Card Games on Oxygen Platforms!

It’s actually been a while since I’ve seen a really good card-game Japanime. There’s Frugy-Yo, the original classic about an accountant who works on the street, beating people in card games, improving their finances and speaking in hip lingo. And then Yard-Raptor Baklava, about the dinosaur who used cards to capture evil spirits who were trying to stop him from creating middle-eastern desserts in the wood-fire oven in his back garden.

But now, they’ve come out with 02: Infinite Space Card-Flict!, the incredible Japanime where card games are an extreme sport played on moving platforms just inside the planet’s atmosphere. It’s a spin on a classic, sure. I particularly like how oxygen therapy comes into play, because those who compete in the card games must train in space, in advanced portable hyperbaric chambers that control their level of oxygen. Se, this is set in a Melbourne in the near-future, where oxygen chambers are totally commonplace and everyone has them in their homes. Basically, oxygen is just a part of daily life, which I personally think is a fantastic justification as to why the card games would take place up high, where the oxygen is thinner. It’s sending a clear message that to be an elite player of card games, you need to have superior lung capacity. You need to throw down where it really matters, and be able to keep your thoughts clear even with the thought that losing the card games means that you get launched into space.

Man, I wish I had a portable hyperbaric chamber. Melbourne needs to get on this, clearly. I never make it to the finals of my local game shop’s tournaments…jitters, I guess. Just need a shot of hyperbaric medicine to really clear my head, maybe.

Dylan-Kun