanth. Came full circle with the Ghoti archetype, a Fish archetype focused on Synchro Summoning.
• Konami Backrooms ^ExplanationThe grand return of the Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championships in 2023 after its long absence due to the global pandemic had a few complaints about the apparent lack of production value, most notably the extremely lackluster venue for all of the matches outside of the grand finals - there was almost zero attempt at hiding the fact that participants were playing in what looked to be an incredibly plain-looking office space. Parallels to the Shadow Realm were made, claiming that those players who did not win their matches would be left to wander the Konami office hallways... forever.
• X died for Y's sins. ^ExplanationIf a deck or archetype dominates the format, Konami will sometimes ban a useful staple for that archetype to avoid hitting it directly, even if it also hurts the rogue decks that also rely on those staples.
• I'm about to get R-ACE-ist ^ExplanationThe Rescue-ACE archetype is often abbreviated R-ACE. Cue the punny nickname for its players.
• thank you! tiaraments strongest ^ExplanationA July 2023 "Road of the King" metagame report for the OCG showed the Tearlaments archetype putting up a whopping 15.8% of total tournament representation in the OCG despite nearly every Tearlaments card being on the banlist in some form. Content creator Farfa responded to the report on Twitter complaining about the OCG's refusal to give up the deck (stemming from the TCG's hatred of Tier 0 archetypes), to which reputable Japanese player and Master Duel World Championship finalist tasuku simply replied with the above quote, effectively giving him a verbal middle finger. This quickly became a copypasta touting the power of Tearlaments and the OCG's creativity and willingness to keep their waifu mermaids in the game.
• Tearlaments Merrli and Laundry Dragonmaid's rivalry in fan art. ^ExplanationBoth cards are level 2 monsters in their archetype that mill 3 cards on Summon, but Merrli has the fuse-from-Grave effect common to every Tearlaments monster. Still, Laundry Dragonmaid sees occasional play in Tearlaments Decks as an extra mill source, though she's definitely less functional than Merrli. Once Merrli got banned in Master Duel, Laundry Dragonmaid could often be seen laughing at the mermaid's plight.
• Oh my God, yes, I love Raye, I would die for Sky Striker Ace - Raye. This support card is going to change my life and it's going to be the best card ever. ^ExplanationJoshua Schmidt, Master Duel World champion, said this sarcastically in one clip regarding two fractions in the Yu-Gi-Oh! community when it comes to Sky Striker support: one either dismissive or fed up of its popularity, the other highly hyped by the new support card. The clip caught on and people started saying it ironically regarding everything Sky Striker.
  • Oh my God, yes, I love X, I would die for X. This Y is going to change my life and it's going to be the best Y ever. ^ExplanationAn ad-lib version of the meme, almost always used in the context of Joshua Schmidt.
• European Plants ^ExplanationThe Rikka Sunavalon deck, a synergistic pile of Plant monsters that also includes Aroma and Therion, has notably only ever seen top-level competitive success by way of Jessica Robinson, a British player who won WCQ Europe 2023 with the deck in an otherwise extremely hostile meta dominated by Kashtira and Dragon Link, and later went on to place Top 8 at the World Championships 2023. This is often blamed on the deck's extremely high difficulty level to pilot and highly unusual matchups, making the deck fairly mediocre when played by insufficiently skilled players. This, combined with the other Running Gag that European tournaments are "easier", has lead to players joking that any buff or nerf to Plants is a buff/nerf to Europe and/or Jessica specifically.
• "I SUMMON POT OF GREED TO DRAW 3 ADDITIONAL CARDS FROM MY DECK!" ^ExplanationA famous line from a VRChat video about a guy roleplaying Yami Yugi in a Yu-Gi-Oh!-themed world and blatantly cheating by "summoning" one copy of "Pot of Greed" multiple times and claiming it allows him to draw 3 cards.
