Tohou Shooter Series

[Eviltape]

Originally Posted by Meirin

I for one appreciate the effort he puts in.

I also appreciate the effort ZUN puts in drawing the characters.... but not so much the result. The IaMP/SWR character pictures are wholly awesome, though. Did ZUN, the-other-doujun-group, or someone else draw them?

In any case, /jp/ usually has a thread open for people hosting SWR multiplayer games (with sometimes, instructions on how to connect) in both North America and Europe. I'm good enough to even fathom trying a game against them, seeing as I usually use all of my lives by the end of story mode.

[cicido]

I haven't even figured out how to do network yet, not that I want to, because I suck at fighting games... ALOT.

[Meirin]

Originally Posted by Eviltape

The IaMP/SWR character pictures are wholly awesome, though. Did ZUN, the-other-doujun-group, or someone else draw them?

They are both the result of a collaboration between ZUN and Tasogare Frontier, but I believe that the latter did the official artwork. It looks too good to have been drawn by ZUN and is rather different from his own art style. Tasogare Frontier also made the Higurashi Daybreak games, which are also buckets of fun.

[Js2756]

Originally Posted by Clarste

I'm not sure I can see the point in redrawing everything for no reason.

I think that Yukari Yakumo is a good enough reason. Am I the only person who thought that she didn't really look all that good in IaMP / SWR?

[konstargirl]

I so love touhou. MY favorite characters are Tewi,Reisen,Kaguya, Eirin( lol I almost spelled Eririn), Reimu and Marisa.

For some reason Reimu, Marisa and Sakuya remine me of Reina, Gaki-san and Eririn from morning musume a little bit but anyway. I loved the music and the characters are so awsome.

[Featherine B.]

Okay, this may sound completely stupid, but there's something I'd like to know; I recently got into the Touhou series and I'm currently playing Perfect Cherry Blossoms. However, something has been seriously bugging me; is there any way you can save your progress in that game ? I mean, everytime I die, I gotta start all over. Or is it that your goal is to survive throughout all the levels and avoid dying at all costs ?

[Elvin]

No saving allowed D:

[WanderingKnight]

Umm, it's a shmup. Saving your game in a shmup would go against the very nature of the game.

Either way, shmups aren't long games. At most, an entire run would take you 40 minutes or so. But then again, mastering a shmup can take you longer than completing a Final Fantasy game. The main ideas when playing a shmup are:

1) Do not continue. Continuing is for scrubs, and it resets your score.
2) If you lose (which you will), try again. You'll get farther next time--it's called improving.
3) Once you 1CC the game (1 Credit Complete), go for the score. The most interesting part of a shmup is, arguably enough, its scoring system.

Read this article by the controversial Alex Kierkegaard if you want to learn more about arcade culture (on which Touhou and general shmup gameplay has its roots at).

[Quarkboy]

Also, if you find yourself not being able to get past the 3rd stage without continuing, SWITCH TO AN EASIER DIFFICULTY LEVEL.

There's no shame in playing a Touhou game on Easy. [EEEEZEEEE MOUUUDO??!!]

Well, as long as you are not experienced playing this type of shooting games before.
It's a pretty decent challenge for a beginner to beat even the easy difficulty level. It's not the type of game you beat on your first try.

Once you can regularly clear a difficulty mode in 1 continue, you can move up to trying to beat the next one and/or go for as high a score as possible.

Perfect Cherry Blossom has a very complex scoring system (arguably the most complex of any in the touhou series), although generally you can max your score by 1. never dying, 2. never popping a border, and 3. grazing as many bullets as possible while unfocused and in a border .

3 is the tricky part.

Oh, and specifics for PCB: Stage 4 is HARD. one of the hardest stage 4s in touhou, second only to Mountain of Faith, IMO.
It's a good idea to practice that stage until you know where all the enemies are going to be coming from.

[WanderingKnight]

Oh, and specifics for PCB: Stage 4 is HARD. one of the hardest stage 4s in touhou, second only to Mountain of Faith, IMO.

Tell me about it. I have already 1CC'ed Imperishable Night on Normal (good ending) and getting there on Hard, but I can't for the life of me beat PCB stage 4 without dying at least once and screwing up the rest of my run.

[Featherine B.]

Originally Posted by WanderingKnight

Umm, it's a shmup. Saving your game in a shmup would go against the very nature of the game.

Yeah, I guess so, but as I said I'm a complete newbie in the Touhou universe, and in the shmup universe as well.

By the way, how many stages are there in PCB ?

[Js2756]

Originally Posted by Bernkastel

Yeah, I guess so, but as I said I'm a complete newbie in the Touhou universe, and in the shmup universe as well.

By the way, how many stages are there in PCB ?

6 Stages, plus an Extra stage unlocked by 1CCing the game, plus a Phantasm stage unlocked by beating the extra stage.

@Quarkboy: I would argue that Imperishable Night has a more complex scoring system than PCB, but that's probably because I don't know exactly the best way to go about maximizing time points is (generally, shoot as human, graze as phantom, but how to actually maximize this is tough).

You're also completely right regarding the difficulty of MoF and PCB stage 4.

[Quarkboy]

Originally Posted by Bernkastel

Yeah, I guess so, but as I said I'm a complete newbie in the Touhou universe, and in the shmup universe as well.

