Touhou 14 demo released: Something about a bomb

[chum]

You're really gonna get hung up on that statement and ignore everything else I said, aren't you?

If you actually want to talk and not just spout nonsense, I'll keep listening and responding. Otherwise I'll just consider you an idiot and move on with my life!

[O. Van Bruce]

You're really gonna get hung up on that statement and ignore everything else I said, aren't you?

If you actually want to talk and not just spout nonsense, I'll keep listening and responding. Otherwise I'll just consider you an idiot and move on with my life!

Answer Cagar's post then... I'm still waiting

[chum]

You're really gonna get hung up on that statement and ignore everything else I said, aren't you?

If you actually want to talk and not just spout nonsense, I'll keep listening and responding. Otherwise I'll just consider you an idiot and move on with my life!

Answer Cagar's post then... I'm still waiting

We spoke on IRC. If you want to know more ask him.

[O. Van Bruce]

Let me ask you something then... do you think any player that doesn't score in a touhou is someone that is doing it wrong?

[chum]

No.

[trap15]

This. Fucking. Thread.

Try to talk about things without COMPLETE ignorance, people...

[Yield]

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

Fairy Wars?

You're both wrong, the first game ZUN made requiring players to be aggressive was IaMP.

[Hagane]

Let me ask you something then... do you think any player that doesn't score in a touhou is someone that is doing it wrong?

Touhou (like Cave) games are mostly built around their scoring subsystems, so yeah you are doing it wrong. Before you say anything, "playing for score" (using the scoring mechanics the game is built around) =|= scoring high.

[ciox]

All this talk of melee makes me think of the Ikaruga prototype mode, where you can run out of ammo and have to use a melee-range attack until you absorb more bullets.
Probably too much for most players though, at most they would stomach something like enemies that die a lot quicker to melee than to shots.

[O. Van Bruce]

Scoring is one thing; Gameplay is another... the scoring systems are built around the caracteristical Touhou gameplay that is focused on:

- grazing bullets

- dodge then.

- collect items.

Now, what makes TD different from other Touhous in terms of gameplay? That it makes the player try to become more focused on the quick kill and staying on top than in other games. How?

- Trance is a huge asset for survival given that the resources on TD are somewhat scarce compared to the other touhous. The only way to maximize then and having a bigger chance at surviving is using the trance when the important spirits come out (green and red)

- A subtle but huge difference is the time you are given for death bombing. While in other Touhous you could sit on the bottom of the screen thinking that hit -> deathbomb, in TD the time for it is so small that most players can't trigger it on time. Besides, when dying you get a very big penalty: you loose all your acumulated trance gauge and that makes it more difficult to get resources. The result is that you should avoid "overwhelming" situations at all costs... and how do you do that? killing everything on the screen quickly. sometimes you don't even have the chance to not do it like in some parts of stage 4 and 5.

- The spirits that really charge your gauge metter are the white ones. You can only trigger then after a succesful stream of enemy deaths and continuing it on a "chain" or by staying closer than ever before in a Touhou to a boss (except when you are supergrazing shit like the very pr0 players). The player must then, in order to increase his chances at survival and his resources be more proactive and daring in order to get his trance gauge filled.

Welp, those are the main points. I'm sure I'm leaving something out so I'll post it when I remeber.

As you can see, nothing I've pointed has anything to do with the scoring but they mark an important difference with other Touhous. Let me make clear that spin-offs doesn't count, as there are only 3 danmaku ones and only StB/DS have a substantially different gameplay than the main games.

PD: I'm not a high scorer player but I've got some decent scores in most of the main games and GFW. 2.700.000.000 on Imperishable Night, 1.100.000.000 on MoF, 37.000.000 on GFW... all on normal mode, those are my best. Inb4 your scores sux... yeah, they aren't impressive but they show that I've taken my time to understand and analyze this games.

[Hagane]

Uh, scoring systems are "gameplay". UFO had UFOs, MoF had chaining, IN had the shot switching mechanics, etc. Dunno what are you talking about. If you are going to ignore those then we can say the same about Cave games too.

Also, the Item Get Borderline and grazing have always been reason enough to get in close and being rewarded for doing so with extra points.

[Yield]

Uh, scoring systems are "gameplay". UFO had UFOs, MoF had chaining, IN had the shot switching mechanics, etc. Dunno what are you talking about. If you are going to ignore those then we can say the same about Cave games too.

Also, the Item Get Borderline and grazing have always been reason enough to get in close and being rewarded for doing so with extra points.

Now, I'm not nearly as accomplished in shmups as many of you guys are (so what do I know), but:

To me it seems more like scoring is competition than gameplay, if one doesn't focus on scoring at all, then it's not an essential gameplay element.

However since so many people accomplish 1cc's, the only other relevant way to differentiate skill is through scoring.

Personally I don't care the least bit about scoring until I have a more accomplished list of 1ccs.

[Giest118]

How many of these games involve using the score mechanics (at least in part) in order to get extra lives?

All of them?
LITERALLY ALL OF THEM?
EVERY SINGLE ONE?

So you do need the score mechanics to play for survival.
Discussion over.

[RNGmaster]

i'm a cool dude who does no-bomb runs and i hope this will be cool to do cool no-bomb runs in

BTW Geist it looks like the life fragment system from SA is back. I hope it doesn't mean you'll be fucking deluged with lives like in that game, though. IMO Touhou games get really boring when you have shittons of resources - see 10D.

[Despatche]

god this is so sad

i swear it's like people have no understanding of art at all

OH WAIT

btw it's probably all bandwagoning like everyone else

but it's really puzzling as to what compels people to keep doing it

Wonder if its just me, or do anyone else also think all games looks the same
Not hating on Touhou I like PCB and IN, but would be nice if the games could change, backround and characters always the same in my eyes.

You're mostly right, yeah. But that's what people want, and since it's all the same series, it's all he can do.

holy shit wait a minute some people actually get it. props to you guys.

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.

how about no. how about there are no recent advances, and the best example of one is something like touhou in the first fucking place. how about you LEARN HOW TO DESIGN GAMES BEFORE WANTING EVERY GAME TO BE THE SAME.

okay i can't post in touhou topics apparently because nearly everyone in them has absolutely no idea how anything works at all NOW WITH 100% MORE O. VAN BRUCE

TRUMPETS ARE A MEME, NOT A CRITICISM, GET THE FUCK OVER YOURSELVES

formless god is the best user ever

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.

FUCK THOSE DUMB KIDS, THEY DON'T PLAY GAMES. DON'T YOU DARE TRY TO CLAIM IT'S ELITISM, BECAUSE IT'S THE GOD DAMNED TRUTH. EVEN IF THEY MAKE IT OUT TO BE A MEME TOO, IT STILL ENDS UP BEING TRUE ANYWAY.

you need to understand what "survivalist" actually is. it has absolutely fuck all to do with casualism.

[Despatche]

god touhou sucks

CHIREIDEN IS GOD

STOP CALLING IT 10D IT'S TD TD TD WORD NOT NUMBER

[Giest118]

I didn't actually mind the life fragment system myself, but you're right, SA is basically the only exception to my previous post.

So, roughly 90% of the time, you need to make use of the game's scoring mechanics to get lives. Even a casual, non-scoring player will be doing at least SOME scoring, if only for that purpose.

EDIT: This was in response to RNGmaster. Despatche wins the thread.

[Yield]

How many of these games involve using the score mechanics (at least in part) in order to get extra lives?

All of them?
LITERALLY ALL OF THEM?
EVERY SINGLE ONE?

So you do need the score mechanics to play for survival.
Discussion over.

You don't get extra lives through the score mechanics in UFO, SA and TD.

[Giest118]

You don't get extra lives through the score mechanics in UFO, SA and TD.

I will concede your point for SA, but in UFO and TD, their scoring mechanics are also useful for getting extra lives.

I mean, unless you think UFOs aren't a score mechanic.

[Yield]

You don't get extra lives through the score mechanics in UFO, SA and TD.

I will concede your point for SA, but in UFO and TD, their scoring mechanics are also useful for getting extra lives.

I mean, unless you think UFOs aren't a score mechanic.

If you mean filling up the meter on the UFOs to get an extra life fragment, well then yes, it's a score mechanic.

However, I'd still argue it all depends on focus, for instance if you're doing a no-death run, then suddenly extra lives becomes a moot point again.

Scoring isn't essential to gameplay, it's part of the metagame, is what I'd say.

[trap15]

(snip)

how about no. how about there are no recent advances, and the best example of one is something like touhou in the first fucking place. how about you LEARN HOW TO DESIGN GAMES BEFORE WANTING EVERY GAME TO BE THE SAME.

okay i can't post in touhou topics apparently because nearly everyone in them has absolutely no idea how anything works at all NOW WITH 100% MORE O. VAN BRUCE

(snip)

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.

FUCK THOSE DUMB KIDS, THEY DON'T PLAY GAMES. DON'T YOU DARE TRY TO CLAIM IT'S ELITISM, BECAUSE IT'S THE GOD DAMNED TRUTH. EVEN IF THEY MAKE IT OUT TO BE A MEME TOO, IT STILL ENDS UP BEING TRUE ANYWAY.

you need to understand what "survivalist" actually is. it has absolutely fuck all to do with casualism.

This is absolutely the best thing I've read on this forum in quite a while. Well-said.

[Giest118]

If you mean filling up the meter on the UFOs to get an extra life fragment, well then yes, it's a score mechanic.

However, I'd still argue it all depends on focus, for instance if you're doing a no-death run, then suddenly extra lives becomes a moot point again.

Scoring isn't essential to gameplay, it's part of the metagame, is what I'd say.

If a scoring mechanic can be used to acquire extra lives (UFOs and Trance count), then it is under the purview of what I'm talking about. It also serves as a counterpoint to the people in this thread saying that these games do not encourage you to use their mechanics at all.

[ebarrett]

cool lgb meltdown up there

[RNGmaster]

Yup, in ufo, getting extra lives is almost always counter to scoring, since it means missing out on getting point item value (since you won't want to pick up red/rainbow tokens while a ufo is summoned if going for lives) and In SA, you get lives for no-missing boss phases, and for scoring purposes it's pretty good to suicide. I understand why you're saying scoring is helpful for survival, but at a high-scoring perspective you don't care about extra lives unless they give you enough resources to suicide and bomb and graze when necessary.

Oh man, and OVB claiming that touhou games aren't aggressive and point-blank focused enough. In any Touhou game, if you don't speedkill enemies during stages you're probably fucked. 10D? Aggressive? All your spirit-collecting for lives and survival will take place while trancing if you optimize correctly. It's not aggression if you're invulnerable, it's standing in place over an enemy spawn point. Takes no skill, man. Being remotely aggressive doesn't enter into it unless you're playing for WR score, trying to get every single grey spirit. And that's the exact opposite of what you're talking about.

Touhou is pretty cool as aggression goes since there's the whole PoC thing but it looks like you're ignoring that.

To me it seems more like scoring is competition than gameplay, if one doesn't focus on scoring at all, then it's not an essential gameplay element.

However since so many people accomplish 1cc's, the only other relevant way to differentiate skill is through scoring.

Personally I don't care the least bit about scoring until I have a more accomplished list of 1ccs.

Fact is that, if you look at a high-level scoreplay, you see that these games were really built around being insanely challenging and rewarding to score well in. If the game is good from a survival perspective but has scoring that is real easy to max out, it'll hold little interest for players who want to keep playing it. Which is kinda the main big draw of shmups, being able to play for years and still not reach the limit of what is possible.

[Sakurei]

RNG, please don't limit yourself to lunatic scoring. outside of a SINGLE suicide at the beginning of the game, you don't want to die at all on lower difficulties in SA. so lower-difficulty scoring is still kind of the same as survival. just really really risky survival. you don't have enough bullets to graze in easy/normal/hard on lower difficulties to make up for the lost star items when you die. please include all difficulties when you talk about scoring in these games

now, it's true that touhou isn't as aggressive as CAVE games are, but saying it isn't aggressive at all is stupid bullshit that shows you know shit about these games. the PoC mechanic is just one of the features all windows games have. let's take UFO, because that one's simple. you go after the tokens, sometimes when there are a lot of bullets on the screen. the 2nd half of stage 4 comes to mind. you have to actively move forward between all those bullets to grab that red UFO token to summon a big one and get those life pieces.
but let's not ride about the PoC too much. in SA, UFO and TD, it has been rendered useless for the most part. you can graze bullets in SA to auto-collect everything on the screen. the UFOs in UFO suck up the items and in TD you often let the point and power items fall off the screen in favor for more spirits. but those are more advanced scoring things (for TD, anyway), so survival players likely won't do some of that stuff.

[RNGmaster]

RNG, please don't limit yourself to lunatic scoring. outside of a SINGLE suicide at the beginning of the game, you don't want to die at all on lower difficulties in SA. so lower-difficulty scoring is still kind of the same as survival. just really really risky survival. you don't have enough bullets to graze in easy/normal/hard on lower difficulties to make up for the lost star items when you die. please include all difficulties when you talk about scoring in these games

I've not watched enough lower-difficulty runs. Guily as charged. I mostly play lunatic and don't have the time to get into lower-difficulty scoring.

The second paragraph wasn't directed at me I hope.

[O. Van Bruce]

Elitism and casual hating... now I understand why it's pointless to have a debate about this here. You'll keep thinking people will play lunatic like it is the standard difficulty or a normal person will dive into the bullets aggressively to get graze for nothing and how the player will increase his point item value when it mostly doesn't help on the survival.

When a normal player don't do that unless he has an incentive. PoC is cool but how many people have you seem using it optimally? your usual player will only move up when the screen is almost completely clear of bullets since it's afraid of dying to some unexpected attack.

Anyway, the only 2 touhous that give extends based on your score are EoSD and MoF. And the phantasmagorias but those are Vs STG, can't compare then with the other games. So no scoring is involved in survival in most of the games.

bleh, the real issue here is simply "don't talk shit about my games".

[trap15]

I think lgb properly responded to that already:

FUCK THOSE DUMB KIDS, THEY DON'T PLAY GAMES. DON'T YOU DARE TRY TO CLAIM IT'S ELITISM, BECAUSE IT'S THE GOD DAMNED TRUTH. EVEN IF THEY MAKE IT OUT TO BE A MEME TOO, IT STILL ENDS UP BEING TRUE ANYWAY.

[DocHauser]

Anyway, the only 2 touhous that give extends based on your score are EoSD and MoF. So no scoring is involved in survival in most of the games.

I cleared Story of Eastern Wonderland and Lotus Land Story recently and they both have score-based extends. Mystic Square probably does as well.

[O. Van Bruce]

Anyway, the only 2 touhous that give extends based on your score are EoSD and MoF. So no scoring is involved in survival in most of the games.

I cleared Story of Eastern Wonderland and L

otus Land Story recently and they both have score-based extends. Mystic Square probably does as well.

oh yeah... I have this bad habit of forgetting the PC-98 games. they are so different from the windows games...