While many soundtracks include music "inspired by" a given property, Music to Duel By is intended to inspire. The songs on this companion to the Yu-Gi-Oh global phenomenon (toys, cartoons, software) is supposed to provide background music for the tension-packed card games played by Yu-Gi-Oh enthusiasts. The album opens with the TV show's theme, a hyperkinetic mix of symphonic sounds and industrial metal, and contains a few other songs heard on the series, but most of the music appears here for the first time. Three of the entries are singled out as "special battle tracks," and they sound very much like high-end video game scores: the of-the-moment drum & bass percussion, the campily canned violins, the grab-bag source material. Those cuts are admirable for their short-attention-span theatricality, the way the various distinct musical segments edge the tension up a notch at a time, allowing for an occasional balladic moment of repose. Some of the vocal tracks evidence that peculiar Japanese fascination with overproduced '80s American pop, and will likely send kids running to their Linkin Park and Mudvayne CDs, but it's hard to argue with an album that includes a limited-edition set of stickers. --Marc Weidenbaum