Gri

So, what are you guys thoughts on the demo of Touhou 19? I have just finished the demo Story Mode with all 5 characters, and so far the game seems pretty much the same thing as PoFV, except slightly better/worse in some area. I did play in Japanese, so I might have missed some things. I didn't try to find out what the card did, so I can't talk about those. The goods: - Graphics are ok - Soundtrack is ok. Nothing groundbreaking yet. - Unlike PoFV, you now have 2 special attacks for your screen (Lvl1 and Lvl2 charge) and 2 special attacks to send to the opponent (Lvl3 and Lvl4). It's cool that the Lvl1 attack is now less powerfull. This could mean that we'd see less characters clearing all enemies with one attack. - Clearing a stage with a "Perfect Victory" gives you a different card. It might get frustrating to try and unlock these, but we will see in the full game how card play out. - Animals spirits seems to have various effect. This is cool, since the player can focus on taking down a specific type depending on the situation. The neutrals: - The slow mechanic can be good, but sometime it plays against you when you are trying to charge an attack Having a key for Shooting/Charging, a key for Slow and a key for Bomb might give more control to the player. - Bombs are limited. This can make bad RNG more punishing, but it also means the match will take less time (In PoFV, have rechargeable Lvl2 attacks that clears bullets could drag on some games, until the bullet speed become really fast) - This might be a Story Mode thing, but the character send a special spell card boss and when you kill it, the match automatically ends. If this is limited to Story Mode, it could be a nice thing since it makes the mode a bit more special. - There's no Character Balance, but at the same time it was to be expected that Reimu and Marisa would be stronger than the other characters. The bads: - I never really had this issue before, but sometime the screen can be pretty hard to read when there's a lot spirit+bullet+special bullets+focus area. It makes things a bit chaotic. - The controls. While you can now auto-fire, you can no longer use one key for shooting and charging. I think I'll get used to it, but being able to choose another control scheme similar to PoFV would be nice. - Had a visual glitch that made the background look weird, like the bottom half of the background was vanishing. Might be just me. - Bombs are pretty weak and don't clear much bullets. So far, the game feels like just more PoFV, so if you liked that game you may like that one.

LLS is definitely one of the easier Touhou game. I only struggled with Lunatic. It is a good game though for those who prefer more simple Touhou. The mechanics are simple (no UFO, aggressive grazing, aggressive POC). It was cool playing LLS to discover the game that solidified the basics of every Touhou game that came after it: Reimu and Marisa being the main characters, Reimu having homing shot and being more beginner friendly (you just have to focus on defense), Marisa having powerfull piercing lasers but more for advanced player (you have to aim at the enemy), death-bomb giving you a "mercy" delay before killing you (while you can death-bomb on purpose, the delay is so small that this delay is mostly to avoid situation where you think "what the hell! I bombed!" like in SoEW where you get hit while pressing the bomb key). If I remember right, this is also where Graze is introduced, along with Focus to make dodging much natural (no need to do micro-taps on the keyboard). All in all, I recommend to anyone whose looking to see where it all began. EDIT: Forgot about the soundtrack: This is where Zun also started syncing the music to the stage, which is really great as it make both the music and the game more enjoyable and memorable. My favorite tracks are all in the Stage 4 (the stage theme and both boss themes)

I meant characters from stage 6 or extra I know there's an extra mode. I dunno if it will be like in PoFV

I voted based on who I think will get in. PoFV didn't have any stage 6 or extra stage character, so I ain't expecting those in this game. The game theme seems to be "animal" and "spirit" related (there's also a connection to the "market"), so I don't expect anyone from Touhou 16 (except the already confirmed Aunn). If I had to choose though, it would be Larva, since she's a fairy and in PoFV we got a few stage 2 characters.

Just watched it. I didn't understand the subtitles, but it seems like the finale it going to be a bit bloated. Main plot seems to be that Marisa is going to investigate who did this to Reimu (Remillia seemed to only have provoked Marisa for fun, and Reimu is clearly not dead). During the investigation, the SA and UFO cast is going to be there. I am afraid the SA and UFO cast won't get much time to shine, and at this point it would be better to just no include them in the plot at all. Including them will rush the plot, which ain't a good thing. This is based on the fact this is going to last only 1 episode. If it's a whole "arc", the it may be feasible. Like I said though, not expecting much. Oh yeah, and let's not forget memories-of-phantasm's signature: hot spring fanservice

Thanks for posting. Here's hoping the finale's decent (my expectation are low for this one)

For me, it's a weird story. I have been aware of the "Ran Ran Ruu" video since ~2008. Then, playing Ys and Etrian Odyssey, some people mentions that Touhou too had a good soundtrack. All I knew at that point was that it was a bullet-hell game. Then, more recently (late-2021), I no longer got hyped on the newer Ys games (and Trails), Etrian Odyssey died with the 3DS, Atlus didn't released anything interesting except cheap Persona5 related stuff and an underwhelming SMT5. My backlog was getting pretty empty, and by coincidence, there was a sale on Steam for XSeed, the localizer of the older Ys games. In that list of games, there was a Touhou fan-game, Scarlet Curiosity, which was a clone of the older Ys game that I liked a lot. It seemed a bit "less-refined", but I decided to give it a go, knowing it was a fan-game (I was planning on trying the real Touhou game after that game). While clearing that game, I got into the Extra dungeon, and in there, the Extra boss was waiting. Her theme's remix was a heavily different from her original theme, so it took a good 1m30s before I finally recognize the music: the same music as the Ran Ran Ruu. I was mind blown, and I knew exactly what happened: I somehow managed to avoid ANY reference to the original theme during all those years, which means I could have known about Touhou MUCH earlier. I have never been much of a "meme-guy", but the "Ran Ran Ruu" meme always stuck with me for some reason. Also, I knew about IOSYS because they did an Etrian Odyssey song about "FOE" (yet again, somehow completely avoided their other songs that are Touhou-related). It was fate at this point, I HAD to play the Touhou games. I searched "Touhou game" online, and quickly found this site (which I learned was a piracy-site later, but since most Touhou games can't be bought anyway, it didn't matter. Today, I bought almost all the main game of Steam), then downloaded Touhou 6. I got beaten pretty badly on Normal, and thought the Extra Stage was just something I would never tackle Fast-Forward to today, I cleared all games on Normal and Hard with all shot-types (including PC-98 and some spin-off). Currently, I am doing Lunatic, and cleared 1,4,6-10 and their Extra stages (all shot types for the main games, just one for the Extra). Currently at 11, where I only cleared the main game with ReimuA and cleared Extra with ReimuB. It was quite the trip.

That's up to you. How much do you think you should have paid for PCB and PoFV? Keep in mind some of these game had free demo before being released, so if you only played a little on the full (but pirated) version, then I think it easily count as a "demo". I did the same thing. I didn't know if I would like Shump games, so I downloaded EoSD as a "demo" and gave it a shoot (and I though these games all were inaccessible outside of Japan anyway). A year and a half later, I played all games and I almost bought every official Touhou games on steam (even those I didn't really like to compensate for the PC-98 era). As long as you aren't abusing the "privileges" this site grants you, it's fine.

This is something I have seen in many places: "veteran" fans looking down on others "novice" fans for not knowing as much as them, gatekeeping them rather than welcoming them to the community and encouraging them to see other stuff other than the "mainstream" stuff that only "noob" would like. To me, we all started somewhere, and that kind of behavior is just childish (can't people enjoy more than 1 thing in life? why must there always be a "winner" that's better than a "loser"? can't we all just relax ?). Unfortunately, we can't do much about those people, other than not doing the same thing as them. Sharing more obscure content to new fans is the way to go to prevent this "elitist" culture from settling into this forum. So far, I think this place is rather decent. , even I don't write much though (I don't like writing big posts, and answering a big analysis post with just "I agree with X" isn't that pertinent ), from the post I have seen, I only saw "tension" once or twice. Don't get too down when conflicts happens. As they say "tomorrow is another day"

One advice I can give to help avoid NSFW (I too, hate that kind of content, so I just avoid it): On Youtube, I sometimes got really borderline videos thumbnails from some Touhou channels (example: A naked Orin having her back to the "camera", making "that" face). The solution: Use an extension called "Video Blocker" to block each channels that post that kind of content. After a week, I didn't see anymore of that stuff. That extension is also very good to block channels that likes to spoil stuff. As for Moriya Shrine, I have never seen any NSFW stuff here. So far, whenever people brought up that kind of content (or something close to it), they used the "Spoiler" tag to hide this kind of stuff, so unless I missed something or you click on them by accident, you shouldn't see anything. Of course, there might be some topic that directly that about those, but the Title of the post should be enough for you to see it's a topic you should avoid.

