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I think we should have a good talk about this topic. I have had a lot of thinking about this topic for a long time. Recent twits by nmlgc and aggressive2hu inspired me to do more research to finally build a full picture. I understood that we should act now until it is too late. The more info I found for this post, the worse the situation became. And it is not just about Touhou, problems are much more serious, but mostly I will talk about Touhou because I really love Touhou and I hope to change situation for better at least for Touhou. The goal of this post is not to bring hate towards anybody in the fandom or ZUN, but to help people understand the roots of the problems to resolve them. CAUTION!! CAUTION!! CAUTION!! If you still want to believe that there are no serious problems in Touhou fandom, and still want to believe in Touhou and doujin magic, well this post may bring you down. You have been warned. CAUTION!! CAUTION!! CAUTION!! Before we start, I hope to see criticism which will explain where I am right and where I am wrong, because this topic is rarely discussed. Thank you. Have you noticed that something is not right? Have you noticed that there are much less new Touhou fangames, doujinshi and doujin music than for example 8 years ago? Have you noticed that a lot of new fan content is nearly unnoticed? Have you noticed that fandom is not united and split? Have you noticed that last Touhou games are rushed and story is less well-written? Doujin events examples: I suppose that everyone noticed at least some of those problems but I am surprised that nearly nobody tried to analyse why these have happened. Well, there are two main causes of the problems: the fandom and the franchise itself. Fandom: But there are other problems that may make people haters of not just fandom, but of Touhou itself. Franchise: But what I can say for sure if this topic is unnoticed and left undiscussed we won't be able to change the situation for better. I thought that Touhou was an islet of safety in current sea of crisis of mass culture, but alas it is already under the water. But wait, let's be clever and take a step further (unlike those haters): what about non-Touhou doujin scene, what is happening there? (Spoiler: the situation is similar there): But everything is not lost! We can change the situation for better if we will stop being scattered and will work together. The worst thing now is just giving up. Thank you for reading this. I would be really glad to receive criticism, corrections and proposals. I know this topic is controversial, but I think that it must be discussed. I just want Touhou fandom to become better. If you have any good ideas how to change the whole situation for better feel free to share them. Also feel free to share this post. There are also some other related thoughts about this topic: Afterwords: If after reading this post you want to hate ZUN or anybody else then I think you didn't understand this post. This post shows that hate didn't change the situation for better and only made it worse. We don't need to hate, We need to act. For the fans who are Still with us.

Thank you for your reply. Yes, Touhou fandom has not fallen yet, and the more people will be aware of those problems the more chances we have to make Touhou fandom blooming again. Sadly, yes. Because this is a pirate site, and after DMCA /r/touhou and Touhou Wiki decided to support Ruw's decision. There is even a group who wrote doujin circles to help them with DMCA. They even created hakureishrine.org (it is just redirect to Steam, and yes they still pay for this domain just for joke). Thank you too, for your reply. You understood it correctly. Just one more detail, there were dramas between main Touhou websites even between main websites. Not only that but also some strange limitations from ZUN and Ruw. You understood it correctly. Somewhat yes. The first solution also include forgetting about dramas at least between creators, so they could work together. Those are just my proposals and they maybe not ideal. I want to bring up this topic for discussion to find the best solution from realistic ones. Thank you for your reply. I also think that persuading ZUN now is nearly impossible. Touhou is mostly made for Japanese fans and ZUN mostly listen only to them, so without their help it would be impossible to do it. I understand it, but I don't have better solutions for now, I am sorry.

Mmmm, this topic has been something of a long time brewing, hasn't it? 1.) General groundworks, fanbase fragmentation 2.) ZUN himself and franchising 3.) Doesn't he only interact with his JP fans? I'm gonna stop here for now and let this thread build up. I'm interested in seeing how this develops as it has been some time since something like this captured my attention.

That would be near impossible. Most Fandom/Community/Whatever attempts at making a company (although you can hardly call Team Shanghai Alice a "company" as it is just one person, but I didn't have any other term to use here) notice them fail.One example I can think of is #Savetf2, which ended with TF2 team responding with a tweet and then returning to radio silence. Although because we aren't dealing with an AAA company here, we have higher chances of well.... I guess you can say "speaking up"? However the issue is that we probably would need at least a pretty sizeable minority with us and a way of persuading and forcing ZUN to stop working with Ruw, however the second part would be much easier to deal with. Other than that I'm also quite pessmistic towards other solutions, however I don't know why as I can't really explain it. It might just be a gut-feeling though. Also I apologize if I misunderstood something or didn't read something.

