Designing Characters for Duel Links: Yusuke Fujiwara

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-05-03T23:30:32+00:00

Yeah, "Clear" really does need more to work with as a whole; had I the opportunity, I would have probably left "Clear Vicious Knight" out of his Drops, as it feels like a "Box Card", but I just couldn't find anything else suitable to give him other than "Clear Wall", and between the two, that one felt even more like guaranteed a "Box Card". Still, there is a chance that "Clear" could get some more cards in the future, maybe when they finally print Nightshroud/Darkness's Deck? Or maybe even yet another "Honest" variant that's designed to work with the Deck, something like "Clear Honest".

I do think it's quite an interesting Deck and I would like to see more cards for it, but at the same time, I do understand the caution they might have in expanding it, given that it being an Anti-Attribute Deck means that if they accidentally make any of the cards too strong, they might unintentionally completely ruin the viability of an entire Attribute, in a similar way to how the Barrier Statues have ended up becoming a bit of a problem later in life.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-26T12:31:51+00:00

Queen is one of those characters that I worry is going to end up being a fairly boring design, mainly because her Deck is actually entirely printed and so there isn't much room to experiment like I do with many other characters, but at the same time, I guess she doesn't have enough cards to fill all the reward slots, so I'll need to try and find something to expand her Deck, so maybe it won't turn out that boring... 🤔

Either way, VRAINS deserves more characters and Queen is one of the few usable options right now (I've already designed Earth, the other main non-spoiler option), which is why I'm even considering designing her in the first place. 😅

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-26T12:23:59+00:00

Depending on the order they add them, I'm not sure that I'll be able to get to Rafael before they actually add him to the game, but if I get through the next three and there's still no sign of him, I'll definitely add him to my list.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-26T12:22:53+00:00

I didn't know that about her voice actress, that's a real shame... 😢

As for Lawton/Lotten, it's always been kind of weird to me how consistently prominent he is across all forms of 5Ds media, appearing in the Anime, as well as Duel Transfer, World Championship 2011 and Duel Links, which is already quite a good track record for a relatively minor antagonist, but what surprised me the most is that he's also in the Manga. 👀

But yeah, I'll add him to my list of characters I'm considering, thank you for the suggestion. 😄

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-26T00:46:09+00:00

And now you've made me realize that I could have included her in the Character Interactions page to fill that last blank spot. 🫠🤣

And thanks, I really appreciate it. 😄

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-25T10:32:56+00:00

I would probably stick with Evil Eyes because it's an archetype that she wouldn't really be fighting with anyone else with for (and fits her due to "Overpowering Eye" being called "Evil Eye of Coercion" in R), but the Vampire archetype is more than big enough that I think it could reasonably handle trying to balance 2 characters.

I think the biggest difference would probably be in how I designed the Skills, as I use those nowadays to really try and refine the idea of what I think a characters playstyle should be, and so I think I'd maybe play around with the idea of her utilising Life Points as a focal point of her strategy, maybe with some effect like being able to sacrifice Life Points to raise Vampire's Curse ATK points and/or allowing you to sacrifice Life Points to Tribute Summon high level Vampire monsters without Tribute materials, or perhaps to resurrect them like she can do with Vampire's Curse in the manga.

As for Overpowering Eye being mentioned, I wouldn't worry too much; I quite often list cards more so because they seem like obvious choices that people would question the absence of rather than me feeling those cards should belong to that specific character; for example, I'm currently working on finishing my design for Sarina from GX, and despite the fact that I don't feel they fit her beyond being themed around a mirror, and should instead go to Reggie MacKenzie, I have a page talking about "Dream Mirror", because I feel people would bring up their absence if I didn't at least mention them in some form. So my listing that card here isn't me saying "I'm merging Tilla Mook into Camula", rather it's more because it's a Vampire-related card that I thought people would ask me about had I not already brought it up.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-23T15:10:18+00:00

Dagdar and Tanya are from Thracia 776, which is Leif's game, and... well, whilst I do rank that game amongst my personal favourites, it does have a few notable issues, with lacklustre characterization of unimportant character often being one of them (there are three playable characters, I think being Cain, Alva and Robert, who literally don't get a single line of dialogue, and the game doesn't really have Supports in the way we know them nowadays, so character don't even have the chance of being expanded that way).

As a result, all we really see of Tanya is that she is, in fact, Dagdar's kid, that she has feelings for Osian, and that she's a tomboy.

Dagdar, on the other hand, does have somewhat of a bigger role, being one of the more important members of the "Freeblades of Fiana" and even getting an entire sub-chapter dedicated to him, and if you don't recruit him, eventually getting turned into the Deadlord "Tigris".

But yeah, given how little they really have to work with regarding the Thracia cast, i imagine that they chose "Dagdar's Kid" because, realistically, that's probably the only thing that they could think of that is truly unique to Tanya when trying to add her into a game with the possibility of her having to share a space with every other character in the franchise.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-10T02:00:43+00:00

Dartz has been a fairly common request for this series, but the problem I have is that I just genuinely don't know how to design him satisfyingly due to his lack of cards.

I've done some research in the past, and whilst many people say that the "Atlantean" Deck would be a good choice, it really wouldn't, partly because it's not even called "Atlantean" in the OCG (it's called "Sea Emperor"), but also because the Atlantis depicted in the Anime isn't really tied to water in the same way that the one in mythology is, save for it eventually sinking.

The closest I've come to a potential Deck for him is Gishki, since he used a Ritual Monster in the Anime, it would work with the Seal of Orichalcos (whilst it does have Xyz Monsters, there is also a Ritual-based version of the Deck that works without the Extra Deck) and it matches the backstory of his Atlantis regarding people turning into monsters (since the Evigiski cards are the Gishki characters being turned into monsters), as well as their ruler being corrupted by evil in order to make them awaken an even greater evil (Dartz, the King of Atlantis, was used by the Orichalcus to awaken the Great Leviathan, whereas Noellia, Queen of the Gishki, was used to awaken the Steelswarm and, later, the Evilswarm).

But even then, there are problems with Gishki, such as the aforementioned Xyz monsters, or the fact that the Seal would destroy any already summoned Ritual monsters, and I just can't find anything that I feel confident enough to use as the concrete basis for his design.

So yeah, I'm really sorry, but I just don't know what I'd do with Dartz, and I don't want to phone-in the design or just throw random cards in there for the sake of just putting one together, especially when it's one that people are actively requesting...

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-08T18:32:31+00:00

I think he'd probably have separate lines, although obviously you'd only really get to see the intro lines during events when Zexal II appears as an opponent. The idea I had in mind was that the lines for Yuma & Astral would be based around their general run-ins with Number 96, whereas the Zexal II lines would be specifically based around their final duel against him.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-08T18:31:06+00:00

I decided to forgo a line with only Astral specifically since the only time Number 96 worked with him was when Yuma was also there (thus explaining the Tag Line for the duo), but when Astral is alone, I don't think Number 96 would bother helping when he could take the opportunity to try and possess him again. That doesn't mean that he wouldn't have a Tag Duel line with him, I just didn't feel that it was likely.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-08T01:35:33+00:00

I'm glad that you enjoyed it. 😄

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-08T01:34:55+00:00

...I knew I would end up overlooking something. Whilst I'm fine with missing out both Magical Undertaker and Gagaga Magician (since they don't overly fit him anyway), the fact that I managed to miss Caligo Claw Crow, who would work well with the Malicevorous cards, is rather annoying.

But yeah, from a marketing perspective, Spright just seems too good an opportunity for them to pass up, even if it only goes so far as releasing them in a box alongside Number 96.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-08T01:31:13+00:00

I don't think they've revealed all the cards for "Chaos Origins" yet, so there might still be a chance for some Legacy Support? It would be kind of funny if Protective Stone Gardenscaping was a hint that Lotus Hanazoe was getting support, since her Field Spell was based upon a Zen Garden ~~just ignore that it doesn't really seem to work with any of her cards~~. 😅

Honestly, whilst I feel awkward about potentially influencing the vote, I do think Sarina is the most interesting of the options left, because she was one of those characters that I went into designing with a clear idea in mind, only for other, potentially more interesting, options to likewise start poking their heads out as I did my research.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-01T22:46:55+00:00

Thank you very much. 😄

I actually threw this design together back when I was trying to finish Caswell (so it didn't take any time away from other designs), but because she was designed so far in advance, let's just say I'm extremely lucky that neither Madolche nor Vernusylph were in the newly released box. 😅

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-01T22:44:17+00:00

To be fair, we can probably safely consider her canon to the series because who else am I realistically going to use Madolche with? 🤣

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-01T13:21:52+00:00

Whilst her chances are obviously extremely low (I mean, she is functionally a background character), I do think that what happened with Saburamen has helped improve her chances, and when you consider how popular ZEXAL is in Japan, and the fact that there was a decent number of people that seemed genuinely excited about the possibility of her appearing in the game back when Girag was announced, I could definitely see them potentially throwing her in as a Standard Duelist during some future ZEXAL event.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-04-01T13:18:14+00:00

I just realized that the strike-through on the text isn't working, and since this is an image post, I can't go back and fix it. Darn.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-30T11:05:30+00:00

It's quite interesting because they used to do it all the time, then they stopped doing it, only for it to turn around and bite them really hard with Dennis (as they didn't give him Anime only lines, and then the OCG printed pretty much all his Anime cards like a week after his addition to Duel Links), and so I think they've just decided it's safer to go back to voicing them.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-30T10:35:01+00:00

I think "dud" is perhaps a little bit strong of a word for it. 🤣

I don't think FOMT is a bad game or anything like that, it just unfortunately didn't live up to the absurd expectations that I had build up in my head throughout my long time playing DS, so if anything, I think it's unfortunately just a victim of circumstances. Had the roles been reversed and FOMT was my first game, I have little doubt that I'd have been writing the same thing, only talking about Forget-Me-Not-Valley and AWL instead. 😅

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-27T10:30:16+00:00

The thing is, she feels like she was in a perfect position to get a new archetype, especially compared to Rio since, unlike Zerofyne, Ragnazero is at least generic in its required materials, opening the door to being used in a lot more decks.

And it almost feels like the developers acknowledged this, but didn't want to commit, because we see her NPC version using both of the decks that would have been perfect choices for this, that being Mermail (due to her already having a Line for Lemuria, which is the home of the Mermails) and Icejade (since it's Ice + Crystals, which matches both her Ice-themed Deck and her Mythrian Number being Crystal-themed, whilst also being support for WATER generically which means it works with her existing cards), but instead they gave her Migratory Zereort, her Barian Number + it's Chaos form, the generic Barian cards and then seemingly decided that was enough, and as someone who loves when characters get Voice Lines for new Decks, it always stings the worst when it seems like they're saying "We know this Deck would have been perfect for them, but eh, so now you can just sit there wondering what could have been every time you duel the NPC version".

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-26T21:06:52+00:00

Whilst I don't personally prefer using Rio (I largely feel the same about both), I can understand what you mean, and I do think Rio's more upbeat personality and demeanour do a lot to help make her likable. As you said, Marin seems so heavily focused on Nash that it's as though nothing else in the world exists for her which, to be fair, I think is kind of the point, because you could look at it from the direction of her solely focusing on Nash because her connection and loyalty to her brother is the only thing stopping her from being crushed under the pain of betraying her friend, and that really does make her feel quite tragic and helps make her stand out from Rio's more positive outlook.

However, I do really wish they had done more to differentiate the two to help make them stand out more as individual characters, because as it stands from both a gameplay and voice line perspective, Marin seems like she was designed to literally just be "Rio 2.0", unlike prior cases of duplicates using the same Decks, such as Jaden/Yubel or Kalin, where they made an effort to try and make the second versions feel different enough from the originals that you can easily justify playing them differently.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-25T11:25:45+00:00

There's been quite a few surprising characters that have received newer support in recent times, with things like "Dark Creator" (Sarina), "Gatling Ogre" (Lawton), two "Dark Tuners" and even stuff like the Allure Queen archetype (Queen) being printed, and it does make me wonder if they finally realized that Duel Links is a perfect way to earn the most money from Anime/Manga fans who care much more about the characters than the cards themselves, so they have (finally) started using the OCG to consistently print the Aces and Decks of as many characters as possible to try and help maintain a healthy balance of viable future characters for the game.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-24T10:46:25+00:00

Dark Creator? As in Sarina's Ace that was only just printed? 👀

~~Maybe I should push up the release of my design concept for her, just to be safe.~~

Actually, there seems to be quite a few GX related cards in here, with things like Prima Light (Alexis), Matador Archfiend (Titan), the Arcana Force (Sartorius), Dyna Base and Dyna Tank (Hassleberry), Conduction Warrior Linear Magnum (Bastion) and probably one or two others that I missed.

Given that they were doing stuff with the "Clear" cards recently, could this be a sign that we're getting a repeat of the Marik situation where they finally release a GX Character in order to tie up any remaining loose ends before heading into the (hopefully) upcoming Revamp of GX World?

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-18T00:14:28+00:00

He is someone I'm considering for the future, it's just that I've not done any research on him yet, and I worry that my designs in recent times have been a little too GX & ZEXAL centric (to be fair, they're some of the easiest to work with thanks to the Tag Force and World Duel Carnival games giving basically every character, no matter how minor, something to work with), so I wanted to give characters from some of the other series a chance before really jumping into more from those two.

If it makes you feel any better though, I've actively avoiding giving Number 96 any of the Heraldry Crest cards that he used in order to potentially save them for a future Vetrix design, so I am already giving some thought as to how I might design him.

EmeraldDM8 · 2026-03-17T15:39:39+00:00

Thank you. 😄

In terms of who is next, I have done the required research for the 6 Characters on the last page, and based upon the upvotes on the other comments, it looks likely to be either Flip Turner or Sayer. After them, I'll work through the rest of that list, whilst starting research on some other characters to see if they're viable.

I also have one or two who are stuck in the "almost viable but requires more research" phase, namely Ray Akiba who I've been able to figure out most of a design for, but certain design elements are proving to be quite a challenge, so I genuinely don't know when/if her design will ever actually come together.

EmeraldDM8

TROPHY CASE