Touhou Tenkuushou (16) |OT| Hidden Star in Four Seasons

[cj_iwakura]

Details

• Developer / Publisher: Team Shanghai Alice / ZUN
  
• Platform: Steam (Out Now)
• Genre: Bullet Hell Shmup
  
• Price: $14.99 (Steam) (Demo available too!)

What Is Touhou?

For a long version, please see the community thread.

Short version:

Touhou has been on two primary platforms. The earliest games in the series were made for the PC-98 computers by a group called "Amusement Makers".

After that series came to an end, a former member of the group who goes by the moniker of "ZUN" formed his own team which took the reigns of the Touhou series; 'Team Shanghai Alice'.

This change in development lead to the Windows series of bullet hell games that the series is currently best known for. The first was Touhou 06: Embodiment of Scarlet Devil.

Each has continually evolved by improving on gameplay, mechanics, art, and music, but the core story is usually the same: play as one of several characters who is hellbent on exterminating every youkai in their way.

And here we are at 16.

??? version:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAbhJk4YJns

Gameplay
Short version: kill all the things before they kill you.

Long version:

Touhou has two key factors you'll want to take advantage of to make your life easier.

One, the item collect line.

Fly above here and get every item on the screen instantly.

Two: spell cards, capturing them and you.

When a boss loses enough life, it will break out a dangerous attack called a Spell Card. If you manage to deal enough damage to the boss, you 'capture' the score card and get a ton of points.

Otherwise you get no bonus.

You can also see the boss' remaining life depicted around them in a red circle, as well as a handy red indicator along the bottom of the screen that indicates its current location so you can focus on dodging.

Can Has Fan Translation?
http://steamcommunity.com/app/745880/discussions/0/1485487749771634089/
Sure. The patch is out, have an enjoy.

Characters
(Each has their own specialties. Reimu has homing attacks but weak strength, for instance, while Marisa is a war machine of magic firepower, but has reduced range.)

Media

Steam Trailer


Demo Playthrough

And don't forget:

(Don't be afraid to start in easy mode, we won't judge. Much.)

 

[Theswweet]

I'm currently getting my arse kicked in Stage 4, but I can't say I'm not having a great time! I'm glad my arcade stick works out of the box.

 

[LordGorchnik]

I only every played 6, 7, and 8. Touhou is not something I follow well at all. The characters, lore, game play, among other things just got blown way too large all those years ago I just couldn't keep up.

 

[Dineren]

I'm terrible at bullet hell games, but ever since playing PCB I can't resist picking these up. At the very least I'll get to enjoy some great music.

 

[Dandy Crocodile]

Tan Cirno is hilarious. I love that she's playable even if it means others like Sakuya didn't make the cut.

Spoiler

ZUN please make Kogasa playable

 

[cj_iwakura]

Not bad for a sight read...

I ALMOST got the last spell card of stage 2's boss. Died literally in the last second.

Spinning Top is NASTY.

 

[shockdude]

This game's difficulty curve is pretty absurd. Gained a bunch of lives and lost them all in Stage 5 due to the most obnoxious bullet patterns that ZUN has ever devised.

I like the OT. That Steam-Money picture from the steam artwork page is brilliant.
Should there be a section describing basic controls and mechanics? In particular, using Focus and using the subshot/season release.

Also I think it'd be cool if we came up with a clever subtitle for the OT.
東方天空璋 ～ Hidden Star in Four Seasons (Touhou 16) |OT| Coming from behind to the top of the Steam ratings.

Spoiler

東方天空璋 ～ Hidden Star in Four Seasons (Touhou 16) |OT| It's the Dark Souls of Undertale meets Cuphead

 

[dadjumper]

Oh shit, this is out on steam? Gotta buy it to support ZUN!

 

[ZoronMaro]

Chiming in for the OT looks good cj!

I've already played a few times, and boy do I suck, I haven't played these games in a while but even on easy I need at least 3 continues. At least I beat it though, going to move onto normal mode.

 

[Theswweet]

I managed to get up to Stage 5 on Normal, and after bumping my head against the wall there I decided to try beating the game in Easy, then start working on 1CC and go from there.

So far I've beaten the game on Easy! Now I just need to work on 1CC...

