Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Sacred Cards (Game Boy Advance, 2003)

Unfortunately for the Yu-Gi-Oh franchise, they have been cursed with the ability to create either a great story-based game with terrible game-based mechanics or a great game-based game with terrible plot. This is one of the good-plot ones.

Since the plot is good on this, and reminds me quite a bit of the show, I've decided to give it some lenience and give it a 3/5. If I were to base my score on the card game's mechanics, I would give it a 1/5. The game doesn't tell you what each card's effect is, so when your opponent attacks a defense position monster and you take damage, you're left wondering what happened. The tribute summoning feature is also entirely different from the game, having you summon some monsters with three tributes, some with two, and some with none. There are lots of cards that aren't even featured in the show or manga. It's extremely confusing, to say the least.

If you actually want to play the story, this would be a pretty good game to rent. If you want to play Yu-Gi-Oh, this is the worst possible game you could buy. It has more in common with Madden than it does the card game.