Even with all the announcements we’ve gotten over the past few months, the next year of UVS is still shrouded in mystery. Here’s what we know so far:

• The Challenger Series will release on January 19th, 2024 and bring a new way to play UVS
• The Hero League Championship will take place on February 2nd – February 4th in Orlando, FL
• The 1st set of 2024 will be Yu Yu Hakusho: The Dark Tournament (Release Date: TBD)
• We will be getting the 7th set of My Hero Academia at some point in 2024

---

That leaves a lot of questions. What will the format look like now that the newest cards aren’t from the My Hero Academia IP? What is the Challenger Series aside from an updated format of Starter Deck? When will we get those reveals? With UVS Games hitting it’s 9th set since the start of the MHA IP some time this year, will we start to rotate out sets? On and on.

Today we got a few answers. If you’d like to read whole the article from UVSGames I encourage you to. I’ll link it here: The Future of Universus Formats The long and short of it is:

• The Main Format going forward will be Standard (All IPs are legal)
• Standard will rotate out sets. Legal sets will be anything released in the current calendar year plus the previous 2 years. (Since MHA Set 1 was released in Oct 2021, it will not be legal in 2024.)
• Other formats will include Spotlight Constructed (MHA Only Blocked, etc.), Retro (Anything since 2010), and Sealed/Draft

---

This is HUGE! Most viable decks today rely on a lot of cards from Set 1, because it’s still the most powerful Booster set released from My Hero Academia. Nationals in Dallas this weekend will be the last time many of these cards will be legal for play until we see them reprinted in another set. This makes the decision to select mostly Set 1 cards as the promos for Nationals more than a bit curious. 9 out of the 14 cards awarded for playing and winning at UVS’s 2nd highest stage won’t have a premiere event where they’re legal for play after this weekend, unless you earn your invitation to the HLC. Kind of stings…

---

That being said, 3 years of sets is probably the best solution for the situation at hand. 2024 was always going to be the pivot year to the UVSGames vision of Universus. As other IPs enter the game, there’s only 2 paths to take. Rotate out sets like MTG or keep everything like YuGiOh. With the crazy amount of power creep that happens over time, it’s clear the YuGiOh model just isn’t a viable one for this game long term. Set 1 always had a target on it’s back. Now, they’ve just come for the body.

Now that we know what to expect, card values are going to adjust accordingly. Cards nearing their Death Date will get cut in value, which might hurt some collectors but on the other hand it gives many players chances to play cards they never could. Looking at you Repeated 100% Smash!

With the news, there’s going to be a buzz about what this means for the format going forward. What decks are crippled? What decks can leap to the front of the pack? I can’t wait to talk to the best UVS players in the world this weekend and find out what they think and report back. Until next time, I’ll see you on the tables!