• Special Summoning used to be Special^ExplanationIn earlier eras of the game, Special Summons were more uncommon, compared to the current state where most Decks can Special Summon upwards of five times per turn and are expected to use their Extra Deck from the get-go. Players who dislike the faster-paced and higher-powered format use this line to express their yearning for the older formats.
• "Today I learned about [insert archetype here] Runick" ^ExplanationA phrase commonly associated with Joshua Schmidt and originally coined by his YouTube videos. Joshua is a massive fan of the Runick archetype and has attempted a large number of Runick hybrid decks with other archetypes that synergize with Runick's strengths despite the archetype commonly being seen as a Base-Breaking Character, with him uploading several videos exploring experimental decks with the exact same "Today I learned about X Runick" formatted title. Naturally, his fans got carried away with this and extrapolated it to other archetypes and even ad-libbing words that make little to no sense in context.
• "You'll need a copy of Trident Dragion. So make sure to check your collection to see if you have one and ask a friend if you don't!" ^ExplanationTenpai, a deck released in the set Legacy of Destruction, in 2024, made immediate waves in the OCG due to its aggressive playstyle and ability to do insane amounts of damage in a single turn, carving out a niche for itself in a format dominated by Snake-Eyes Fire King. Synergy with Trident Dragion, an old Synchro Monster from the 5D's era, lead to the card becoming hyper-expensive in the run-up to Legacy of Destruction's release in the TCG, especially after set leaks showed that Tenpai itself was an overall cheap deck to make due to being low-rarity. In the coverage video for the set, the above quote was said by a Konami representative while describing Tenpai, which caused ire in the playerbase due to Trident Dragion having not seen a reprint since 2014 by that point- whereas the OCG version of Legacy of Destruction did include a reprint, the TCG version of the set did not, single-handedly keeping Trident Dragion's optimal variant out of budget player's reach. The quote immediately became a meme reflecting the tone-deaf lack of communication Konami's TCG team frequently exhibited, alongside being repeated mockingly by players who either got into the game in the years since Trident Dragion's last printing, or whose friends flatly said no to being asked for a spare copy.

Individual Cards

Many cards in the game have grown through Memetic Mutation on their own for multiple reasons. Here is a little list of them:

• Shapesnatch, a Level 5 Normal Monster with 1200 ATK, is a popular meme figure in the community because of its bizarre art, low ATK for its Level and lack of any true functionality. However, some crazy bastard made an OTK Deck (A Deck focused on killing your opponent within a turn) out of the guy. This became more popular with Ratamakafon's The One Whose Shape Was Snatched.
  • In Japan, this status is instead given to "Morinphen", a different Level 5 Normal Monster who is considered even more useless due to its extremely awkward statline of 1550 ATK on a body that requires 1 Tribute. It's so memetic that it scored well enough in a popularity poll for sleeves to be made for it.
• Larvae Moth, a monster who, and we quote, "can only be Special Summoned by Tributing "Petit Moth" on the 2nd of your turns after "Petit Moth" has been equipped with "Cocoon of Evolution"." And nothing else.
• "Hungry Burger" is one of the more bizarre early Ritual monsters, and as a common card it found its way into many players' collections. People joke about Hungry Burger support or building around this card, and its 2000 ATK makes it a perfect target to Summon with Drytrons — a hilarious Bait-and-Switch when people are expecting the likes of Herald of Ultimateness. It's since become an Ascended Meme with the Nouvelles, a Ritual archetype that uses "Recipe" Ritual Spells and uses "Hungry Burger" as one of its boss monsters.
• Darkness Approaches was this until its erratum. By discarding two cards from your hand, you could flip a face-up monster face-down, without changing its battle position, creating a theoretical face-down Attack Position that was not intended to be in the game. Its confusion-inducing rulings caused it to reach this point, until an errata caused it to change the monster to face-down Defense Position instead.
• "No matter the situation"^ExplanationThe earliest versions of Mask of Restrict, due to Early-Installment Weirdness, prefaces its effect with the unusually aggressive "No matter the situation." While reprints of the card have tidier text, players will still comically exaggerate what "no matter the situation" means.
