Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan brings the game to life like a Star Wars 3D chess game

After 7 months of testing, working and tinkering, French Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan SuperZouloux has built one of the coolest card game tricks I’ve ever seen: a gaming mat and camera that, thanks to augmented reality technology, can broadcast 3D versions of his monsters as he plays his cards.

When I say he worked, I mean it. While SuperZouloux had a lifelong dream of making something like this a reality, when he started the project earlier this year, he knew virtually nothing about it any the technology or software he would need to pull this off. So he started studying.

He had to learn to develop in Unreal Engine, so he was able to program and animate the monsters. He had to dive into the Arduino scene to be able to hack together the hardware needed. He needed to learn how NFC worked and how to use it so cards placed on his custom mat would trigger the required actions.

“Fortunately, I’ve managed to surround myself with passionate and competent people who have managed to pass on their expertise to me, accompanying me on this pitfall-strewn path,” says SuperZouloux. “I doubted all the time, but mostly I learned. I learned that even with a project I wanted to do alone, it’s important to surround yourself. Alone it goes faster, in a group it goes further, this maxim has never touched me as much as with this project.”

SuperZouloux demonstrates the technique in this video, which is in French but with English subtitles throughout so we can all join in. Mostly to enjoy how happy he is about how Great the whole looks.