 

[cj_iwakura]

This game's difficulty curve is pretty absurd. Gained a bunch of lives and lost them all in Stage 5 due to the most obnoxious bullet patterns that ZUN has ever devised.

I like the OT. That Steam-Money picture from the steam artwork page is brilliant.
Should there be a section describing basic controls and mechanics? In particular, using Focus and using the subshot/season release.

Also I think it'd be cool if we came up with a clever subtitle for the OT.
東方天空璋 ～ Hidden Star in Four Seasons (Touhou 16) |OT| Coming from behind to the top of the Steam ratings.

Spoiler

東方天空璋 ～ Hidden Star in Four Seasons (Touhou 16) |OT| It's the Dark Souls of Undertale meets Cuphead

Click to shrink...

Would you believe I cleared the demo without knowing about the season release mechanic?

 

[Durante]

It's up to almost 17k owners now on SteamSpy already, which is ridiculously successful for what it is.

 

[AtticNotes]

I actually saw a Chinese discussion about how it didn't sell very well, "VA-11 Hall-A sold 200k" and what not.

Most people in Japan who wanted the game already have the physical disc. Semiofficial sources numbered the hardcore Japanese Touhou fans at ~140,000. If Touhou becomes Steam-exclusive AND all barriers to using Steam in Japan are cleared, 100,000 should be the sales baseline there, assuming a 70% conversion rate. And that's not counting casual fans.

(Sources: 1. An unserious article by the editor of official Touhou books said "200,000 Touhou fans of all Japan"; 2. An ad this July for WaHH, a manga largely read by dedicated fans, declared its 1 million total sales milestone at 7 volumes, which averages to 140k.)


For now, this Steam release is mostly purchased by existing foreign fans. Touhou's influence among Chinese anime fandom is immerse (like, smaller than shounen tentpoles, but comparable to the most popular otaku-oriented shows, except Touhou has been around longer), and Steam is widely adopted in China. Nonetheless, I expect a very low conversion rate because not that many fans actually want to play the shmups. A 5-digit to 100k sales seems correct.

Things should be different if they'd release the fighting game Touhou 10.5 with its expansion 12.3, which might be the most globally popular Touhou game by far. I can imagine that reaching 20k owners in the first three days. But they aren't going to do that very soon.

 

[Dash Kappei]

Thanks for the thread CJ although it would have been good to have some media... dunno like a gameplay video or something.

 

[cj_iwakura]

Thanks for the thread CJ although it would have been good to have some media... dunno like a gameplay video or something.

Click to shrink...

The Steam page(which i linked to)has a trailer, if it helps.

 

[Dineren]

For those using the translation patch, are you leaving the seasonal items transparent? I disabled that line and so far they don't seem any more distracting than before. I haven't played very far though, maybe that changes later on.

 

[AtticNotes]

It might be better to have slightly fewer and smaller images, plus a few spell card screenshots in the OP.

Things should be different if they'd release the fighting game Touhou 10.5 with its expansion 12.3, which might be the most globally popular Touhou game by far. I can imagine that reaching 20k owners in the first three days. But they aren't going to do that very soon.

Click to shrink...

Addenum: Touhou 15.5, the game they are actually scheduled to release on Steam next January, is the 3rd iteration of the Astra Super Stars-inspired fighters. This sub-series are the least popular official games. 15.5 shows signs of gameplay refinement over its predecessors, but it's unlikely to win the 12.3 audience back.

I can''t say I enjoyed playing the sub-series, but do admire the devs' dedication to their vision over financial gain. They could have kept reiterating on their most successful formula till the end of the day if they wanted.

 

[cj_iwakura]

It might be better to have slightly fewer and smaller images, plus a few spell card screenshots in the OP.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, I mostly grabbed them from screens of my demo playthrough. I'll see if I can get more spell card images and maybe resize the other images tomorrow.

 

[shockdude]

For those using the translation patch, are you leaving the seasonal items transparent? I disabled that line and so far they don't seem any more distracting than before. I haven't played very far though, maybe that changes later on.

Click to shrink...

I left the season items as default. I personally avoid graphical mods for Touhou games, and I got used to the season item transparency anyway.

Currently trying to 1CC the game with Reimu, since I've already 1CC'd with Marisa + Fall before the Steam release.
Reimu + Spring is an awful shottype due to the lack of shot damage and the limited usefulness of the release. I might switch to Reimu + Winter instead.

