So I've had a lot of "What the heck is Touhou" ever since I've started mentioning it here. I don't blame anyone for not knowing what it is, since Touhou is one of those things that are extremely popular in one place, but the rest of the world probably don't know what it is. In this case, most of Japan is familiar with Touhou, but not many Westerners know about it. Might as well make a thread to enlighten people on the subject.

 

 

 

The Touhou Project: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touhou_Project

 

 

 

tl;dr version:

 

 

 

The Touhou Project is a series of danmaku shooting games made by Team Shanghai Alice, which is really only one person that goes by the alias ZUN. It plays like a standard vertical shooting game, so you don't really need to understand Japanese to play. You choose your character, your weapon type, and your difficulty level (Easy, Medium, Hard, Lunatic). You go through 6 levels shooting everything that moves and everything that doesn't move. You then encounter a boss at the end of the level. After the beating the game, you unlock an extra level, that is much harder. Sounds a lot like any typical shooting game right? You would be correct, but Touhou has one thing that makes it much different than regular shooting games (Besides the fact that all characters are girls).

 

 

 

This is Danmaku:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Danmaku (literally Bullet Hell in japanese) is a genre of shooting games where the enemies shoot massive amounts of bullets, and you have to dodge them while shooting back. From the image above you probably think winning is impossible, but only a few pixels of the bullet will actually make you lose a life. Bullets have a hitbox, and your character has a hitbox as well. They are only a few pixels big, so its very common that a bullet will have contact with your character but it won't kill them.

 

 

 

Touhou is for you if you like:

 

- Challenging games

 

- Fancy shapes and patterns

 

- Shooting games

 

- The Japanese culture (AKA Anime)

 

 

 

Touhou isn't for you if you hate:

 

- Losing (It will happen often)

 

- Concentrating (You need a lot of concentration to dodge bullets)

 

 

 

Touhou games can easily be downloaded via the internet if you are interested. A demo of the newest Touhou game, Touhou 11, Subterranean Animism, can be downloaded here. Microsoft Apploc might be required to run the exe.

 

 

 

All other Touhou games can be downloaded from here:

 

 

 

http://www.doujinstyle.com/touhougames.php

 

 

 

Still tl;dr? Watch this replay from Touhou 8, Imperishable Night and all will be answered:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PS: The game isn't really that fast, it just speeds through the non-boss parts. :P

I'll try it out, seems like it might require a lot of movement though...

Wow...That looks extremely interesting. And insanely difficult. Precise movements...I definitely need to try it out...

I tried that extra stage after seeing it in the thread about recommending PC games and IT"S SO DAMN HARD!!! I'm serious, I've never seen a shooting game THIS difficult :shock:

 

 

 

FYI the rest of the game (Touhou 8) is MUCH easier (and short), that's just an ultra-hard extra stage.

 

 

 

Oh and the second song in that video (Mokou's theme or something) has this freaking sweet remix called Eternal Nocturne (search that on youtube to hear it) which is so freakin sweet I went ahead and got it on my I-pod. :thumbsup:

I tried that extra stage after seeing it in the thread about recommending PC games and IT"S SO DAMN HARD!!! I'm serious, I've never seen a shooting game THIS difficult :shock:

 

 

 

FYI the rest of the game (Touhou 8) is MUCH easier (and short), that's just an ultra-hard extra stage.

 

 

 

Oh and the second song in that video (Mokou's theme or something) has this freaking sweet remix called Eternal Nocturne (search that on youtube to hear it) which is so freakin sweet I went ahead and got it on my I-pod. :thumbsup:

 

 

 

Imperishable Night has always been a fan favorite because it was one of the easier ones, the choice of 8 characters, and great music. Extra stage is hard, but its nothing compared to the extra stage in Touhou 7 Perfect Cherry Blossom.

 

 

 

Also, Touhou music is awesome enough that there are dojin circles that remix their songs.

 

 

 

Here's my favorite song:

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think I just [cabbage]ed myself.

 

 

 

Here's my favorite song:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Argh.. I hate that song..

 

 

 

Now I don't want to play this anymore... :lol:

I tried that extra stage after seeing it in the thread about recommending PC games and IT"S SO DAMN HARD!!! I'm serious, I've never seen a shooting game THIS difficult :shock:

 

 

 

FYI the rest of the game (Touhou 8) is MUCH easier (and short), that's just an ultra-hard extra stage.

 

 

 

Oh and the second song in that video (Mokou's theme or something) has this freaking sweet remix called Eternal Nocturne (search that on youtube to hear it) which is so freakin sweet I went ahead and got it on my I-pod. :thumbsup:

 

 

 

Imperishable Night has always been a fan favorite because it was one of the easier ones, the choice of 8 characters, and great music. Extra stage is hard, but its nothing compared to the extra stage in Touhou 7 Perfect Cherry Blossom.

 

 

 

Also, Touhou music is awesome enough that there are dojin circles that remix their songs.

 

 

 

Here's my favorite song:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good god, they call that easier? :lol:

Holy crap.

 

 

 

I love games that can't be beaten by 99% of the population, but this is going to be a REAL challenge. I'll try it definitely. An average western person will hate this game because they're used to wuss-games with checkpoints every 10 seconds and clicking 1 button to complete 20% of an area while lazily reading an online forum.

