Chicken Game – #CORE-EN068
The player with the lowest LP takes no damage. Once per turn, during the Main Phase: The turn player can pay 1000 LP, then activate 1 of these effects;
● Draw 1 card.
● Destroy this card.
● Your opponent gains 1000 LP.
Neither player can activate cards or effects in response to this effect’s activation.
Date Reviewed: May 2nd, 2024
Rating: 3.87
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is awful. 3 is average. 5 is excellent.
Reviews Below:
King of
Lullaby
Hello Pojo Fans,
Chicken Game coming back on the latest ban list was a surprise, and is our Throwback Thursday choice this week.
True to its name, Chicken Game is one of those Field Spell cards that benefits both players, which can be a seriously dangerous route to choose.
You’ve got lower LP, you take no damage, but damage isn’t too much of a concern unless you’ve got effects to play for and now can’t. Each players gets their shot to play chicken, paying 1000LP to do so and can get an effect from Chicken Game:
● Draw 1 card.
● Destroy this card.
● Your opponent gains 1000 LP.
Spell Speed 4-like protection on Chicken Game as you cannot negate whatever effect is chosen, which is great for you, but not when your opponent uses it. Of the choices, drawing a card is always going to be chosen unless you are in position to end your opponent and you need to get in damage. No one is going to give their opponent 1000LP so they can pay to use this card again, even if it meant you would be under the damage protection from Chicken Game. This card was thrown into so many different decks when released and was run up until its stint in ban jail. It was like a reverse Upstart Goblin where you’d take damage instead of increasing your opponent’s LP and then draw a card. It didn’t matter if your opponent could do the same thing next turn, because you could always destroy Chicken Game using a monster effect during your turn and then finish your opponent.
It’s been close to a decade before its release and Chicken Game still holds a use, even in today’s meta. There’s enough destruction/bounce effects that can counter its activation, or get rid of it if you want to close out your opponent. Its benefits are still fantastic. If your opponent can’t destroy it and your LP are seriously low, it acts as a damage absorber to prevent you from losing the game. With how many archetypes have almost everything they need though, it should be interesting to see if Chicken Game finds as many homes in decks like it did upon release.
Advanced- 4/5 Art- 4/5
Until Next Time,
KingofLullaby
Crunch$G
Throwback Thursday this week brings us yet another Field Spell that can help get you more cards from the Deck, this one recently being unbanned in the TCG: Chicken Game.
Chicken Game is a Field Spell that prevents the player with lower LP from taking any damage, which is solid. The turn player can pay 1000 LP to either draw a card, destroy this card, or give their opponent 1000 LP. The 1000 LP gain effect will probably be used the least, since while you are making the gap wider between player LP so you can deal damage, you’re also just giving your opponent LP to use the other effects. I imagine your opponent will use the destroy this card option more than you so they can make an attempt to go for game, though they might give that up for a draw and hope to out this another way. The card mainly saw play to give the player using it a draw and then swap it out for another Field Spell. It also got your LP low enough to do an FTK with Life Equalizer and Magicial Explosion when this was at 3, prompting the TCG to ban this card and the OCG to ban Life Equalizer before eventually banning Magical Explosion themselves. Neither player can activate cards or effects in response to this effect’s activation, so it’ll go off without a hitch in that department at least. As long as the TCG keeps Life Equalizer and Magical Explosion, I don’t imagine this coming back to 3, though you do have to ask if banning those cards would hurt the game in any capacity, if not making it better? Chicken Game seems popular as a Set Rotation target for Decks using Field Spells, since drawing this just lets you dig deeper into the Deck, or the opponent has to risk you drawing cards if it gets back to your turn and they want to activate this. Solid Field Spell with interesting applications, it’s literally a game of chicken.
Advanced Rating: 4/5
Art: 3.5/5 Nice cameos from Overdrive and Oni Tank T-34.
Mighty
Vee
Throwback Thursday brings us the illustrious Chicken Game, which was unbanned and brought to 1 in the recent TCG banlist, though its arrival came with little fanfare as the banning of Baronne de Fleur and Borreload Savage Dragon proved to be an even hotter topic. Chicken Game is a Field Spell that prevents the player with lower Life Points from taking damage and has a soft once per turn effect that lets you pay 1000 Life Points to either draw 1 card, destroy Chicken Game, or give your opponent 1000 Life Points; as a bonus, neither player can respond to this effect. As its name suggests, Chicken Game simulates a game of chicken– if you take the draw, you give your opponent the chance to also draw, which could be the one card they need to break your board. While the Life Point protection sounds great for stalling on paper, your opponent can easily equalize your Life Points, or even put themselves into the protected zone as they annihilate you. You probably won’t depend on the protection outside of dedicated LP reduction decks like Dinomorphia. In ancient times, Chicken Game was banned simply due to being soft once per turn; decks like ABC could use Ancient Fairy Dragon to destroy their own Field Spells and activate multiple Chicken Games, drawing multiple cards and building a strong board in the process. Of course, people also consider Chicken Game, much like last week’s Upstart Goblin, inherently broken because of the free draw, but OCG has proven that 1-for1 draw cards for the sake of it aren’t all they’re cracked up to be in modern Yugioh. Some decks can use Chicken Game well; Ashened basically gets it for free with Set Rotation, and decks that can play Ancient Fairy Dragon can still grab it for a free draw if you wanted to. Chicken Game would probably be fine if it came back to 3, so I expect to see it slowly return. If your deck really needs that small consistency boost, go nuts!
+Free draw!
+Has nasty combos with Field Spell enablers like Ancient Fairy Dragon
-Can quickly backfire in some scenarios
-Modern deckbuilding philosophy doesn’t need 1-for-1 draw cards
Advanced: 3.5/5
Art: 3/5 My money is on Overdrive, since it does have slightly higher attack after all.
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