By the way, how many stages are there in PCB ?

All windows Touhou games are so-called "6+alpha" stages (except imperishable night, which I'll cover below). The main game is 6 stages with the final 6th stage much shorter than the rest (it's almost all boss fight).
If you managed to beat the game without continuing on any difficulty level (except in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil it has to be normal or higher) you unlock a special "Extra" stage which is a stage about 2 times as long as a normal stage and much harder, with a fixed difficulty level (this is normally slightly easier than lunatic) and an extremely long and hard boss fight. Beating the extra stage takes about 15 minutes.

PCB actually has another extra stage two, making it unique, called "phantasm" which you unlock by beating the extra stage. "phantasm" is nothing more than a harder remix of extra, however, with different bosses (although very similar attack patterns), so it's not really a brand new stage.

Imperishable night is somewhat unique because it has 2 possible bosses for stage 4 (depending on which character you use), and 2 possible stages AND bosses for stage 6, which depends on whether you've continued by the time you beat stage 5. If you haven't continued you can go on the A path with leads to the true final boss, otherwise you go on the B path and up up with a bad ending.


To cover PCB more specifically:
Stage 1: Easy.
Stage 2: Gets a lot trickier, stay near the bottom until you are familiar with it. Chen (the boss) is pretty simple with some practice.
Stage 3: The stage is short, but dense. You can get 3 extra lives here if you are good by collecting items and the midboss drops a 1up. Alice is the first boss that will really test your dodging and fine-tuned movement skills.
Stage 4: The best bet is to use "practice" to practice the stage and develope your own strategy for each wave of enemies. If you beat lily white too fast, you get a ton of extra enemies shooting lots of bullets. Good for more points, bad for survival: It's easier to dodge lily . I find the 3 sisters very annoying. Their final 2 attacks are simple, but their individual patterns are hard to consistently dodge.
Stage 5: Another stage when memorization pays off. If you aren't in position to blast enemies as they appear they will quickly fill the sceen with bullets. Youmu's first pattern she uses is hard to dodge, even on Easy, although when she reappears as the boss, she luckily uses relatively easy to understand patterns (that are still hard to dodge).
Stage 6: Just a giant swarm of ghosts, dodge as long as you can then use a bomb. Youmu's reprisal is weak, but Yuyuko is NOT weak. Watch a replay video to get a good idea on how to best dodge her attacks, but to be honest, it's a lot harder to do it than to watch someone else do it.

[cicido]

Originally Posted by Js2756

6 Stages, plus an Extra stage unlocked by 1CCing the game, plus a Phantasm stage unlocked by beating the extra stage.

@Quarkboy: I would argue that Imperishable Night has a more complex scoring system than PCB, but that's probably because I don't know exactly the best way to go about maximizing time points is (generally, shoot as human, graze as phantom, but how to actually maximize this is tough).

You're also completely right regarding the difficulty of MoF and PCB stage 4.

Maybe it's because I played IN first, but I find the cherry system way complexer, for the time point, I just shoot with human the whole time, and if I happen to be lucky and I didn't die, then I can maximize it no problem.
But my way is probably the worst type of strategy.

Also, I agree that MoF level 4 is very hard, especially since every time I run out of life near the end and then I have to start the whole level all over again.

[WanderingKnight]

I also find Imperishable Night's system more complex--possibly for the same reasons Js2756 pointed out. There are so many things giving you points and determining how much score you get that it's hard to "maximize" it.

I'm a bit disappointed with the simpleness of MoF's system. Well, mainly in the fact that being unfocused doesn't provide you with any scoring advantage. Also, no more graze counter

Stage 1, 2 and 3 in PCB are pretty easy. Sometimes I get shot for stupid reasons in stage 3 but most of times I can pass through unharmed. Only one of Alice's patterns is hard to dodge consistently (the spell card before the last one).

[Clarste]

Note: everything I say applies only to Normal and below.

In PCB stage 4, there is a certain kind of enemy that shoots at you when they die. Well, they shoot at you when they're alive too, but a whole lot less. I've found that if you go through sections of the stage without killing anything, it becomes much easier. I can only assume that this would destroy your score, if you care. Also, note that many of the enemies are aiming at you and shooting huge masses of bullets, which means you pretty much have to dodge by starting from one side of the screen and inching your way towards to other. If you just dodge them as they come you'll almost certainly get trapped.

[Sheep]

I never really had much trouble with PCB stage 4, as the patterns are pretty easy to remember. Stage 5 and 6 however were just a constant bomb-spam for me, and I cba with those stages really. I'd rather stick with EoSD.

[Magedark]

I feel like I'm getting better at Touhou in terms of...Well not being bad.
Embodiment of the Scarlet Devil is my main focus, but I haven't gotten far. On hard, I've only gotten to the last spell card of Cirno.

[Don_Don_Kun]

lol, one day I intend to beat any of the Touhou games on normal without continues. Right now I can only get to stage 5 on PCB before Youmu kills me...

unfortunately easy is wayy to easy now, kind of a big jump between difficulties, huh?

[konstargirl]

If only I have the game so I can play it like everyone else. Question but what website can you download touhou games???

And look what I foud yesterday. :

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Z3dZ69i7ryc