Touhou 14 demo released: Something about a bomb

[SuperSoaker360]

He is getting better... I wonder why he never asked one of those doujin circles to draw the characters for him. Some of them are really damn good. Especially this Usotsukiya guy. Dem socks.

10/10 wud fap

[RNGmaster]

Ten Desires got 1280 x 960 as well, so I guess it's natural that Touhou 14 will too.

I'm just hoping it'll also have an option for 1280 x 960 in fullscreen.

That was upscaled. Apparently this game's sprites are higher-res.

[KAI]

Can't believe this thing is still alive. Don't care about the game, but a new CD is always welcomed.

[Zengeku3]

Pls don't have Lunatic be a joke this time around. That's all.

[Formless God]

I'm kind of glad none of the WR holders have this mentality.

[hail good sir]

the

[Pretas]

A back-to-basics approach sounds nice, but I think ZUN still needs to address the fact that the non-boss sections of his stages are bland, identikit and uninteresting. There should be more non-popcorn enemies, bigger enemies, segmented enemies, ground enemies, environmental features, maybe even a few sub-bosses that aren't little girls. I get the impression that the extended Touhouverse has no shortage of material to pull from. I mean, if Clover-TAC can make something like Crimzon Clover all by himself...and ZUN has far more development experience.

High-risk, high-payoff melee attacks could be a great addition, if they're in fact going in. They'd certainly decrease the incentive to hang back at the bottom of the screen and only move laterally all the time during bosses.

Do we have any idea how much ZUN still plays other people's shmups? I fear his fanbase has made him grow out of touch with the more recent advances and innovations of the genre, since most of them will lap up anything from him regardless of quality.

[Formless God]

There should be more non-popcorn enemies, bigger enemies, ground enemies

This.

segmented enemies

Imperishable Night.

environmental features, maybe even a few sub-bosses that aren't little girls

Not gameplay.

decrease the incentive to hang back at the bottom of the screen and only move laterally all the time during bosses.

This can be achieved with better bullet trajectory (10D), not necessarily melee gimmicks.

[chum]

High-risk, high-payoff melee attacks could be a great addition, if they're in fact going in. They'd certainly decrease the incentive to hang back at the bottom of the screen and only move laterally all the time during bosses.

If you're doing this all the time then you're not playing the games right. You don't need melee attack to encourage aggressive play.

[O. Van Bruce]

come on guys, we are just comenting about the pssibilities that melee attacks can bring to Touhou.

Also, ZUN is quite the conservative man in terms of bullet patterns and stage designs: the only way he innovates then is through gimmicks. Well, he did tried to innovate at TD in terms of gameplay, with terrible and halve baked attempts, so maybe this time we should get something interesting and non-broken.

[chum]

But those possibilities have been there all along, just in a different guise. Yes, melee attacks are awesome, but I don't trust ZUN to implement those well. Look at Youmu in TD, a complete disaster.

[O. Van Bruce]

But those possibilities have been there all along, just in a different guise. Yes, melee attacks are awesome, but I don't trust ZUN to implement those well. Look at Youmu in TD, a complete disaster.

just look at Donpachi and its chaining and compare it to DOJ's. from experience come mastery. At least I'm sure he'll do a better job this time on the game system... if in the end he really implements melee attacks

anyway, what really makes me uneasy is how will be the music. Zun tried something new by putting a lot of emphasis on rythim rather than melody in TD but the results weren' very inspiring... the only track that was well executed was stage 4 BGM. ZUN should pay attention to Mushi's and Esp II soundtracks if he wanna continue on that path.

PD well there are only a few days left for the demo so I'll be able to start raging and bitching about how ZUN has completely forgotten the way he composed back in Imperishable night and Perfect Cherry Blossom

[AntiFritz]

Zuns had like 13 games to improve though.

[Formless God]

The previous 12 didn't have melee though

stage 4 BGM

Just the intro, honestly. I felt the BGM for S3, 5, 6 had more melody to them. And the Stage 1 theme and Extra boss theme are fantastic.

I'll be able to start raging and bitching about how ZUN has completely forgotten the way he composed back in Imperishable night and Perfect Cherry Blossom

man the trumpets ruined everything

[O. Van Bruce]

Zuns had like 13 games to improve though.

More than 13 games in fact but he has just recently started to implement new ideas on the gameplay. Touhou has allways been about dodging and nothing more than dodging until TD.

[O. Van Bruce]

The previous 12 didn't have melee though

stage 4 BGM

Just the intro, honestly. I felt the BGM for S3, 5, 6 had more melody to them. And the Stage 1 theme and Extra boss theme are fantastic

.

I recognize they sound good but once you start putting more attention to then, specially in the structure and technique, they are mediocre if we compare then with earlier works.

About the ZUNtrumpets, yeah they don't sound very well but that is the pitch he applied. If you were to let pass that issue those BGM's become the best he composed not only melodically but technically. I've got to say that there has been "islands" in more recent games like Byakuren's theme and Loose Rain on GFW. GFW was a nice experiment, I still wonder why ZUN lowered the quality so much for TD.

