Yu-Gi-Oh!™ goes online!

KONAMI CORPORATION has announced that it will launch Yu-Gi-Oh! ONLINE, an online version of the Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM Official Card Game, Konami's global strategic product. Konami's subsidiaries - Konami Online, Inc. and Konami Computer Entertainment Japan, Inc. - have joined forces to develop the new on-line service, which is scheduled to start December 18 on a test basis.

The full-scale service will be launched simultaneously in Japan, the US and Europe in Spring 2005. Konami Group's leading companies will collaborate on network infrastructure, services and operations as well as content development to further enhance the internationally popular Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM.

In the Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM Official Card Game, two players face off in an all-out battle, armed with a deck of cards consisting of Monster Cards, Spell Cards and Effect Cards. A player wins when they reduce their opponent's Life Points to zero. Yu-Gi-Oh! ONLINE will authentically recreate the Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM battle field on the Internet. It will offer not only single play beyond international borders, but online chatting and trading.

In Japan, Konami will distribute the Yu-Gi-Oh! ONLINE CD-ROM bundled with the December 18th issue of the Shueisha magazine, "V Jump". The CD-ROM lets users install the Yu-Gi-Oh! ONLINE application to their PCs and access the official site to register a player ID and password. The service will be provided free of charge during the test period through Spring 2005.* The CD-ROM will be distributed similarly in the U.S. through "SHONEN JUMP", German magazine, "BANZAI" (both to be released in January 2005), and Swedish "Shonen Jump" (to be released in February 2005) for simultaneous development in the Japan, US and Europe markets.

Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM is based on the comic series by Kazuki Takahashi, which was first published in Weekly Shonen Jump in 1996. The series quickly achieved sales of 23 million copies and over 33 million copies including related books. Konami has sold games and trading cards based on the comic series Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM - also by author: Kazuki Takahashi - since 1998. It made its way into the US and European markets in 2002. The deep strategy along with the game's content which overcomes languages barriers has gained the support of children worldwide. Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM is one of the strongest brands in children's entertainment.

Overview of Yu-Gi-Oh! ONLINE

Supported Operating Systems: WINDOWS 98 or higher

Recommended Environment: OS: Windows 98SE, Me, 2000, XP

CPU: Pentium III 800Mhz or higher

Memory: 256MB or more

Hard disk: Available memory of 600MB or more

Video card: Direct X8.1

Sound card: Direct X8.1

How to play:

After installing the Yu-Gi-Oh! ONLINE CD-ROM, follow the instructions on the screen to complete your registration (get an ID and password). You will receive XX cards as your initial deck to start playing. To play, challenge any player waiting in the online meeting place (Lobby) to a duel.

Content:

Single Play, Match, Auto Duel, Match Watching

Chatting

Trading cards

® 1996 KAZUKI TAKAHASHI

Yu-Gi-Oh!^TM ONLINE will be released for PC in Spring 2005. For more information, please contact Steve Merrett at Lunch PR on 020 7633 0694 or email steve@lunchpr.com.