Touhou 13 announced - 東方神霊廟 ~ Ten Desires (demo is now out)

[Observer]

What adds insult to the injury is that I think some enemies can end up spawning bullets on top of you, creating some sort of invisible deaths where you can't even tell what killed you since you are point blanking like mad...

Oh, shit, I forgot about Dangun Feveron. Yeah, it's more like that but since you get items (spirit orbs) at max value (if you let the orbs stand there, they lose their value until they are worth nearly nothing) I instantly thought of Ketsui cubes. Maybe a fusion.

On a purely survival level, the game is accessible maybe even easy, at least until Hard. Need to try Lunatic, which might be bullshit incarnated. On the scoring side, ZUN... f$%$&$%&%$/$%/.

[Chaos Phoenixma]

1cc'd the demo on Hard. Wasn't going for score or anything since it's too early. Seemed fun.

Lunatic seems like ragefest like UFO so far.

[Bananamatic]

Tried it.
Sucks.

Slow, basically nonexistent music and the difficulty seems to have went down a lot - first attempt lunatic with 6 misses without trying to even bomb/without getting a single extend.

[Observer]

moozooh> to activate the pathetic excuse of hyper Ten Desires uses, press the "trance button" once the spirit bar is filled and says "MAX".

MAX my balls. All hail DOJ/DFK/Crimzon Motherfucking Clover hyper modes.

I still don't feel like saying it sucks but I'm close to it. If you are not trying to score, the game feels piss easy because, to some extent, most patterns appear to be designed with the point blanking in mind so they are full of openings, which is good because the game is less claustrophobic and I starting to hate the micrododging and starting at a hitbox without being able to release 32 glorious lock-on guided laser missiles...

But when I read comment like "stage 2 boss is so ~moe"... I just want to cry. Yes, she is cute but, come on! You all know Maelstrom is cuter.

Edit: what I'm seeing is that people are really enjoying and clearing the game with ease, even in harder difficulty modes (as I mentioned, the game looks pretty easy on hard) but don't mention the whole scoring deal.

When I tried to score efficiently (point blank nonstop, trying to memorise when to trigger the spirit mode and grabbing all the bomb/life pieces at max value and trying not to leave any spirit orbs deprecate in value on screen) things definitely stopped being easy. Or fun. Or anything at all. Perhaps it's just me, I don't know.

[Blackbird]

This looks... really bland O_O. The hyper implementation seems so uninteresting. In DOJ/Clover, you KNOW when it's hyper time! Enemies explode into a billion pieces from your massive beams of plasma death. Here you... desaturate your shots a bit =/? I was expecting something with a little more pizazz, like some crazy magical spells or something. Some seriously cool magical effects. This seems so lame.

The sound doesn't seem very exciting, either. Hyper needs to be accompanied by some sound! Like a rocket shooting off, or a whoosh, or a shoomp or something! It's Touhou, there should be arcane sound effects or loli battlecries whenever you set off a hyper, dammit!

You would think other aspects of the game would have grown with refinement, but even the character portraits seem like a downgrade. From my (admittedly limited) experience, the portraits in Imperishable Night, while somewhat awkward, had a somewhat painterly quality to them that was well-intentioned and had humanity. Perhaps reminiscent of a visual novel. The new art looks kind of sterile, like low budget anime =/. Ugh, I hope it improves in the end product...

[Bananamatic]

wait there is a hyper mode? all i know is that i died and got free shooting sometimes

lol

Ugh, I hope it improves in the end product...

it's ZUN, stop hoping

[KennyMan666]

ZUN's art is definitely something that has fluctuated wildly over the years.

It's probably directly tied to how drunk he is when he tries to draw. IN definitely has some of the best, which obviously means he was near unconscious when he made them.

[Observer]

I thought he was back in shape during UFO and perhaps Double Spoiler. Here you can tell he drew Youmu in that cool IN-like fashion and the stage 2 boss (which is decent too) first, then made quick sketches for the rest...

I'm glad I'm not alone when it comes to the huge disappointment this new "hyper" mode thing caused to me.

I mean, in Diadra Empty the mere act of activating the chain aura would cause a brutal point conversion, your dragon went crazy and shit blew up all over the place. Let's not even mention Crimzon Clover, it goes without saying

A more refined, and closer in terms of danmaku, example could be RefRain where activating the M.E.F.A. would produce all sort of awesome and destructive effects as you kept charging it. Here you wait an eternity to trigger the damn thing and it's like... "Look, I'm invincible and now it's time to collect smilies! Yay~!".

[Chaos Phoenixma]

wait there is a hyper mode? all i know is that i died and got free shooting sometimes

lol

Ugh, I hope it improves in the end product...

it's ZUN, stop hoping

That's autohyper. Hopefully it gets removed. You can manually activate it for better scoring when it's full and press C. Thankfully you can still deathbomb. And that hyper mode is seriously disappointing.