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Okay, so here my real answer to that topic (sorry for that SoTN reference, it was too tempting): I personally don't like the concept of "Waifu" at all. You can like/dislike fictional characters, but for me being literally in love with a character is just unhealthy. This is similar to having feelings for someone who doesn't know you and has never seen you (like a actor/actress, for example). In those case, you can develop an obsession with them, where you fabricate an idealize version of them. The difference, though, between real people and Waifus is that real people are real (duh), and therefor can do things that do not match your "phantasm" of them, which may help break that obsession a little, by showing you that what you though of them wasn't real. At this point, you can deny it, but deep down you'll always know they are not what you wanted them to be. Waifus, on the other hand, are not real, and their "character/lives" are limited to whatever material they are from (game, anime, novel). If you fall for a Waifu, you know she will never change (unless they are in newly released material). She will always be that character you are in love with, and since her "character/lives" is limited, you can always fill-in-the-blanks with whatever you wish (the classic example is making the Waifu horny even when there no indication at all of that officially). The Waifu will never break this "phantasm" you have. Worse, some fans that have the same Waifu may reinforce that "phantasm" by making artwork of it (like those Fusu post, for example). This is why people like them, they are "concept" that are vaguely defined, and can be slightly-changed to match each of their taste. It is much easier than having a real relationship where the person may betray your "idealize" version of them and I am no expert, but isn't this a necessary step toward a real healthy relationship? To accept the other, for both the goods and the bads? Isn't it a bit childish to consider only the good? I never had any Waifus, but I do have some fictional characters I like. Let's pick the Touhou project as a example, I quite like Satori in Touhou 11. I like the concept of someone able to read mind, and becoming a bit "jaded" (translation of tired + indifferent) because people are predictable and nothing can really surprise her (she also isn't shy to use her ability at all). In her boss theme, there's a hint of creepiness', which shows why people avoid her (and in the game, the theme picks up exactly where she becomes serious). In her stage theme, there's a hint of lonliness, which could both means she's lonely or simply that her Palace is lonely because there's no one there except her (and some animals). Now, how did the fandom turn her into a Waifu? By focusing only on her "lonely" side, and making up that she want someone to comfort her from that loneliness, completely disregarding the fact that 1) She isn't that lonely, she has pets that don't mind being around her 2) She ain't horny, way too "jaded" for that 3) They wouldn't last a day having their mind being read against their will (everyone has secrets). Now, I know this is all fictional, but if you reconstruct a character so that you'll love them, taking only the parts you want, ignoring what doesn't match your taste, making up what that character would tell you (as oppose to someone actually talking to you, possibly challenging you), can you truly say you love them? Aren't you just loving your own image of them? This is almost like saying "I like sushi, when it is covered in chocolate and there are no sushi in it"

What is a waifu? A miserable little pile of pixels.

Well, I think the main game are a very important part of Touhou, I mean, this is where all these characters and music comes from. I think a so-called "Touhou fan" should at least take a look at the original games and soundtracks to see what is (otherwise, how can you tell if a fan-work is an interesting extension of the Touhou project, or just some uninspired BS (both for story and music remixes) ), and at least try one game (to define whether the gameplay is for them or not). And no, these game are not hard when you choose Easy (excluding 10-12 which have the bad continue system and don't allow to increase the number of lives) I personally have a really hard time to believe those people that claim they can't clear PCB on Easy with all continues, you can practically clear it without moving. 1CC is another thing, but with a 1C you at least get to experience the soundtrack in-game (in some stage, the music follows the stage progression) and most of the dialogs (endings being lock behind 1CC, and some games that lock content from Easy). Yes there's a lot of fan content, and Touhou wouldn't be Touhou without it, but the same goes for the main content, so I think you all shouldn't underestimate it's importance.

Quick Post: Thanks for sharing this interview.

Here's my simple take on that: Re-draw of an original art is a re-interpretation, and this means alterations will be made. Artist are free to re-interpret art as they want, but spectators are also free to like or dislike a re-interpretation. It all comes down to how people respect each other freedom (and of course, artists respecting each other). The only Touhou fan art I saw are from Youtube thumbnail, and I saw some "re-interpretation" I didn't like (making character more sexy or making them psyco-edgy). I choose to respect the artists, move on and not waste time and energy on trying to impose MY taste on others. It's always more productive to focus on thing you enjoy, rather than things you don't. I know the example in this topic was about "re-interpretation" of a character from one skin-tone to another (not too sure I to describe that accurately in english), but I think any alterations should be considered and treated the same way (political, sexual, edgy, kawaii, close-to-original). There's a public for each taste, even unpopular ones.

For that second question, is it:

I see. Hopefully they'll release their albums digitally. I know I could get it now (heck, youtube is the only reason I discovered them), but since I like their work, I would like to support them. Thanks for searching. I'll keep an eye out on that tweet.

A new Demetori album has just released (Oh yeah). But it seems like it can only be bought physically, and it's already sold out (at least on MelonBook). Does anyone knows if the album can be purchased digitally? Or if the circle has some kind of Patreon so I can at least support them?