Yu-Gi-Oh! Legacy of the Duelist: Link Evolution doesn’t reinvent the Nightmare Wheel as far as Yu-Gi-Oh! games go, but it brings the value of dueling on the go with plenty of content to scratch that dueling itch.
Link Evolution is practically the same game as the original Yu-Gi-Oh! Legacy of the Duelist but polished and adjusted for Switch. As far as game content goes, this is where it shines best on Switch as it contains about $100 worth of DLC, which consists mostly of additional Campaign and Challenge Mode content, all available from the start.
The game covers the story of all main Yu-Gi-Oh! series starting with the very first with Yugi Muto and friends all the way to the latest in Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS; however, it is worth noting that much like Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc-V in the original version’s release, VRAINS only has a few parts going for its campaign. Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc-V on the other hand has its complete campaign from the start.
Campaign Mode isn’t anything fancy—it doesn’t have a worldmap or anything of that sort with mostly stage-based duels and story bits told in simple manner. For these duels, you get to choose between playing with a pre-made deck or your own custom decks. I always go with the pre-made decks since it’s always fun to see how they replicate the decks used by these characters from the story and using their strategies. Once you beat a duel you also unlock a “Reverse Duel” version of it where you get to pretty much play as the other character to change things up a bit.
Keep in mind that if you choose to go with pre-made decks, you might run into some bumps along the way as the Duel Field and everything is updated to the New Master Rule format with two Extra Monster Zones. This makes it a bit awkward when you’re running with an Extra Deck-heavy setup, but I’ve only encountered the issue on a handful of duels, mostly from Yu-Gi-Oh! GX and Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal.
With it being in New Master Rule format, there are Link Monsters and the Link Summon summoning method in the game, so returning players and those who haven’t kept up in recent years will have to learn about some of new rules. You can read all about it here or simply learn it through the game. I personally haven’t kept up with Yu-Gi-Oh! in a few years but it didn’t take that long to figure things out after playing Campaign Mode in order of series.
My only real knock on the game goes to its online multiplayer. Ranked Matches are pretty much a joke. It always seems to take a while to find matches and when you do get one they’re often laggy. Those things I can take, but it’s the actual ranking system that irks me, as it’s based on matches won instead of a proper ranking system with rank points or anything else but matches won. Ranked Matches are also just single-elimination matches. You can however do Create Match to play with friends or other players with your own set of rules including LP and time limit.
If you’re more of a casual player or just want to play some quick duels on the side, the game has plenty to offer to keep you busy for hundreds of hours. However, if you’re more of a serious Duelist then you’re probably better off sticking to Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links for a better competitive environment and format.
Food for Thought:
The game features about a couple dozen character animations but I definitely wished they had more of them since they’re more exciting than they have any right to be.
Yu-Gi-Oh! Legacy of the Duelist: Link Evolution is available for Nintendo Switch.