Also, how can you say it was Easy when you didn't even 1cc it? And some of those spellcards on Lunatic make some of UFO's BS look good. Of course, maybe I just don't know some of the gimmicks yet, but I got annoyed with gimmicky crap in UFO.

The game doesn't even seem well designed in the scoring department either. Proximity system with few chances to get close on high difficulties.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

I watched those 2 YT vids and im uninpressed. With Crimson Clover just coming out and the knowledge that 13 has a hyper system I was hoping ZUN would do something special in the eye candy department with this game. Sadly it isnt the case he's done what he always has done, using the same graphical assets as the last 3 or so games.

As The Observer has already noted, watching the hyper was a massive letdown too. Im not 100% sure but when the timer is displayed tahts the hyper right? For someone who knoew the game had hypers but still wasnt sure what part it was, is totally indicative to how badly Touhou is lacking in eye candy including graphical representation. If there is one unwritten rule that every shmup designer should follow, it's that hypers shoul always be awesome over the top affairs that leaves the player pro or noob player the inpression that this is a hyper and its a kickarse weapon. Thats one of the main draws for crimson clover ffs. ZUN's hyper is so under whelming that it actaully spoils the game somewhat. I wish he would just for one fricking Touhou shooter would stop making half baked games every year and spend 2 or 3 years on one title just so he can give the game the polish and presentattion that many of the games deserve.

[KennyMan666]

I really don't understand what you people are on about about the hypers. The screen goes VISUAL EFFECTS and your shots get big and glowy. Obvious hyper.

The only thing I don't like about them is that you can't manually hyper unless you have all three filled. Just what.

[Bananamatic]

Also, how can you say it was Easy when you didn't even 1cc it?

loleasy and slow stages.

Bad stages=bad game.

[Observer]

Check my third video where I trigger by mistake the hyper on the big fairies. Notice how it just doesn't feel too powerful at all?

Also, at least with Sanae the shots get glowy but you actually have far less area of coverage and feels less imposing than her regular shot.

Granted, the screen gets that swirly thingy and the music changes but, let's compare that to triggering a hyper in DOJ or DFK or CC or, as I mentioned, chaining M.E.F.A. moves in RefRain.

I give ZUN props for at least syncronising some stuff to the music, for example, how the lights go up when two big fairies enter the screen, or when the mid bosses show up.

edit: to everyone. It's not Autoguard, it's actually fucking worse. You LOSE your life, just that you get a forced moment to "score" (which is pointless because if you are dying at the wrong moment there is no chance in hell you can score well...) and them, bam, dead. And getting extends in the demo is tough as hell. I first thought the idea was precisely that: accumulate a bunch of lives and suicide-bomb but dying actually here hurts you a whole damn lot. Powering down upon death pretty much destroys your chances of point blanking stuff fast! At that rate I would rather have a real auto-guard that doesn't screw my power over...

[RNGmaster]

As if I though Touhou couldn't get easier, they added auto-bomb?

I'm actually disappointed in this, since the inclusion of hypers made it seem like ZUN was trying to follow other trends in doujin gaming rather than just copying his own bland aesthetic. But no, he didn't take anything interesting from CC - no ground enemies, no exciting weapons, no flashy explosions...

[Chaos Phoenixma]

It's not exactly an autobomb, it's an autohyper if you fail the usual deathbomb and have hyper.

And you still die after it unlike autobomb in any other game that has it. This is still better than autobomb, though it'd be better without it.

[Aisha]

The auto-Trance gives me the impression that you'll have to suicide in order to cash in on a partially filled Trance meter in some areas of the game, because there were many instances where I wanted to activate the damn thing but couldn't (unless dying eats into your point item value?).

So far the music hasn't stood out to me, but the art actually seems decent all-around (unlike MoF). The "hyper" is how I expected it to be; I didn't think the game would have a seizure and melt your computer upon activating it, because, it's fucking Touhou. The difficulty seems to be on the easier side this time, but I haven't bothered trying anything higher than Normal yet. The scoring system reminds me of PCB a bit.

[ChainsawGuitarSP]

Allow me to be the first to say that CC's flashiness is what turned me off from the game. I honestly think it looks stupid as shit. On topic: how fitting that the 1st stage boss of this game also happens to be one of the easiest endgame bosses in the series. I am also probably the only one disappointed to see that the UFO system didn't stick.

[Chaos Phoenixma]

I don't find Yuyuko easy, but then I

almost never play that game anyway
Am terrible at it when I do play it, obviously due to the first one.


As it is, I find Kaguya and Kanako to be easier.