Edit: I meant Loose Rain instead of Magus Night, sorry

[Hagane]

I don't know what games have you guys been playing, but I see new systems every game, and stages are much more important than what some people seem to believe (particularly in a game like UFO).

[O. Van Bruce]

I don't know what games have you guys been playing, but I see new systems every game, and stages are much more important than what some people seem to believe (particularly in a game like UFO).

well, the issue aren't the scoring systems, which are indeed quite different from game to game, but the gameplay that has allways been about dodging and passiveness. TD was the first time that ZUN made the players become aggressive.

And about the stages some people find then lacking on variety. It's not been an issue for me but it would be nice some new ideas for the stages. Imperishable Night with the familiars was very fun.

[chum]

The stage design in Touhou is simple but the systems is what makes them shine. Point blanking has been around for quite a while and is a relatively important skill in many of the games, but somehow people seem to ignore that.

Enemy variety is a legitimate complaint but somehow I was never bothered by it. GFW is all fairies all the time, but they do exist as low, medium, and large threats like in a normal shmup. To me the sparseness of Touhou's enemies just serves to highlight important things like bullets and items, it feels cleaner and easier to take in as opposed to CAVE's more cloying stage design. "Less is more" to put it bluntly, but It's only my opinion.

[chum]

well, the issue aren't the scoring systems, which are indeed quite different from game to game, but the gameplay that has allways been about dodging and passiveness.

Scoring is gameplay. Just because you can sit at the bottom for the most part and still clear the easier games doesn't mean the games encourage you to do so or that that's what the game is "about".

By the way, you can sit at the bottom and "passively" dodge and clear a LOT of shmups that way, including Cave, Raizing and Psikyo games.

TD was the first time that ZUN made the players become aggressive.

What are you smoking.

[Formless God]

I dunno about "melodically" ... I think his later works have more coherence and moderation to them, and in turn, the melodies are also easier to digest. A lot of the earlier works borked themselves trying to be melodic (PC-98 stuff, EoSD, boss themes of PCB, Necrofagtasia, boss themes of IN, the body of any PoFV song), or shows blatant padding (the long ass chorus of Ancient Temple, Phantom Ensemble and Lord Usa's Elemental Flag; waste of good intros, too just like Desire Drive). SA and UFO never really had this problem; the themes have a healthy variation from start to finish.

Of course he hasn't succeeded in topping these yet, but they're the minority.

About the quality in TD, you technically only listen to half the songs, that's why they sound like ass.

P.S. Yeah, I was hoping you typed that wrong :V

TD was the first time that ZUN made the players become aggressive.

Fairy Wars?

[O. Van Bruce]

first, let me hear what you consider agressiveness on a shmup because we may be talking about different things.

[Erppo]

well, the issue aren't the scoring systems, which are indeed quite different from game to game, but the gameplay that has allways been about dodging and passiveness.

This makes zero sense. The gameplay of most games in some way contains grazing which encourages getting up in the face of things.

[O. Van Bruce]

You are all seeing this from an scorer point of view. Try to think how would approach a normal suvivalist player to the game in order to clear it safely.

[Cagar]

Indeed.
No hypers, no kakusei, no charge-attacks, no huge point-blank damage bonus, no mode-changing etc etc.
+VERY lame stage design.

Touhou is boring and bad game for survival, and survival is pretty much what everyone starts with.

I'm 99.9% sure that we would have much more modern shmup fans & players, if touhou wasn't the first and only bullet hell series that casuals get to know.

[chum]

You are all seeing this from an scorer point of view. Try to think how would approach a normal suvivalisr player to the game in order to clear it safely.

Most games can be cleared "safely". Again, I don't understand what makes Touhou so different in this regard.

Besides, the "survivalist" point of view is a boring point of view.

[chum]

Indeed.
No hypers, no kakusei, no charge-attacks, no huge point-blank damage bonus, no mode-changing etc etc.
+VERY lame stage design.

Touhou is boring and bad game for survival, and survival is pretty much what everyone starts with.

I'm 99.9% sure that we would have much more modern shmup fans & players, if touhou wasn't the first and only bullet hell series that casuals get to know.

Trances, UFOs, Human/Youkai, etc.

Freezing, Photography, and Youmu's sword slash are all charge based, charges are also a thing in PoDD and PoFV. Plenty of the games have large point blank damage bonuses with certain Shot Types, Reimu B in EoSD, Reimu C in MoF, Sanae B in UFO.

Stop being ignorant, people.

[Nifty]

Touhou Kishinjou ~ Double Dealing Character

"Will the girls take their weapons or fight, or will they throw them away....?"

Please tell me I'm not the only one thinking Darius Gaiden meets Mystic Riders

[Cagar]

Trance, UFOs

These are the only things I know about.
I was talking about the main games.
..and I thought we were talking about touhous from casual perspective. You mentioned stuff that only experienced touhou players know about.

[O. Van Bruce]

Trance, UFOs

These are the only things I know about.
I was talking about the main games.
..and I thought we were talking about touhous from casual perspective. You mentioned stuff that only experienced touhou players know about.

We can't because elitism.

the "survivalist" point of view is a boring point of view.