For the last few weeks no one has been going to any UFS tournaments in New York City. So I thought i would make a few calls to the people that normally go and sadly I heard nothing really but bad news. I heard various people are going to stop playing. Of course I asked them why and they all pretty much said one of the same three reasons.

1. Displeased with prize support

I heard stuff like "oh why am I going to play a card game just to win a few promos? Once in a blue moon I would like a big event where i can win some money or prizes like mats or an I-pod or something" People who also used this reason also brought up the Tekken 6 pre release as an example since there was no Tekken 6 mat for the winner it seems.

2.Displeased with the game orginazation

It seems that due to the reset of the game, or the constant push backs of sets it has really annoyed people to a point of just not wanting to deal with it i guess.

3. Lack of attendance.

When UFS was in its first year we had 20+ people playing in a tournament on the norm. Our first ECC has so many people I cant remember. Then things just started to drop,the second ECC had 50 and then this just past year we had only 18. Normal weekly tournaments as of late have not been happening. When you are able to count how many people still play on one hand,that is not good.

If by any chance any of you fellow New Yorkers who still wish to play, or come back and are reading this I am calling out to all of you. Do not let this game die out here.I read all this talk about how people are joinning because of Tekken,sadly it does not seem to be the case here in N.Y.C. I dont want to let New York City be know as Battle City AKA yugioh city. If people where to show up to weekly events I am sure by just taking this small step the game will florish. It does real really suck that when i bring me with my play group i am half the tournament.. i understand i dont expect everyone to come back so suddenly since people need to get the cards from the last 3 sets to make there decks but hell it really makes it better for new people to play as well since there is only 3 sets as of right now. so lets try to get some new blood as well here in N.Y.C. Well I hope with in a few weeks I will see people playing once again.

Magumo said:

Hate to sound like a ******, but tell them to not let the door hit their ass on the way out. What differentiates UFS from other card games is precisely the nonexistent prize money. In EVERY game that there's money involved, it is an unpleasant experience. I am glad for no prize money, and if someone wants to quit because of that, then bye.

On the other side, I'm sad to hear NYC has no players. **** it, Omar, get to recruiting!

This makes me immensely sad as New York has been one of the strongest metas since the game came out. If you can get a hold of anyone let them know that the whole game is being revamped. Prize support will be improved. The UFS Pro Tour is already ensuring that. We have people coming from all over North America to play in the first stop in Ft. Myers.

I know its a fairly common thing to say on these boards, but it will get better. James and Steve have both been busy as hell overhauling the game to make it better overall. There is fallout from forced rotation. Prize support is whack right now. But it is still very early in the season. Store champs, city champs, and the Pro Tour should turn things around when they get ramped up.

I think the problem in NYC though is too many people play Street Fighter 4

Anyways, keep pushing the game. Try to get people back. Where are Omar, Goo, Noel, and all of the other NYC guys?

From the Intell I have gathered, Omar still wants to play but no one shows up. Rumor has it if no one is playing here he might start playing Naruto>< Me and my cult.. err i mean team. just have not been able to gather the cards we want to be able to play at a competitive level against him. He is not a champ for nothing ya know. So we want to be at our best when we play him even if it is a normal weekly event. Also he is not a jerk, i know he would gladly help us with cards like he has done in the past just i know he is not going to just give us cards ya know, and we been getting pulls from packs kind of the stuff he already has sets of and such so we dont have much trade bait sadly since the good stuff we need for decks are the things other people want for decks lol. as for everyone else they like fell off the face of the earth or something.. i have not seen Goo and the rest of them in like forever and a half..

I got some Naruto cards for trade. I'm stoping that. Don't really like some stuff about the game and community. Well at least around here.

If you play a card game for prize support, you're playing it for the wrong reason.

Why would I need a card game to buy me a 150 iPod? I have what's called, iuno, a job? And it's a minimum wage one, no less, and I could have 2 iPods in 1 paycheck, if not more.

its the thrill of winning something

If its just 'some' thing then, yes, you'll be winning promo cards. As few as they may be, you'll be 'winning' them. Perhaps you'd like to expand your argument a touch Awaken?

people need to understand the reality of how things work. i don't care what the prize is or who i'm playing i just want to play a deck that is worth playing and fun, because if i'm not having fun it's just going to be lame for you playing me.

WAKE UP PEOPLE PRIZE HAS ALWAYS BEEN AN ISSUE!!!!!!!!!!!

you have to be dumb to think that prize support is not what makes the game it;s all part of the percentage of what makes a game. Any TCG must cover every ground of what the players expect to get out of the game. rewarding players for the time and energy show that you care about them, that those even considering about playing the game. To be honest i think people been too kind and defensive about this game and need to be like come on your falling off. Because of the new rotation i've seen 0 new players in nyc and don't you even dare say i did'nt try not to get players into the game. i have been the poster boy for this game and represent this game to the fullest. Back in the day when people had nothin to play this game i have lend out 4-7 decks when this game started. So when i say something i say it for a reason not to be a douce or ahole i mean it for the passion of the game. To bad i don't have a store because ufs in nyc would'nt be having this problem.

Well I don't know about everyone else, but Mondays which is our normal play day, has become next to impossible for me to get to with my Job being what it is. Not saying any day would be much better, but honestly without job i have no money. With no moeny I couldnt play anyways, therefor sometimes the game has to take a back seat.

The sad truth is that the bad/recovering economy is to blame I think. cards are not cheap and work hours are long for a lot of people. Its really hard for me to get out of work anytime before 7 (my normal time), run to the one store in NYC that still runs events at that hour, play a real and not rushed event of any substance, get home to actually spend time with my fiance, and then get up in the morning to get to work.

Prize support is an issue though. I'm not saying money is the answer mind you, but it's honestly been months sine there has been a tourney where the prize was anything but unappealing for the time and cost of an event. I don't want a card that everyone is getting and I won't be able to trade.

Maybe when work calms down a bit it will be a bit more realistic for me to make it to events more often.

nice point and it goes for most of players in the city who have jobs.

See the early rotation had the totally opposite effect in michigan. I think our player base has doubled and one of our new players even won a tourney of I believe 10 - 12 ppl. Also I have to agree with Fred, the economy can really be a fairly large blame. I myself don't get to play that often between work, school, family.

It's just a bad time for games in NYC. We don't have a good central location. JH Comics has been great for opening it's doors to us and they are seeing money from the CCGers who used to play at Neutral ground, but the store is not equipped to be a true home for the game or hold major events. Kings Games is large enough but they are located in the far end of Brooklyn which means for most everyone with a job not in Brooklyn the trek is too much. Add to that the fact that the store owner is really invested in every other game they sell and has no incentive to promote UFS, and it's not really a home for the game either.

The reason we don't have a home is purely the economy. Rotation more or less was a non issue in NYC, as just about everyone would have switched to mini block after Gencon anyways.

Protoaddict said:

Ironically I looked into that. The problems with opening a game shop in NY are neumerous.

For one location is paramount. The closer you are to the city the better it becomes for people who want to play regularlly, but the more the rent goes up. You ahve to really weight the balance between cost and effectivness.

Two is it's simpily not a high profit margin industry. I would probably make a more efficent living keeping my day job than I would being the sole owner of a sucuessful game shop.

Three is Yughio. You can't open a shop in NYC without catering to the yughio crowd. That crowd is awful young children with little moeny who cause trouble whereever they go, including fights and theft. They are a huge liability that you have to take on and it is physically impossible to have a store that dosent cater to them. Catering to them means not only a huge level of risk (YGO is basiclly the reason Neutral ground dosent exist anymore) but also I would have to learn the game, of which i have no intenion in doing.

Four is Competition. Kings games really has a strangle hold on NYC for most games. For a lot of us its not viable to get there, but they have a huge magic and ygo playerbase. Sadly if you can't capitalize off of them your not going to be sucuessful.

If the economy was in better shape it might be a different story, but people just dont have the time or money to play card games at the level they used to, and i hate to say it but:

• UFS does not have attractive prize support for most players
• No major events (at least major to someone who dosent play already)
• Smaller Player base
• No organized ranking system

I think that last one is the big one i don't think have been really addressed either. Even in the downtimes for the game, Magic players still play in events, and even with iffy prize support, because they can raise their DCI ranking, which has other benefits. I'm not saying UFS needs to mimic this, and obviously with the smaller player base it does not make sense too, but without something yearlong and persistent it dosent make a whole lot of sense for a player to go out of their way to play in an even that costs money they dont have, time they cant spend and travel they havet o suffer for to get cards they already have and will not be able to do anything with.

