Manga

Yu-Gi-Oh began as what most animated series (from Japan) do-- a manga. Or, if you want to speak English, a graphic novel/comic book. However, the term 'manga' isn't necessarily synonymous with 'comic book' or 'graphic novel.' While the word 'comic book' tends to conjure up images of thin, colorful books packed with POW! and WHAM!, and 'graphic novels' might evoke an image of "Rated-R" novels, or simply novels with pictures intersparsed between the pages, MANGA are vastly different.

Typically anywhere from 100 to 200 (or sometimes even MORE!) pages long, manga stories are released bi-monthly in "tankubon" format, which are pocket-sized comic books-- except they're in black and white, and the artwork is MUCH more detailed than your run-of-the-mill comic. They are published in this format usually after the contents have been serialized in weekly magazines. In the case of Yu-Gi-Oh, Shueisha's "SHOUNEN JUMP" magazine, which publishes popular and long-running comics oriented towards boys and young men.

Yu-Gi-Oh! began as a serialized manga in SHOUNEN JUMP in 1996, and ran through late 2004.

The manga's artwork is much more detailed than the anime's, of course, and since it has been running longer, the story is somewhat more developed. Whereas manga takes longer than anime to produce, you are often apt to see more characters and "filler episodes" in the anime than you are in the manga. On the flip side, the manga often is more "adult" in nature, featuring more violence and gore than the animated series' producers could possibly allow to be shown on television.

If you'd like to check out text manga translations, then head on over to the Links page and look for the link to Edo's Yu-Gi-Oh page; he offers episode summaries and text manga translations, so if you own the Japanese or Chinese Yu-Gi-Oh, you can read along with your book! If you WANT the Japanese Yu-Gi-Oh manga, character books, or other Japanese source material, I would be happy to send it to you; there is a Japanese bookstore not far from where I am, and I can arrange shipment to anywhere in the U.S. for a nominal fee (payment includes cost of book, tax, and shipping/handling)! If you are interested, email me.

The manga is currently being published by Viz under their American SHONEN JUMP label, and has so far released:

• Volumes 1-7 of Yu-Gi-Oh!
• Volumes 1-8 of Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelist (Volumes 8-14 of the original manga)
• Volume 1 of Yu-Gi-Oh! Millennium World (Volume 32 of the original manga)

There are 38 total volumes of the Yu-Gi-Oh! series, as drawn and written by Kazuki Takahashi.

Takahashi currently supervises the release of Yu-Gi-Oh! R, drawn by Akira Itou. Yu-Gi-Oh! R is not a sequel to the original series, but a manga adaptation of the GameBoy game "Reshef of Destruction" (Shin Duelist 8).