• Flamvell Magician is a Level 4 FIRE Spellcaster Tuner that has no synergy with his own archetype, gaining 400 ATK when there is an Ally Of Justice monster. Not even a boost for each one, just 400 ATK, and no more. This is because in Duel Terminal lore, Flamvell Magician helped to make the Allies of Justice. This Prompted RANK10YGO, yes, him again, to yell "LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" due to Konami preferring lore relevance over meta relevance. And so the meme was born, and Flamvell Magician became "Flamvell Loreman."
• #FreeStratos^ExplanationElemental HERO Stratos is one of the biggest Woobies in the game, right behind Sangan. It destroys backrow and has searching capabilities when Summoned, which even though it is not once per turn, it was not a completely broken card, so when Konami banned the card in the TCG in 2015, an outrage among fans, particularly HERO players, brewed. This led to the hashtag #FreeMyNiggaStratos and #FreeStratos to be a thing. The fandom rejoiced when it was finally taken off the banlist on September 2018.
  • The #FreeStratos meme quickly started getting snowcloned and being applied for other banned archetype cards: after Lavalval Chain was banned, #UnchainTheChain became popular amongst the small Laval community, for example.
• The entire Fur Hire became this when their TCG effects came to be. See, how Problem-Solving Card Text would normally work would be that the name of the archetype would come before the name of its type. Konami decided to put the type of the card before the archetype name (monster "Fur Hire," as an example). The archetype proceeded to get laughed at and basically lost any credibility it once had. Not like it was going to get better after they had name changed "Skyfang Brigade" to this. In Duel Links, however...
• Blue-Eyes brings power, Red-Eyes brings potential^ExplanationThis line from the Toei anime movie has become quite ironic as waves of legacy support were introduced. Cards to support the Blue-Eyes archetype seem focused and capable of winning Duels in one turn, while Red-Eyes support is disjointed and of notably poor quality even when a support card has the same inspiration as its Blue-Eyes counterpart. "Potential" is also used as shorthand for the poor quality of Red-Eyes support. Fans have also taken to the belief that someone at Konami hates Red-Eyes, or Joey, or that the company is run by Kaiba.
  • Red-Eyes brings potential, Blue-Eyes brings $$$^ExplanationA paraphrasing of the above, often used mockingly of how Konami has basically made Blue-Eyes more versatile than Red-Eyes because Blue-Eyes sells better among the nostalgic fan community.
  • Just play Rush Duel^Explanation The Red-Eyes support in Rush Duel is inexplicably much more competent than its Master Duel counterpart, with a single cohesive theme centered around burn damage and Fusion Summoning with Meteor Black Dragon, to the point where the deck is considered meta viable. Expect this phrase to pop up often when players ask about giving Red-Eyes good support.
• "Poor Sangan." ^note If there was ever a trope called "Memetic Woobie", Sangan would be the poster child for it. Ever since it was banned, Konami has produced a series of cards showing his trip to where banned cards go. So far, as a result, he's been scared out of his wits by the other banned cards several times, cried over being banned while the Angel from the Graceful Charity artwork comforted him, and was eventually Wrongfully Arrested. It's gotten to the point where fans are honestly interested in seeing the next card in the series, just to see how much worse the poor monster's luck can get. Thankfully he's received an errata and come off the banlist.
• There were quite a few Dark Knight Rises jokes made due to the name and revival effect of Number C101: Silent Honor DARK (Silent Honors Dark Knight in Japanese), but these went up to eleven after Hot Red Dragon Archfiend Bane was revealed for the TCG.
• "X" Card was banned because of interactions with Jerry Beans Man. ^note Used to poke fun at some of the odder ban list decisions, whether it's cards getting hit that didn't deserve the hit or cards that were hit long ago and really don't deserve the ban anymore because of Power Creep making them obsolete. Jerry Beans Man was already a meme-worthy card because of how ridiculous its name is, so it being the target companion meme wasn't surprising.
