Misprint An actual misprint results from a malformed printing plate . Usually , the printing plate contains a design error made before the plates were manufactured . Plates are inspected and , if necessary , discarded before card production begins . Unfortunately , malformed printing plates pass inspection on occasion , and some cards print with this error . Once the mistake is identified , the defective plate is discarded and replaced by a new one , and misprinted cards are destroyed before they are packaged . These misprints must escape this last quality assurance also , and their rarity gives them their collectible value . However , if the printing plate is not destroyed and substituted by a new one , the error cannot be considered as a defect , since production took the conscious decision to continue printing with a malformed plate . Misprints are supposed to happen by a combination of accidental errors before the production starts , and by definition , are supposed to be extremely rare . If production continues while the problem is acknowledged and no intervention occurs , there is no accidental error and cannot be considered defected . During production , cards are sometimes printed with flaws . In some cases , these printing errors add no value to the card . Cards , for example , that are printed when the press runs out of ink are not official misprints . Printing presses cannot be easily stopped , so it ' s very common that cartridges run out of ink before they can be refilled . While quality control usually prevents this situation , it can happen with some regularity since a press needs time to refill properly . Cards that have chopped edges or unevenly cut borders are not misprints . After card sheets are printed , precisely aligned blades cut the sheet into individual cards . At some point , the cutting blades become dull or misaligned , and this results in imprecise cuts and irregular edges . Misprinted cards are legal for tournament play . However , the misprinted item is treated as if it was correct . For example , a " Gaia the Fierce Knight " with the name misprinted as " Last Turn " is treated as the former , rather than the latter . Misprints . Official misprints . To be considered as an official misprint , a card must be printed from an unacknowledged defective plate . Once the error is reported , the defective plate must be discarded and substituted by a new one which does not contain the same error . The defective plate must be destroyed , so the same problem does not persist in the same production run . In most cases , misprints are located and destroyed or are subject to substituted quality controls before they can reach the streets , so the amount of available misprints in the market is very limited . Spelling mistakes . Sometimes cards contain spelling mistakes . However , these are not considered misprints , because they occur on all cards in that print run . Usually cards only have one or two letters misplaced , which is often difficult to notice . Unofficial misprints . Due to the nature of the printing process , the press needs to be constantly supervised and re - calibrated . The printing plates are supposed to be perfectly aligned to respect each others position . From time to time , due to the printing press vibrations , one of the plates loses its proper alignment , producing cards with their names , artwork or texts out of their original positions . These cards can be considered as a production failure , but not as official misprints , since the printing plates are not defective . The plates just need to be re - aligned . Also note a massive press cannot be easily stopped . Once it starts to run , it moves very fast . Stopping a press in the middle of production is an unlikely situation . If the press runs out if ink , the production is not stopped . Usually , the press continues its work while being refilled . For this reason , several sheets can be partially printed with parts of their artwork or texts missing . These sheets are usually located and separated from the rest before being cut and packed , but from time to time few of these cards may reach the streets . Refilling the press can cause the exact opposite situation , cards printed with excess of ink . Both of these situations can be considered as bad quality printings , but not official misprints . Similar as the ink filling problem , the press is fed with several different paper rolls of different weight . The paper rolls are also mixed with an Aluminum foil roll to produce the Yu - Gi - Oh ! foil cards . Sometimes , one of the rolls runs out and is later replaced , producing as a result cards thinner or thicker than usual , cards that have the foil on top or back of the card , or cards without any foil at all . Mismatches . Several different printing plates are used to produce one sheet of cards . A plate set for a specific run of cards is usually composed of four plates - one for each color , plus one or two extra plates for the special finish of some cards ( gold or silver lettering , shining cover for parallel rares , etc ) . Sometimes , one of the printing plates does not belong to the same set . By mistake , one of the plates is mounted on the press from a different sheet set . As a result , several sheets are printed with their names switched with other cards , sometimes of different rarity . In these cases , once the error is discovered , the wrong plate is switched back with the correct one and the production continues . In fact , in most cases , this type of error is easily detected during the initial test run of a sheet and immediately fixed , but few cards can be missed and accidentally packed , hence the reason why mismatches can be easily found on the streets . These cards do not count as official misprints for two reasons : the plates aren ' t defective and there ' s no need to create a new one and the correct plate simply is placed back on its correspondent position , and in most cases the mismatch was produced as part of an initial test printing . Cards printed during the initial test are supposed to be discarded before the main production begins ( see below Production test prints ) . Examples . Some cards are printed in 1st Edition , but instead of the golden square at the bottom right corner they have the silver square , like an Unlimited Edition card . Reciprocally , some cards are printed in Unlimited Edition , but instead of the silver square at the bottom right corner have the golden square , like a 1st Edition card . Production test prints . Since preparing the press to print a specific set of cards is a labor that takes several hours , prior to the main run , several test sheets are printed to determine if the printing press has been properly calibrated . This production test includes all possible variations a card may have . The most common is a series of CMYK stripes initially printed to corroborate if the press has the appropriate amount of ink all over the printing roll . Once it has been tested , these production tests are discarded and trashed . However , since cut and packing is part of the entire production line , sometimes few of these test cards can be packed by accident , and are included in few boosters . Few of these Test Print s have significant value , since they are have no actual purpose except for being a curiosity . Defects not considered to be misprints . While cards with both front and back sides cut off - center are not considered misprints but miscuts , those with an offset face but a regular back side are considered misprints since they were cut properly , but the paper sheet was misplaced during the front side printing . English language cards with a Japanese back are not misprints , they are Asian - English cards intentionally printed that way . They are produced in limited amounts exclusively for Asian countries outside of Japan , China and South Korea . Errata are changes to a card ' s elements , description or effect wording , usually to make the card rulings easier to understand for the players . Cards which were intentionally printed that way prior to any change and are not considered misprints , but cards with unintentional mistakes later fixed by errata are considered misprints .