Alright, so to develop a bit what I was talking about:
- after more than a year of playing the game (Touhou LW), I feel like it has become stale. Everything is the same daily grind which does not really bring you any sense of fulfilment. You just grind for rare story cards with awful drop rate, grind points for events, grind characters to raise their level, grind items to use on upgrading said units etc. The new game mods have not felt very exciting at all, and were rather a frustration, even if they are supposed to be the more "strategic" modes (Conflux and whatever EX there is), the endgame. But it only feels cheap, with enemies that have multiple HP bars and whose gimmick is to lock your abilities while one-shotting your units.
- the way in which they are giving priority to new content is weird to say the least. Chapter 3 (with its way too prolonged story in 4 acts) took over a year to be completed and translated on Global by what seems to be a 2 men team. However, it looks like it only took them 5 days to already translate the teaser for Chapter 4, and the Dev Letter on the 3rd of August might actually be what will announce that story's introduction on Global. Meanwhile, Chapter 3.5 is still ongoing, and was not solved yet. There is no sign we will get next part of Interlude, whose ending apparently ties into Chapter 4. And let's not talk about the story cards which for months have been waiting to receive a translation, still staying there with a "Coming soon...".
- the characters - oh god, the characters. I am quite scared to say, but I am not feeling excited about anything coming at all. Let's take it chronologically with the story. Chapter 3.5/Interlude has already been out for half a month. However, as a surprise, Sumireko did not come yet as a banner despite her being the protagonist of that story (contrary to the seeming custom of LW to add a new character as banner soon after their story). Then, what seems to be the new set of units. First set of 5 units to be more precise, all on the same theme: BEACH EPISODE. Yes, it was inevitable as a gacha game to get such a phase eventually. It would have been fine if the characters (Yukari, Reimu, Marisa and Hecatia; Summer Rinnosuke will probably be NPC) were just summer costumes. But NOOO, it is already confirmed that at least "Summer Yukari" will be a separate unit, and an Epic Fes one above anything else. It remains to be seen what will be happening to the other ones.
- one more chunk of characters - the ones announced in the past couple days. Is it just me, or many of them feel like either cheap recolored units or just do not fit aesthetically into Touhou? Like without the Touhou brand stamped all over them, I would not have been able to recognize them. Before, alts seemed to be only the exception, that character who used to be affected most by the Lost Word incident. Chapter 1 had no alt. Chapter 2 had Scarlet Marisa. Chapter 3 introduced Tiny Yuyuko, Mysterious Sword Master, Blue Reimu and "loli Yukari". Then Hifuu pretty much went full on alts only. Which in itself is interesting if well executed. But now, I feel like they are becoming slightly too many, with some hard to recognize who they originally were. Let's take this one for example:
Initially, I though this was an alt version of Sanae. However, surprise, surprise, this is actually Yuuka. Had I not been told, I would have never realized it. The design itself is nice, I am not gonna lie. However, I am starting to feel like this game is starting to scream more and more OC galore, as they are running out of official 2hus to add. But this is more of a problem with gacha games in general. Always forced to add new content to stay relevant, they had to add everyone in as soon as possible. And now, after 2 years of JP, they are scraping the barrel. Once the whole UM cast is in, it is very much game over until ZUN comes up wit new characters - of course, if LW survives until then. And it is not necessarily about the fact they are adding alts. Again, it is fine, since we are talking about a premise revolving around going to alternate universes. The only problem is that these characters might take the spot of the official characters. When the game came out on Global, alts did not exist yet, the tier list being made out of the original 2hus. Now, if the OCs take the spot, what will happen to the game? Will this just be a game that has the word "Touhou" in its name, but will be more about alts? Will this become just "Touhou OCs - The Game"? Sometimes, it really feels like the real 2hus barely get any love anymore. If these new OCs will be mostly UFES and SFES, I am not very sure relevant that designation will be anymore. I do not really know how relevant the designations are anymore. It is already confusing that we have 4 different paper doll kinds, or that 2 new rarity levels were introduced in just a month. The normal Touhou characters, especially those from like last year, are no longer relevant, and will be replaced by reskins of them, I mean "retros" just because nobody really seems to be planning to update them. I wonder what will this game bring up next...
tl;dr: Honestly, I feel very fatigued, and without high expectations or excitement for what is to come. I just want to finally finish the collection of personal Top 10 Touhou characters, and then to take a break. Maybe part ways with this game at last, or just take a long break until anything new and actually interesting will be introduced. I still have hopes for this game to bring in something good, even if my hope is low.
As for you,
@Isaac I think LW Global lost a good chance to add Parsee with the SA Koishi banner. In my case, I guess Wood EX will be the moment they will finally add Raiko into the game. As for Chimata, only god knows when she will come. I just hope it will not be too late for that, until I will finally break and lose all hope and interest in this game.
