Tag: Danmaku

Analysis

A Journey Through Gensokyo, Part Two: Style and Beauty of Eastern Wonderland

[sayori]

If you’ve played any Touhou games other than the 2D fighters, you probably know that ZUN isn’t the world’s best artist. However, as most Touhou fanartists have realized, beneath the technically flawed character portraits lies a wealth of creative, memorable, if not gimmicky character designs. I’m sure we can all think of one character off the top of our heads whose design stands out from the rest, a character who would instantly catch our eye while scrolling through the picture collection. Every game has one of them; frankly, every game has lots of them.

One aspect of ZUN’s character designs that I find interesting is the fact that they occasionally tie into the story and the character’s personality. Sometimes this takes the form of a visual motif; a distinguishing trait, be it an article of clothing or a story-related magical power, that’s always capitalized upon in fanart, and sometimes even in-game. Amazingly, the danmaku that the player struggles to dodge can be more than just a mess of shape and colour! Be it through clothing or hair colour or magical vampire wings and frog-eyed hats, here are a few characters whose designs are slightly more than meets the eye.

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Review

PC-98 Touhou – This stuff isn’t half bad

 

Over a decade after the launch of a certain infamous series of danmaku games (which, ironically enough, didn’t even start as danmaku), I think it’s safe to say that just about every otaku has at least heard of ZUN’s endeavours in the world of doujin soft and the production of arguably one of the best shmup series ever made. From the intensity of capturing trying to capture Yukari’s Boundary of Life and Death, to the heart-pounding conclusion of every 1cc run where you clear the last pattern with zero lives and zero bombs, and even to the fanboys constantly arguing over whether Marisa should be paired with Reimu or Alice, Touhou has, through some means or another, become a staple in otaku culture. However, there’s a certain little part of the series that people tend to forget; those five SNES-style games that started it all.

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