 

 

 

Really, this game is an ultimate brain and reflex test. You can't beat this game without being insanely skilled or talented/powerful brains that can process dozens of events per millisecond.

 

 

 

I'm also amazed how ZUN has created everything in this game single-handedly.. Animations, coding, bullet patterns, real music, characters...

Damn this game is nuts. Have to play again when I've actually gotten sleep recently :lol:

I've read a fair few touhou doujins, I know most of the character's kanon story stuff (albiet there isnt an awful lot) but I've never actually played any of the games. I keep meaning to, but I can never find a reliable download source.

I've read a fair few touhou doujins, I know most of the character's kanon story stuff (albiet there isnt an awful lot) but I've never actually played any of the games. I keep meaning to, but I can never find a reliable download source.

 

 

 

I know of some good download sources, the one I have in the original post is the demo of the newest game. If you want a previous game though, feel free to PM me a request.

 

 

 

And might I suggest Silent Sinner in Blue for a doujin worth reading through.

A few months back I saw some videos on the internet relating to Touhou (I love their music) and like Jaziek I've been wanting to play the game but perhaps after this post I'll get off my lazy [wagon] and download it. The doujins never fail to keep me entertained.

 

 

 

Anywaaay, maybe when I play the game I'll reply something productive to this thread.

Lol, mano, I never heard of that song before... and I know most Japanese songs. And since were on the subject... who doesnt like Exile? :thumbsup: Although I love Seamo.

 

hWZjJ6eFoF0

 

 

 

Ive never heard of Tohou as well... Ill ask some friends here in Japan if they know such a game.

 

 

 

(Sort of spammy... :lol:)

 

 

 

I might try the game back when Im in America. It seems pretty interesting, although Im pretty caught in RS... :oops:

Oh and btw here's the kickass remix I was talking about (with a badass mokou picture):

 

 

 

e_6mN0iYQuA

 

 

 

and even though I've only tried a few times, I can't get past her 3rd spell in Imperishable nights! Partially because it's a long road to get there and I've already lost a lot of bombs/health. The boss just before is annoying as well, her first spell always gets me, the second one gets me almost always, the third is just ridiculous. Then there's that crazy enemy just before Mokou who sends a circular pattern of shots in all directions, very pretty but hard as hell.

 

 

 

I wonder if I'll ever have the patience to beat that extra stage.

 

 

 

EDIT:

 

 

 

Here's the second most kickass remix:

 

 

 

Q_bxgIG9jak

 

 

 

Now this one's almost as great and has a beat that I would be willing to dance to, only one problem is that, compared to the original, there's a really fast-paced piano mini-solo right near the beginning that you don't really hear so well in the remix. Oh well, it's still awesome :

On the topic of remixes, here is Marisa Kirisame's theme, stage 4B boss battle:

 

 

 

 

 

 

We could have an entire thread in the Music, Movies & Television forum for awesome music like this. :lol:

Well I'm really 'into' the whole touhou 8 music simply because after seeing that vid on "Recommended PC games" I started watching it, was blown away by the bullet hell that the game it was but I only really began to take interest when Mokou's theme started. Eventually I decided to play the game myself so I sort of played the game simply because of one of the songs in the game.

 

 

 

It does have some other awesome tracks though, Marisa's is pretty good but I have bad memories of her fight; there's something about her stars that drive me INSANE! I have such a hard time dodging them for some reason. At least the HUGE [bleep]ING LASER is pretty fun to see too.

the demo doesnt want to work on my PC, directx problem or something, and secondly I'm a little peeved that my PC wont display the japanese kana even though I have eastern language packs enabled and active. Its bloody annoying because I can see them fine in firefox but windows just doesnt like stuff other than english.

the demo doesnt want to work on my PC, directx problem or something, and secondly I'm a little peeved that my PC wont display the japanese kana even though I have eastern language packs enabled and active. Its bloody annoying because I can see them fine in firefox but windows just doesnt like stuff other than english.

 

 

 

DirectX problems are annoying, you can try downloading the missing d3dx9 file from a site, or you can try an older version of the games, which in my opinion are better:

 

 

 

http://www.doujinstyle.com/touhougames.php

 

 

 

Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, Perfect Cherry Blossom, and Imperishable Night are the best ones. Pick whichever you want, or play them in order.

 

 

 

Also, with language problems, launch the exe using Microsoft AppLocale:

 

 

 

http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/tools/apploc.mspx

 

 

 

In retrospect I should have posted the download link for the games in the first post, I'll go do that now. :wall:

Oh, Jesus...

 

 

 

This looks AWESOME.

 

 

 

It's kinda along the lines of the Raiden games, right? That's what I'm getting from the videos. But a lot harder. It looks great... I'm gonna give it a try.

Awsome games, The 3 games i like the most is Immaterial and Missing Power, Scarlet Weather Rhapsody and Imperishable Night.

 

Downloaded them all, played them all and i can't get enough.

IaMP and SWR are good games for those that like fighting games with a twist. My signature has 3 moves from SWR. :lol:

I can't install these games on my PC :|...

I can't install these games on my PC :|...

 

 

 

Did you download .bin and .cue files, or are they exe?

 

Did you download .bin and .cue files, or are they exe?

 

 

 

I didn't notice you added new links. I'll try one from there, I downloaded the newest episode.

 

 

 

It might just be my Windows install, something messed up somewhere and I can't run certain programs...