• "Ah, Sea Monster of Theseus, the best card of 2017!" ^note Sea Monster of Theseus is a pretty useful card, being the first and still one of the only Fusion Tuners in the game and boasting a level low enough to be summoned off Instant Fusion, as well as fulfilling the requirements to bring out Ultimaya Tzolkin. However, Konami predicted that it would be one of the strongest monsters of the year when it was unveiled—at the time of its release, it wasn't even considered the best Instant Fusion target in the game, as Elder Entity Norden was still legal. Even moreso, it came out in the same set as truly meta-warping cards like the initial Zoodiac lineup, Miscellaneosaurus, and That Grass Looks Greener, and 2017 as a whole saw Master Rule 4, which not only saw the notoriously powerful Link mechanic's debut, but made Sea Monster of Theseus's intended niche a lot more limited. Consequently, quoting Konami's claims about it will be pretty much mandatory whenever it comes up.
• POP/YEET THE BABY^ExplanationBabycerasaurus is a Dinosaur that summons other Dinosaurs when destroyed by card effects. To facilitate synergy with this card, several Dinosaur support cards have the ability to destroy other Dinosaur cards like this card. As Babycerasaurus is an old card, there is no restrictions on how many times this effect can trigger, so it gets re-summoned and destroyed by the player's own cards multiple times in a typical Dino combo. The Black Comedy is not lost on players.
• Many jokes have been made over the years in response to the OCG's seemingly irrational fear of Goyo Guardian. For the longest time, it remained banned because of being very powerful when it was first released but years of Power Creep have rendered it rather weak in comparison to today's monsters. Despite this, the OCG still seems to be terrified of letting it back into the game; despite being unlimited in the TCG for years, when the OCG finally unbanned it, it was only to one, with an errata that further Nerfed its effectiveness by making it require an EARTH Tuner to summon.
• Dogmatika Ecclesia, the Virtuous eating huge meals in many of her fanart. ^note According to her concept art, Ecclesia is the type of girl who eats a lot of rice. Fan artists took that and ran with it. There's even a tag just for her eating. ごはんはたくさんたべるタイプ for those curious enough to look.
  • OSORO GOGGLES ^note  "Osoro Goggles" is Japanese for "Matching Goggles". In the concept artwork for Ecclesia, the Virtuous of White, there's a section where Tribrigade Kitt and Ecclesia wear matching goggles, and the title for said section was OSORO GOGGLES. They both looked so cute, that Japanese fans repeated the phrase in response to the artwork.
• "Stock up on Snake Rain!"^note Snake Rain is a card with an amazing effect (discard one card, send four Reptiles to the Graveyard), being effectively a Foolish Burial on steroids that would be banned immediately if it designated any other type. However, it's also locked to the Reptile type, which has never had a particularly strong archetype: Worms, Reptilianes, Aliens, Venoms, and Evoltiles are generally regarded as okay at best and abysmal at worst, and none have any cards able to make much use of Snake Rain. Consequently, Snake Rain is considered one of the biggest "cards that could be incredibly broken someday" candidates. This results in players immediately recommending you buy three copies whenever there's a whiff of a new Reptile monster that could herald its own archetype, and then being disappointed when the card in question ends up being a one-off within a non-Reptile archetype or no archetype at all. This one really picked up traction with the announcement of the Ogdoadic in Deck Build Pack: Ancient Guardians, a Reptile archetype based entirely around summoning Monsters from the Graveyard (and thus the first to actually make good use of it), and reinforced by Snake Rain getting a reprint in that set.
• There have been multiple instances of cards supposedly being "memed into existence", where Konami seemingly randomly makes a card that happens to relate to a specific meme. Some examples include "Blaze Cannon" as Volcanic support In Name Only, Petit/Great Moth support, a Red-Eyes boss monster card (Dragoon) with almost limitless potential to the point where it is one of the most broken boss monster cards so far, etc. There have been enough instances that Rank10YGO has become annoyed at the suggestion that he has memed multiple cards into existence.