You've... scrambled my brain. I don't know what to say. At first I just want to get clarification on your main points, because honestly, your post is huge. Is this interpretation correct? -Problem1: Bigger websites (discord, facebook, etc.) get more popular -> fans leave main touhou websites -> fans are in smaller divided circles (ex: discord servers) -> more divide/drama -Problem2: Touhou getting enfranchised -> lower effort games -> more negativity towards the series -Outcome: Combining outcomes of problems 1 & 2 -> harder for newcomers to get in -> less fans -> entire fanbase begins to degrade (fanworks and events) -Solution: Everybody going back to centralized touhou websites OR creating a huge website list containing all fan circles I'm really not too sure if I understood everything. Please let me know if I misunderstood anything.

i'm impressed with your analysis. Well, I understand the pessimism and all of the unfortunate situations, but I still believe that touhou fandom have not yet fallen. I can't be considered an avid touhou fan (i entered the fandom 1 year and a half ago) but i guess we still have a chance, but, knowing how things happen, it's very unlikely that it'll occur (at least based on the fandom actions themselves, cited by you). Anyway, great point being brought here (i'm sure most people won't even read the first lines) and thanks for making me(us) aware of the whole thing. and also, for some reason it hadn't yet sunk in for me that we are considered the black sheep of the fandom

coming soon... a tale of romance... (teehee... how can i even thank you?) betrayal... (i thought you wanted to commit your entire life to me...) and BUTTONS... (OF COURSE I HAVE NO IDEA WHICH IS WHICH!!!) THE SANAE PARABLE/PROJECT or SANAE SAVES YOU FROM SUCCUMBING TO THE BUCKET available on 4/27!!!!

If 2hu is so great, why haven't they made 3hu? Checkmate, weebs.

the problem with being faster than light is that you can only live in darkness context : OMG IT'S THE DEPRESSED SONIC KID!!!! SAY THE LINE!!!!

nice wallpapers

these are my wallpapers (on my phone)

WHY ARE THESE WALLPAPERS SO GOOD HELP-

he sad :'(

Very cool topic! I read through most of the other replies, and I think you all have amazing ideas :) I especially love that idea, ReisenFanatic :D Feels like so many games these days are about violence so that sounds cool. Me personally, I always wanted to make a big open world game (map is like 2 km wide) in which there is no real objective except survival. You get to start at a human village, and try to make friends or enemies or whatever. I am thinking about a HUGE emphasis on npcs that adapt to the environment. For example if you help out certain people, their enemies start to hate you. Or if crop yields are getting low, villagers start blaming each other. You can even spread rumors that people may or may not believe! It's probably nearly impossible to make such a complicated system, but I like to imagine :) Anyways, the character and settings. Since I only play touhou 4, the main character is mountain youkai Orange. She might pass as a human to most, but needs to be a bit careful near people like Reimu. Overall nobody is really hostile at the start, but environmental factors (famines, rain, earthquakes), player interactions, and npc actions slowly shape relationships. It all depends how you react. You could be a helpful person that is friends with everybody. You could be a secret murderer that the police keep struggling to catch. It's your game, your world, your life! Writing this during class so I might be making no sense right now hehe. Thanks again Yumetou for the interesting question :P

he can see 3d movies without 3d glasses - donkeytf2

the _________________

guys i have a theory human civilisation will die in a few years because of greed and enshitification

Thank you for your reply. I am grad you liked this post and and I would be grad for your analysis. I have read most of your threads before I created an account here. You really made great analysis there. Thank you for your reply. I agree that uniting all the fans nearly impossible now. So I purposed a little more realistic solutuon (only unite creators). I didn't thought about a language factor, a really good point (but from what I know that is not that big problem in other fandoms. Mostly agree. I hope correctly understood the second part. I don't think the age is not a serious problem I think, because if the series is really good there would be fans even after 50 years. But yes, newer Touhou games are very different from older ones (not everyone likes it, but for me it is okey if they are made well). Also kind of ironic that ZUN wanted to create a shmup for PC98 which had way more bullets than Caves shmups. Agree with everything. Agree with everything. Yes, it is a big problem. That is one of the main reasons why fans leave the fandom. Yes, you are right. He also knows about Chinese community, because he visited China and met Touhou fans there. (Am I the only one who has strange feelings about this video? Agree with all. And that is a problem that they are that used to gachas. I thought that was obvious: mostly thwiki.cc Comiket: https://thwiki.cc/Comic_Market Reitaisai: https://thwiki.cc/Reitaisai Kouroumu: https://thwiki.cc/东方红楼梦 Meikasai: https://thwiki.cc/东方名华祭 Autumn Reitaisai: https://thwiki.cc/博丽神社秋季例大祭 Hakudenkai 2022: https://extra.hakudenkai.games Hakudenkai 2023: https://hakudenkai.games/ Again, thank you for your interesting thoughts.