But Yuyuko in this game is mostly pretty easy. I think there was maybe only 1 thing that could be some issue on Lunatic.

[Sapz]

The automatic hyper upon death is excellent. Lots of delicious suicide-for-points opportunities coming up.

[Bananamatic]

The automatic hyper upon death is excellent. Lots of delicious suicide-for-points opportunities coming up.

I love it when it comes up on your last life so you have to wait 10 seconds for your demise

[Chaos Phoenixma]

The automatic hyper upon death is excellent. Lots of delicious suicide-for-points opportunities coming up.

I love it when it comes up on your last life so you have to wait 10 seconds for your demise

That's probably the best part of it, unless there's some way to save yourself during it, maybe getting an extend during it.

[Observer]

There isn't much suicide for points to be had when each successive life takes more and more heart pieces to get, combined with the slow charging (on lower levels of course) for the spirit bar...

And, after all, you are going to power down and have to crawl back up collecting a fuckton of Ps. And the idea of powering down, diminishing the speed at which you can point blank/kill stuff, etc., etc.

Does death also screw with the point item value? That would be the last nail on the coffin.

I hope he tweaks some things for the full version regarding collisions. I still feel there is something wrong with some of the hitboxes, both characters and bullets.

[Sapz]

The automatic hyper upon death is excellent. Lots of delicious suicide-for-points opportunities coming up.

I love it when it comes up on your last life so you have to wait 10 seconds for your demise

That's probably the best part of it, unless there's some way to save yourself during it, maybe getting an extend during it.

Yes, you can do this.

There isn't much suicide for points to be had when each successive life takes more and more heart pieces to get, combined with the slow charging (on lower levels of course) for the spirit bar...

As per usual, this seems a pretty Yagawa-esque system. Early scoring replays I've seen involve spending the bombs to pointblank things risk free for more hyper charge. There's plenty of hypers to go around if you can keep it up.

And, after all, you are going to power down and have to crawl back up collecting a fuckton of Ps. And the idea of powering down, diminishing the speed at which you can point blank/kill stuff, etc., etc.

It seems to be a similar case to UFO in that there's not actually a huge power difference between 1 and 4 power. It just seems that way because your shot is smaller. :V I guess you also have less range, though.

Does death also screw with the point item value? That would be the last nail on the coffin.

To my knowledge, no it doesn't.

I hope he tweaks some things for the full version regarding collisions. I still feel there is something wrong with some of the hitboxes, both characters and bullets.

I think as a whole, the hitboxes in this are smaller compared to previous releases.

[Observer]

I noticed the bombing for risk-free point blanking and then triggering the spirit mode. So it's more about bombing rather than sacrificing the poor flying girl in a frilly dress, right?

In fact, I noticed the smilies/spirits start changing colours too. I see blue and redish ones... then some pink ones came! Any info on that?

So the hitboxes are smaller. Ah, I see. I could swear that sometimes some stuff should've killed me but it didn't. In other situations, I seem to die for no reason.

[Naut]

But no, he didn't take anything interesting from CC - no ground enemies, no exciting weapons, no flashy explosions...

You must be new to toohoo.

Why are all you fools comparing it to CC/etc when you fucking knew it wouldn't be anything close to it. It's Touhou. We got exactly what we expected. If you want to play CC then go play it.

[Chaos Phoenixma]

Not sure if autohyper will end up having a place in scoring or not.

There's a lot of suiciding and bombing for score in the series though.

LLS seems like bombspam the PoC at the right times and suicide as needed for bombs.
EoSD has a few suicide and bomb spots for graze
PCB
SA(Lunatic)

I want to learn SA scoring sometime, but I'm more focused on IN at the moment since it rewards you for getting your graze milk wihout dying or bombing to do it. Still got a lot of learning to go though.

[Aisha]

There isn't much suicide for points to be had when each successive life takes more and more heart pieces to get, combined with the slow charging (on lower levels of course) for the spirit bar...

As per usual, this seems a pretty Yagawa-esque system. Early scoring replays I've seen involve spending the bombs to pointblank things risk free for more hyper charge. There's plenty of hypers to go around if you can keep it up.

Can you please link to some scoring replays? I checked Royalflare but they don't have a Touhou 13 section yet. I've been out of the loop so I don't know where else to look.

[Despatche]

The game was just released, you should wait a day or two.

score.royalflare.net won't have a Ten Desires section until the full game is released.

[dannnnn]

I'm getting 42 fps max

The most recent Touhou game I'd played before this was MoF, which ran at a solid 60 fps. Crimzon Clover runs perfectly fine too. Is this really that much more demanding? It doesn't seem like it should be.

[Treasurance]

Downloaded.
Played.
Deleted.

Just a fucking NO.

off to play that other touhou 13