• The "Maxx "C"" Challenge. ^note A TCG meme that became popular again, due to "Maxx "C"" being Unlimited in Master Duel. Its nature as one of the de-facto staples in the game, in addition to the game's popularity, has led to players posting videos where triggering "Maxx "C"" too many times ends up backfiring tremendously on either the player dropping it or the one affected by it. The most famous examples are decking out the player that activated the card, and the ones where they end up winning through the effect of "Exodia, the Forbidden One".
  • Maxx "C" keeps combo decks in check ^ExplanationDefenders of Maxx "C" argue that it punishes Special-Summon-heavy Decks by forcing them into ending their turn or risk giving the opponent loads of resources to punish or interrupt them with. The problem is that the combo player can also use their own Maxx "C" after establishing their multi-negate board to make even more difficult for the opponent to break it open and establish their own board. While this argument for Maxx "C" may have held water at the time of its release, the modern game has evolved such that every competent Deck has to Special Summon multiple times to establish decent board presence. However, the better decks can reach a compromised but decent end board with fewer steps, while weaker ones would need to bend over backwards in a long combo to get something comparable, thus widening the disparity between weak and strong decks. This argument is now a focus of mockery whenever Maxx "C" debates are abound.
  • Combo decks keep Maxx "C" in check ^ExplanationAs a facetious counterargument, there are a handful of combo pile decks, such as Adamancipator, generic Dragon, or Synchron, that can churn out enough special summons that it is entirely possible for them to cause the opponent to draw too many times and subsequently be decked out.
• "Check THIS out!" ^note A reference to the flavor text of Mekk-Knight Avram. The Japanese text of the flavor text is a poem/prophecy about Avram's path as The Chosen One, and the Heroic Sacrifice of Mekk-Knight Blue Sky, to give Avram his power. The English text replaces the whole thing with a generic taunt that doesn't fit the intended tone of the card at all. The line has become a go-to reference to mock Konami of America's choices in localization. You can especially expect to see it whenever one of Avram's many forms or evolutions appears on a card or fanart.'
• "Have you read Misc?" ^ExplanationMiscellaneousaurus is a Dinosaur monster that can be discarded during either player's Main Phase to make your Dinosaurs unaffected by activated effects for the rest of that phase, and can Special Summon any Dinosaur from the deck by banishing a number of Dinosaurs from the Graveyard, including itself, equal to the level of the Dinosaur you want to summon. Both of these effects are incredibly powerful and are a major part of why Dinosaur has had such a strong competitive presence, leading players to vent their frustrations over the deck's strength just by drawing attention to this one card.
  
  On the flip side, Misc's protection effect has very small intricacies that a savvy opponent can exploit — for instance, passing to end of Main Phase since the protection wears off by then, before dropping effects that Misc would have protected against. The meme can then be turned on players who've used Misc but weren't aware of the finer details.
• "Normal Summon Aleister". ^ExplanationAleister the Invoker is the focal card of the Invoked archetype, an archetype that fuses him with monsters of a specific Attribute to make powerful Fusion monsters. Aleister, on Normal Summon, searches for its signature fusion spell Invocation, and that card can banish monsters from either player's Graveyard as Fusion Material and recycle Aleister on future turns. The Invoked engine is compact enough to function in several hybrids, so normal summoning Aleister as the first play became quite popular in competitive decks that could afford to use him. Players then made "Normal Summon Aleister: response?" into a meme, referring to either Aleister's annoying power and prevalence, or to suggest a bandwagon effect on the part of the players playing him. Even when people aren't complaining about Aleister, "normal summon Aleister" has become a very specific phrase surrounding him and his playstyle. "Negate Aleister". "OK. Activate Invocation" ^ExplanationStopping Aleister from searching Invocation trips up their main line of play, but sometimes the opponent already has a copy of Invocation in their hand. You can extrapolate this — negate Magical Meltdown only for the opponent to Normal Summon the Aleister already in their hand, and then negate Aleister only for them to activate the Invocation already in their hand. It's joked that Invoked players have an uncanny ability to have all their key cards already in hand.
• VFD the "Very Fun Dragon" ^ExplanationVFD was an abbreviation used for the Japanese Name of "True King of All Calamities", a Rank 9 Xyz Monster. This meme has a couple of layers. First off, despite its draconian looks, being part of the True King archetype means it is a Wyrm-type monster instead (a type made specifically to allow for more dragon art without giving too much support to the already incredibly strong Dragon-type). ^{More Explanation} As of late 2020 however with the advent of the Virtual World archetype among other things it has become the poster child of the metagame. Its effect effectively shuts down the opposing player's entire turn without an immediate counter leading to the meme being mentioned in derision... until it was noticed that VFD being the focal point of the metagame actually did something that players have been desperate to see for ages: It slowed the game down, to the point that Traps are once again viable and thus the meme is being used almost sincerely as VFD helped bring "fun" back to the game.
• Nibiru Token end board ^ExplanationUsed to describe decks that could create an impressive end board, but fail to put out a monster negate by the fifth Summon, thereby exposing themselves to being punished hard by the asteroid. The HERO and Salamangreat archetypes are most susceptible to this and their players have incorporated this meme as a form of self-deprecation.
• Laundry Dragonmaid and Eldlich ^Explanation Laundry Dragonmaid, oddly, hardly sees use in her home archetype since Parlor and Hospitality offer better targeted mills, but her mill effect on Summon has good synergy with the Eldlich archetype as it can put a lot of its cards in the GY to advance its board state with ease. Fanart depicts the two in an unlikely partnership, such as Laundry being employed as an attendant to the Golden Lord.
• "Konami hates Air Neos." ^note Despite HERO being one of the most supported archetypes of all time, Elemental HERO Air Neos is the only monster in the archetype to not receive any kind of reprint ever since 2007, with Konami seemingly doing everything in their power to not acknowledge the card's existence, such as it being completely absent from Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel and it being excluded from the artwork for Instant Contact, said artwork being a remake of a shot from the third GX opening that included Air Neos in the first place. Several rumors for Air Neos's neglect range from legal issues with its own artwork to its name being similar to a real life airline.
• "Nice [boss monster]. Too bad. It's a turtle now."^ExplanationThe Kaiju archetype can Summon themselves to the opponent's side of the field by Tributing any one monster. This bypasses a lot of common forms of protection, so even a Nigh-Invulnerable monster is not exempt from being replaced by a Kaiju. Gameciel is the most played of the Kaiju simply because it has the lowest ATK among them so that their player can easily punch over it with their own monsters. Players whose strategy involves pushing out a single boss monster have also adopted the meme, joking that Gameciel is their true boss monster after the turtle's thwarted their game plan one too many times.
• Liebe best waifu ^ExplanationSuperdreadnought Rail Cannon Juggernaut Liebe has a Gratuitous German name meaning "love." Train fans ran with this unusual choice of name and made the giant train tank an ironic "waifu" amidst the other cute cards that hold this label.
• "Imperm column" ^ExplanationThe card "Infinite Impermanence" has a secondary effect if activated while Set where it negates all Spells and Traps and their effects activated in the same column as itself for the rest of the turn. Due to being a lingering effect, it's decently common for players to forget about it and play into it either immediately or later in the same turn and negate their own cards, leading to hilarious misplays and complaints about "tunnel vision". Can be even more embarassing if the player who activated "Infinite Impermanence" uses the column for their own Spell.
• When the Order is Imperial^ExplanationThe continuous trap "Imperial Order" negates all spell effects on the field. This leads to a lot of games being won solely because one player had Imperial Order in their opening hand to shut down the opponent and leave them with no outs, as opposed to winning by skillful play. The Game-Breaker nature of the card eventually led to it being put on the Forbidden list once again in January 2022 after it was previously unbanned with an errata in 2017.
• Draw 7 ^Explanation"Ursarctic Radiation" is an infamous card that sounds like it has an astoundingly broken effect: Upon activation, it places 7 counters on itself, and each time the player summons an "Ursarctic" monster, they can remove 1 Counter to draw a card, with no once per turn limitation, allowing them to generate a ton of card advantage for free simply by doing their normal combos. The problem: It's chained to "Ursarctic", a notoriously bad archetype that is horrendously inconsistent and eats up resources for very little worthwhile gain. "Ursarctic" ended up becoming the poster child for an archetype that is so poorly designed that a card that reads like a custom card and would be instantly banned if it were tied to virtually any other archetype isn't enough to make it even remotely decent.
• Prank-Kids Meow-Meow-Mu ban ^Explanation "Prank-Kids Meow-Meow-Mu" was banned on May 17th, 2022 for being the lynch-pin in the Brave Prank-kids deck, which was extremely unfun to play against for many people in large part due to Meow-Meow-Mu allowing players to do too much with a single card. However, despite this it was one of the most controversial bans in Yugioh history and many people were immediately unhappy with the ban. While it's not uncommon for Game-Breaker cards to have calls to be unbanned made for them in Yugioh, generally that only happens when a card has been banned for years and players begin to feel nostalgia for the card. It is highly unusual for a game breaker card ban to have the immediate backlash that Meow-Meow-Mu's ban received
• "Raye is 13" ^ExplanationRaye's card art makes her look 15 to 17, and as you'd expect there is a fair amount of Rule 34 circulating involving her. Yu-Gi-Oh! OCG Stories revealed Raye to be 13 when she took up the Sky Striker technology, and this revelation made the parts of the fandom that are invested in this kind of content really uncomfortable. To this day, haters of the Sky Striker archetype are quick to parrot this statement to try and paint the players as ones who lust after a young teen, merits of the playstyle be damned.
• "End of Main/Battle Phase" ^ExplanationEvenly Matched is a very powerful board-breaker that can be only activated at the end of the Battle Phase, and can be used from your hand if you have an empty field. It gets rid of all but one of your opponent's cards at best, banishing them face-down to deny leave-the-field triggers. A player going second skipping straight into the end of their Battle Phase is a major This Is Gonna Suck moment for the opponent. "End of Main Phase" is an extension of this — you have to declare the end of phase and many Quick Effects are Main Phase only, so immediately declaring your intention to end the Main Phase is a common bluff to force the opponent to use their Quick Effects to minimize their losses from an expected Evenly Matched, even if you don't have it in hand.
• "Chain Havnis"^ExplanationTearlaments Havnis can trigger a whole cascade of milling and Fusion during the opponent's turn when they so much as activate a monster effect, leading to a Tearlaments Deck in its prime creating their end board before properly getting their first turn at worst. Many game plans by a player trying to devise an end board to beat Tearlaments often gets met with "Chain Havnis," implying Tearlaments can render your efforts moot by getting to their end board first.
• "Pot of Desires" is -9 ^Explanation"Pot of Desires" is a "Pot" card that banishes 10 cards from your deck to draw 2 cards. Calling it a "-9" is an oft-parroted misinterpretation of how card advantage works (it's a +1, since the cards you banish from your deck are not ones which were available to you and thus aren't counted towards advantage) that is frequently mocked by more seasoned players when they come across players arguing against using it.
• "i summon blue-eyes abyss dragon then have sex with it. i end my turn"^ExplanationA copypasta from 4chan based on Blue-Eyes Abyss Dragon, whose design is considered to be bizarrely voluptuous by fans.