Not amazing, but wooooooohooooooooooooooo

have you guys ever realized that we are a species born to struggle and suffer in this world and that nothing is actually worth doing, yet it's in our nature to push forwards regardless, simply because we like challenges and the feeling of being in a tight situation is simply what drives most of us towards success the sole reason we are alive is because of tthe hardships we face, and how we deal with them, so don't ever give up, for life is made of struggles

touhou is the only franchise that people can draw the characters slightly differently and people won’t complain and/or agree that’s them

WAAAH I JUST CANT RN

renaming mother computer to MOTHERCHIP you know, the main antagonist of mathilda's world (>w<)

not the wolf pic i'm crying

Moved into my first new place in years. Still don't have internet. Hoping to be back here more often. Eventually...

man

love the fact this emoji exists in the moriya shrine emoji selection

guess where i got this from?

you guys into analog horror?

koakumas help me there's a bucket in my room and it's speaking the language of gods will i make it out alive what should i do? ...is that the DEMONIC BUCKET(tm)? what?

yes i am cooking for my son and his wife it's his thirtieth birthday context is an illusion

i translated "cirno" 50 times and it gave me "i'm not satisfied"

how do i do the blue bg and funny font on windows movie maker? it's for 4/27

should i achieve world domination? >:D

2hus 2hus 2hus

show me anything and i'll explain why it is a tsp reference

YO I JUST GIVEN YOU 500 FAITH LEVEL CONGRATS :0000

my tsp hyperfixation is getting out of hand i can't even read fanfics without thinking about it now i can't continue the ERORMAM series please help

i have acquired a months worth of days won

an educational game featuring well-known touhou OCs (apple girl + half human half kappa half unoriginal) and unused and not well known 2hus (rin satsuki, yatsuhashi...) the game is a platformer, shooter, quiz game, rhythm game amalgamation-whatever (just like most edutainement stuff), it's kinda long and it teaches morals (like good manners, empathy, being yourself...) by first having dialogue, then the gamplay, then repeat the last steps differently (because the world is complex!) and finally a quiz and A REALLY CATCHY SONG!!!!!! it's gonna be called "rin moves to mysteryland!" because why not slip in a touhou 4kids patch reference? and eventually, it's gonna be for toddlers who just got to school and (i really love this) *fake cough* PRETEENS!!!!! BECAUSE THEY NEED A LITTLE REVIEW OF THEIR LESSONS (if you know what i mean)!!!!!! and if that actually exists, send me a link. it's for... research purposes. i love edutainement games.

there’s definitely gonna be two chapters of IF this week

Doki Doki Literature Club is one of my favorite games. It belongs to the meta horror genre (thank you that video for letting me know what genre these games belong to), basically just 4th wall breaking stuff. You think I'm gonna share DDLC ost right? WRONG. This is gonna be about Irisu Syndrome, which is a game that the creator of DDLC even said to be his inspiration while making DDLC. Irisu Syndrome is also one of my favorite game, the deep layered story (how I feel) makes me relate to it. It's a puzzle game with falling blocks that you shoot at, and the music accompany with it is relaxing AND very good....and sad? Sometimes sad I guess. But yeah this game is apparently the first meta horror game. The whole soundtrack is awesome. Kinda wanna add the last song with the last timestamp from the vid tho, but it kinda spoils a bit because of the theme and whatnot. Oh well....too much trouble....whatever... (reference from the game lol)

do you fw with black kray?

CONGRATS ON VETERAN

I saw an ad and it just hit me with such inspiration I was like "That's rad" and did some kicks and the lights turned on and my dad beat my ass because it was 3am and a school night.