 

[Dineren]

I left the season items as default. I personally avoid graphical mods for Touhou games, and I got used to the season item transparency anyway.

Click to shrink...

Wait, maybe I misunderstood, but I thought transparent seasonal items was a mod done by the patch. Are they transparent in the original?

Edit: I guess I can answer my own question, I opened the Japanese version and they are not transparent.

 

[Barrylocke]

Blegh, I'm getting a Direct3d error with the demo for this. I'd rather not buy the game until I'm able to resolve that. I recall having a similar problem with either LLK or DDC, but it's been quite awhile since those and I forgot what I did if anything.

 

[shockdude]

Wait, maybe I misunderstood, but I thought transparent seasonal items was a mod done by the patch. Are they transparent in the original?

Edit: I guess I can answer my own question, I opened the Japanese version and they are not transparent.

Click to shrink...

oh whoops. Regardless I left the season items as default, whatever "default" is.

Blegh, I'm getting a Direct3d error with the demo for this. I'd rather not buy the game until I'm able to resolve that. I recall having a similar problem with either LLK or DDC, but it's been quite awhile since those and I forgot what I did if anything.

Click to shrink...

Should be resolved if you install DirectX 9 Redistributable. On mobile so I can't give a direct link.
Ironically if you buy the game, Steam will (should) install DirectX for you.

 

[cj_iwakura]

Added some more screens and trailers, resized the characters.

Couldn't find many spell card images, but I'll put more up if people have them.

 

[AtticNotes]

Sales seems to have stabilized. Meanwhile, they posted an update (in English only, not bilingual like past updates) restating the Touhou spoiler rule: don't stream or upload videos of game endings or Music Room (because the latter may show spoilers).

 

[Barrylocke]

The full version on Steam does seem to work, as suggested. I was also reminded that my laptop keyboard ghosts in a way that makes playing Touhou games with it unfeasible without something like Autohotkey. When I did the OT for the Playism release of Double Dealing Character, I included a section on ghosting that is worth sharing again.

I try to use the keyboard controls, but I'm unable to do but so many actions at once and it's ruining my game!

Some keyboards (such as on many laptops) can only allow a certain amount of keystrokes in at once. In a game like Touhou where you may be moving, focusing, shooting, and then suddenly trying to use a bomb, all at once, it can be frustrating, especially since there's no native option to change keyboard keys. The best two options I've found for this is to either switch to a controller (the game oddly DOES lets you change controller settings) or use AutoHotKey to set up a short script that can let you use keyboard keys frequently. Here's the script I use for AHK to play Touhou games on my laptop:

Click to shrink...

#NoEnv
SendMode Input

a::LShift
s::z
d::x
f::c
z::LCtrl

You can use this tool to determine if your keyboard has ghosting that will affect your Touhou games and then find a solution for you.

 

[shockdude]

HSiFS's sales have jumped to over 21K, possibly a result of the holidays and the visibility from the Steam Autumn Sale.
Also Steam changed its review helpfulness metric recently, and since thenHSiFS became the highest reviewed game on Steam.

The full version on Steam does seem to work, as suggested. I was also reminded that my laptop keyboard ghosts in a way that makes playing Touhou games with it unfeasible without something like Autohotkey. When I did the OT for the Playism release of Double Dealing Character, I included a section on ghosting that is worth sharing again.

#NoEnv
SendMode Input

a::LShift
s::z
d::x
f::c
z::LCtrl

You can use this tool to determine if your keyboard has ghosting that will affect your Touhou games and then find a solution for you.

Click to shrink...

AutoHotKey is great. I'm too used to using my left hand for directional movement, so I rebound the arrow keys to ESDF. This is what my AHK script looks like:

#MaxHotkeysPerInterval 1000
#NoEnv
SendMode Input

e::Up
d::Down
s::Left
f::Right
j::z
l::x
o::c
k::LShift
i::LCtrl

 

[Deleted member 8861]

Just got the demo, it's amazing that a Touhou game is on Steam and for an actually respectable price to boot (25 lira in Turkey, which is sensible).

 

[Deleted member 8861]

wait... THAT'S what "Item Get Border Line" is about? HOLY FUCK THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING