Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon.

During my run today, a weirdass memory came back to me. For no apparent reason (except a little bit of personal drama) I found myself remembering the beginning sets of the game...and the drama therein.

It didn't take a genius to see that we were being BS'd at times. One of the excuses for BEUD's late arrival was that Shueisha, the company that manages Jump Festas and therefore Premium Packs, did not want it released. Since BEUD was released in a Premium Pack, it wasn't allowed to come over here.

Let's look at the other contents of the same Premium Pack BEUD originally came in, shall we?

Tri-Horned Dragon -> Secret in LoBEWD. Well-deserving of its position given the environment.
Gate Guardian -> Secret in Metal Raiders. Only looks good in a binder. Way to go, Konami!
Meteor Dragon -> McDonald's promo
Meteor Black Dragon -> Unreleased. WTF.
Fire Winged Pegasus -> Tournament promo.
Serpent Night/Evil Knight Dragon -> Secret in Magic Ruler. Probably should not have been.
Sengenjin -> Tournament promo.
Magician of Black Chaos -> Premium Pack 1
Black Magic Ritual -> Premium Pack 1

So three of them were released within the first three sets, two of them were released as tournament promos (which they originally were- OK), one came in a Mickey D's set, and Chaos + Ritual came in a long-awaited (post-BEUD, oddly) stateside Premium Pack. BMD has yet to be released to the rest of the world, but really...what are they waiting for? Fusion Monsters are about as alive as the Tasmanian tiger - some sightings, but have altogether been replaced by the more-efficient Synchros. If they don't release it soon, people might not be interested enough to even try it.

Now, I realize that the UDE reps on Pojo had to plug their product. I realize they wanted to keep Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon on the low-down for a little bit. I realize that it was probably a marketing ace in the hole for them. That does not mean that they should have held it out like they did; people would have bought a YGO-branded pile of vomit if it had that darn dragon in it!

Don't give Konami your money, kids. You will set yourself up for disappointment.