Ask John: How Popular is Dual Masters in Japan?

Question:
I’ve Been watching Duel Masters on Cartoon Network for a while now, and I really like the show and how it pokes fun at pop culture stuff. How popular is the series in Japan? I’ve heard it’s overtaken Yu-Gi-Oh as the number 1 anime series on TV in Japan. Also how many episodes have they aired so far and is it still airing in Japan at all?

Answer:
While the early American promotion of Dual Masters would have us believe that the franchise is a massive hit in Japan, a little bit of research suggests that the franchise is, in fact, only a reasonably but far from smashing success in Japan. The Dual Masters anime TV series consists of 26 episodes, but only the first 23 episodes had a limited television broadcast from October 21, 2002 through April 4, 2003. The nine volume Japanese DVD release includes the unaired episodes 24-26. In fact, the Japanese broadcast of the series seems to be so obscure that it’s very difficult to find any Japanese website, list or report that even confirms that this first series was ever actually broadcast on Japanese television. Likewise, according to Animage Magazine, the Dual Masters Charge anime television series now has more than 15 episodes under its belt, but once again, the series seems to be virtually unheard of. While it’s broadcast by the TV Tokyo network, TV Tokyo doesn’t even have a web page for the series.

The Dual Masters trading card game that spawned the anime, likewise, doesn’t appear to be that well known or popular in Japan, judging from the lack of hits that come up for it in a Japanese web search.

The franchise has been adapted into three console video games, but once again, none of them seem to be particularly well known. Takara released Dual Masters for the Gameboy Advance on August 7, 2003, and Dual Masters Gekitou! Battle Arena for the Game Cube on December 18, 2003. Atlus released the Dual Masters 2: Invincible Advance game for the Gameboy Advance on March 18, 2004.

The fact that the collectable card game and its related spin-offs are still current in Japan after two years implies that the franchise has more staying power than an attempted multi-media marketing franchise like .Hack. But based on my outside observer’s conclusions, Dual Masters seems to be no threat to the dominance of Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh in the Japanese or American markets.

And just for relative comparison, the average number of viewers in Japan watching the Yu-Gi-Oh anime series is less than half the number of viewers watching programs like Naruto, One Piece, Atashinchi, Detective Conan, Poirot to Marple, and Chibi Maruko-chan. The most watched anime series on Japanese television, Sazae-san, earns roughly four times as many viewers as Yu-Gi-Oh each week.