• Mannadium Prime-Heart has a special defensive ability that stops your opponent from targeting it with card effects. No monsters facing Mannadium Prime-Heart will be safe due to its multiple energy blades! Find this powerful card in Cyberstorm Access, releasing on May 5th!^ExplanationA tweet by the official Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG Twitter account promoting Cyberstorm Access had the unfortunate timing of coming out right when the player base was expecting a new Forbidden/Limited list update. This proceeded to become a popular copypasta to post in the replies of other tweets by the official Twitter account to make fun of its tone deafness in regards to the player base.
• V I S A S S T A R F R O S T ^ExplanationAn infamous Superheavy Samurai deck profile from the 2023 North America World Championship Qualifiers , among other things involving the cards being placed onto a shirtless man's chest, involves a Running Gag where every time the card Visas Starfrost is mentioned, everyone in the room chants "VISAS STARFROST" in a cult-like manner.
• Electrumite unban ^ExplanationHeavymetalfoes Electrumite is an incredible piece of generic Pendulum support that was part of the infamous wave of summoning mechanic Link support that other banned cards Crystron Halqifibrax and Predaplant Verte Anaconda were a part of when New Master Rule was introduced in order to keep them relevant with the new Extra Deck summoning restrictions. Unlike its compatriots, however, Pendulum has fallen behind as a mechanic due to Power Creep and Electrumite was never banned in the OCG with little issue; in tandem with the Master Rules April 2020 Revision retaining nerfs to Pendulum Summoning introduced in New Master Rule, there's a vocal base of TCG players who believe that the card has been power crept enough to not be a problem at Limited and could be eventually unbanned. As a result, whenever Pendulum-related support cards are announced by the OCG, a good chunk of players theorize that maybe this time Electrumite will come off the list in an attempt to push product, despite it never coming to fruition (and Konami of America's outspoken hatred of the card).
• There's nothing Normal about their Summoning^ExplanationThe Floowandereeze archetype is built around Normal Summoning. Most players are allowed only one Normal Summon on their turn, but the birds' effects let them perform additional chains of Normal Summons, sometimes even on the opponent's turn. They Normal Summon about as much as any other Deck would Special Summon, and irritated players use this line to riff on how the birds aren't Special Summons only becaue their effects say so.
• Let him cook!^ExplanationNormally used in online discussions as shorthand for "Don't interrupt him yet, let's see what his point is." In the case of the card game, it's "Don't use that negate, let's see if he's got an interesting game plan." If any player is running Suships or Nouvelles, which are themed around sushi and French cuisine respectively, the expression becomes more literal!
• わくわくアーゼウス / Joyous AA-ZEUS ^ExplanationThe "Melffy" archetype is a group of super adorable cartoon animals drawn in soft pastel colors that also happens to be an Xyz deck. This means that they have the ability to Rank Up into "Divine Arsenal AA-ZEUS - Sky Thunder", an extremely badass Humongous Mecha. The sheer absurdity of this interaction did not go unnoticed and was subsequently parodied by a certain comic on Twitter, causing the "Joyous AA-ZEUS" meme to catch on in Japan. An official 25th anniversary animation referencing several notable archetypes an characters acknowledges this meme with the Melffy section immediately cutting to an AA-ZEUS section.
• It's just Pot of Greed! ^Explanation"Cup of Ace" is a card that allows the user to draw 2 cards if the user lands heads on a coin flip, and allows the opponent to draw 2 cards if it lands on tails. Naturally, expect this phrase to come up whenever it lands on heads.
• "Stop saying Chaos MAX, he's not playing it!" ^ExplanationA meme from Yu-Gi-Oh! streamer DistantCoder, in which he says this exact line in response to his chat reacting to the activation of Chaos Form right before his opponent summons Blue-Eyes Chaos MAX Dragon while Coder has a 0 DEF monster on his field.
• "Which Ash?" ^ExplanationOne of the key cards of the Snake-Eye deck that became a top dog in the metagame in early 2024 is Snake-Eye Ash, which just so happens to be named similarly to Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring, often causing confusion whenever someone refers to one of them as Ash. Players have since given the Snake-Eye monster the nickname "Snash" to differentiate.