These circumstances are unfortunate. New York has been a defining meta for the game, still, just as there is a time and season for everything maybe now is the time for another meta to defiine UFS. A Changing of the Guard. With NewFS at full swing such a thing could happen. The question is, whose meta will take New York's place? Or will New York find a way to hold there title. Guess we will find out.

Just out of curiosity, does the new york YGO players have to pay in order to play? I know the ones we have here sure do. Point being, unless UFS is paid for, the last I check it is free. I expect UFS weekly prize support to be just promos. If your expecting prize support in the form of cash and i-pods every week, than I got news for you...it probaly is not going to happen. However, i have heard that prize support has sort of been sucking ass as of late, so I can not blame you on that point. Now if we have a once a month prize support that is cash or i-pod...that seems reasonable to me. Maybe once every two months.

As Proto has stated though, there are other circumstances to take into account and lets face it, LIFE happens first. Hobbies are second to this. travel is important as well. Bus and subway fees can be costly...so I can defeinately understand that.

Wish you New Yorkers luck.

Awaken said:

Um...yeah, the thrill of winning A CHILDREN'S CARD GAME.

I don't care for consoles, iPods, w/e, because then you'd be whoring out this game like XBox whored out to people who don't understand what TRUE video gaming means.

You play a card game for the card game. End of story.

MarcoPulleaux said:

No true scotsman...

MarcoPulleaux said:

Excuse me but this is not Yugioh. This card game is not marketed towards children. The only reason that YuGiOh is called a children's card game is because it has a TV show aimed at children airing is a saturday morning lineup(or at least was) aimed at children. Also all the cards in the game are edited to make the as child friendly as possible. UFS has big breasted barely clothed women on the majority of it's cards as well as blood and violence. Each of the games it represents are at the very least T for Teen.

I'm gonna be honest and its gonna sound like I' being an ass.. But one of the problems with UFS in NY is people seem to not excel and blame it on so called "broken" cards.. And truth is they're just tired of loosing. Here's an example. Animation Odyssey is one of the favored UFS spot due to the store credit players can earn for winning. In all honesty outside of Magnus FoP and Hata's AoP victories, I've NEVER lost there at all. And for the longest I had to hear the "its cuz you run brainless evil, BRT is broken, boo hoo hoo!!" So after worlds I had a new excitement thinking all the "broken" cards are gone so all thge complainers will flock to events... Boy was I wrong, now I hear "boo hoo hoo they took my fav cards away"

Its soo bad me and Mag are planning to take a random trip or two over to Tapout stomping grounds(I'm sooo going to take Hanovers store championship).

Starting friday I'm gonna make another month effort to make it to all 3 UFS days in NYC.. Lets see if anyone shows up?

Immortal-JyNxX said:

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO shots fired .

Anyhoo I personally don't have a problem with yall taking it over but the reason that you have never lost and i,m sayin it cause I don't go there a lot and if I did then maybe just maybe that streak would end. Now to be blunt John's my boy and all but he has not that much of a gaming mind as far as ufs is concerned but in yugi he's good Paul and his crew good but don't have the resources to be real competitive as far as right now. But Osei son you have to remember dat **** if you do **** if you don't yeah I heard the B.C.M'ing and I know who your talkin about and as far as people not showin up i,m the reason for that cause of my job status right now ( not having weekends off ) but if that changes than yeah expect people showin up.

Granted i dont know much about the life of anybody up in NYC but if you guys really want to save UFS up there then get togehter and find out if you guys can all agree on a location and a new set time where the most people could be there

Even if you dont have the luxury of having kings games and the major event capability its still better to actually have a playgroup and a way to save the game over anything else

My playgroup in Va has about 10-12 people not everyone shows up for tourneys but we still play games at the store throughout the week and our store could never hold more then 30 people at a time as its a small store on the downtown strip

Sol Badguy said:

If you watched Yugioh the Abridged Series (found on youtube, or at yugiohabridged.com), you'd understand the humor in my remark.

For what it's worth, you NYC guys are always welcome to come down and join us in Jersey.

Immortal-JyNxX said: