Touhou: Difference between revisions

*** [[New Super Marisa Land]]

** [[Touhou Labyrinth]] (also known as ''[[Labyrinth of Touhou]]''; dungeon crawler in the style of ''[[Etrian Odyssey]]'')

** [[Touhou Ningyougeki (Video Game)|Touhou Ningyougeki]] (''[[Pokémon Fire Red]]'' [[Game Mod]])

** [[Touhou Pocket Wars Evolution (Video Game)|Touhou Pocket Wars Evolution]]

* [[Continuity Creep]]: The plots of the games were originally largely standalone. Each game was generally self-contained. However, starting with ''Mountain of Faith'', the series has gained continuity, the events happening in each game becoming connected in various ways. ZUN has both stated that "''Touhou'' is not a series" and included the phrase "''Touhou'' series" in manuals.

* [[Continuity Reboot]]: The first 5 games were released between 1996 and 1998 on the Japan-only PC-98 computer. In 2002, the series continued on the Windows platform starting with ''Touhou'' 6, ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil''. Although the numbering scheme still includes the PC-98 games, most of the characters and events in these games have never been mentioned again in any canon materials, including ''Perfect Memento in Strict Sense''. The only exceptions are PC-98 characters who made reappearances in the Windows games: Reimu Hakurei, Marisa Kirisame, Alice Margatroid (looking much older than her appearance as a child in ''Mystic Square'' and with a different backstory), and Yuuka Kazami. Fans still argue if the rest of the PC-98s are canon and if Alice's new backstory can compliment hers in Mystic Square.

** Reimu does comment on how incredibly hot it is and that she's feeling like she's about to get roasted. She (and probably Marisa too) is most likely only saved by her very powerful magic shielding her.

* [[Cool Gate]]:

* [[Curtains Match the Window]]: All of the PC-98 characters have a same eye color as their hair (given that they're in their regular outfit). There is a fair share of Windows characters with this as well.

* [[Cut and Paste Translation]]: There is at least one instance wherein the English translators just made stuff up, namely the "only a stage 2 boss".

* [[Cute Monster Girl]]: Almost every [[Youkai]] depicted in the series is one of these.

* [[David Versus Goliath]]: Averted. The playable characters are all depicted as being at least as powerful and competent as any of the boss characters, and are the same size as the boss characters. Especially unusual in 2D scrolling shooter games, since most tend to have huge tanks and planes as bosses which are much bigger than the player character. The rules of danmaku, which every character follows, make sure that everyone has a chance of winning despite their difference in sheer power. The player characters even have their own [[Calling Your Attacks|special attacks]] comparable to boss characters' attacks... just not when you're controlling them.

* [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu]]: In the PC-98 games, you defeat the Angel of Death, [[Giant Space Flea From Nowhere|two goddesses who created their own dream world (just because your player character was bored)]], and The Goddess of Hell. In the Windows series, the protagonist stops the mistress of the Netherworld with the power to invoke death in mortals, the local Charon equivalent, one of the Judges of the dead (who is implied to be more powerful than anything in Gensokyo), five gods, a hell raven who gains the power of nuclear fusion after devouring a dead sun god, and a vampire that can destroy anything she sees, not to mention the [[Reality Warper|reality-warping]] youkai who may have created Gensokyo itself. This is one of the purposes behind the spell card system - it allows even weak humans and youkai a chance at fighting stronger opponents to settle accounts, without needless, one-sided bloodshed.

* [[Do Not Spoil This Ending]]: ZUN has requested that the fanbase keep the endings of the games secret and, for the most part, the fanbase complies (although you can find all of them if you know where to look). Given that request, and the fact that, to get a good ending, one has to 1 credit clear the game, seeing the good ending of a game is [[Earn Your Fun|a great accomplishment, indeed.]]

* [[Dream Land]]: The later stages of ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'' and the extra stage of ''Lotus Land Story''.

* [[Drop in Character]]: Half the cast, to one degree or other, and into various locations, the most common being the Hakurei Shrine.

* [[The Fair Folk]]: [[Youkai]] tend to act like this. They have been relatively behaving this generation due to a lazy yet powerful [[Miko]] and trigger-happy [[Cute Witch]] who have been [[Defeat Means Friendship|befriending them]] constantly.

* [[Fairy Tale]]:

** Other fairy tales are sometimes referenced in spell cards.

* [[Fanime]]:

* [[A Worldwide Punomenon|Flandre]][[Flanderization|ization]]: [[Fanon]] is fond of this, characters commonly reduced to a single character quirk which may or may not have been a major part of their character in the original games. Given that this happens to every single character, often in multiple ways, a full list of every change would far, ''far'' larger than this page.

* [[Flying Firepower]]: ''Everyone''.

* [[Functional Magic]]: Inherent Gift, Theurgy, Device Magic, Alchemical Magic, Rule Magic, and Force Magic are all present.

* [[Fun With Acronyms]]: Most of the games' names have both a Japanese portion and an English portion. The Western community refers to games by the acronyms of their English parts: ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' - ''PCB'', ''Imperishable Night'' - ''IN'', etc. One wonders if ZUN took notice, as the 12th game's English name is ''[[Exactly What It Says On the Tin|Undefined Fantastic Object]]''.

*** Toyosatomimi no Miko and company were seeking this, as was Byakuren.

* [[Immortal Immaturity]]: Practically everyone. Notable exceptions are Kaguya and Yuyuko, when she's not busy harassing her guardian.

* [[Informed Ability]]: Due to how danmaku battles work,<ref>they're essentially a formalized dueling system designed to level the playing field and reduce lethality</ref> most characters' stated abilities have very little relevance to their gameplay performance.

* [[It Amused Me]]: Bored characters do a lot of crazy things in this series and are occasionally responsible for the entire plot with no further motive than to shake things up. Many extra stage fights are along these lines on the part of both protagonist and boss. This is the entire reason why Tenshi comes down in ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''.

* [[Lovely Angels]]: ''Imperishable Night'', the 8th game in the series, fits this trope by the player playing a team of two characters, although most LA teams are a ''little bit'' more functional than they are in this game.

* [[Lower Deck Episode]]: ''Fairy Wars'', a much shorter game than usual, focuses on a quarrel between Cirno and the Three Faeries. Every single person in the game is a fairy, with Daiyousei, Lily and the Three Faeries themselves as bosses, rather than any of the usual "A-list" cast members. {{spoiler|Except at the end of the extra stage, where Cirno takes on Marisa}}.

* [[The Magic Goes Away]]: There are various fanmade interpretations of this, ranging from "Magic has disappeared from the world at large, and Gensokyo is one of the few remaining homes for it," to "It's an elaborate [[Masquerade]] which allows creatures of magic to exist without being bothered".

* [[Meaningful Name]]: Most characters have at least one name (the family name, most often) that's vaguely related to what they do.

** The spell card rules mean the games follow this trope. There is very strong lampshading of this, and very good reasoning for characters ''not'' wanting to kill the human characters. Also, since most of the characters are youkai, odds are many of them can't be killed by physical damage anyway, while the fairies which provide most mook enemies are said to have very short lifespans but constantly revive, giving them little concept of mortality.

** A good number of characters are implied to have killed people, but no one that's introduced ever dies. The only exception to this is Mokou apparently dying during her battle... and it doesn't count, since she's immortal.

** From Touhou 13's staff roll: "[[Lampshade Hanging|Lately I've been wondering if there's a real point to the staff roll]]."

* [[Not Drawn to Scale]]: In particular, boss characters tend to look taller in cut-ins than they would logically seem to be based on their sprites or other aspects of their character. Most fans depict Remilia as fairly short, but her cut-in makes her as tall as Reimu.

* [[Poor Communication Kills]]: In ''Imperishable Night'', the [[Let's You and Him Fight|boss fight with either Reimu or Marisa]] is the result of one or both sides either not understanding what's actually going on, or outright ''refusing'' to listen. When the Ghost Team tries to mention the Moon to Marisa, Marisa says "this has nothing to do with the Moon!" and if Magic Team brings it up to Reimu, she turns around and blames them for the Moon as well!

* [[Power Up Magnet]]

* [[Puny Earthlings|Puny Humans]]: Humans in Gensokyo are vastly outnumbered and outpowered by youkai (and other subraces), and the number of humans who can go toe to toe with them can be counted comfortably.

* [[Recurring Riff]]:

* [[Red Shirt]]: The [[Mooks|fairy maids]] that Remilia takes with her on her lunar expedition in ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' fit the classic ''[[Star Trek]]'' redshirt archetype in that they accompany the main characters onto an alien world and are completely useless when dealing with the native inhabitants.

** Then again, it was already well established that Remilia's fairy maids are useless at ''everything''.

* [[Really Seven Hundred Years Old]]: Most non-human characters.

* [[Reference Overdosed]]: The series is full to the brim with references to mythology, science, and some popular culture.

** There's a meme about depicting Keine's hakutaku form as one.

* [[Sacred Hospitality]]: The number one rule for [[Muggles]] in the [[All There in the Manual|backstory.]] Be polite. All the rude people the series focuses on have the firepower - or at least regeneration - to survive it.

* [[School Swimsuit]]: Fairly common in fanart in general. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUqeBa36UDM Touhou] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=527Anv-Ne00 EWI] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0tOLOodEF0 series] by WINN, has the girls play their themes and fire danmaku at the same time [[Captain Obvious|while wearing school swimsuits]].

* [[Schrodingers Player Character]]: In most games the characters the player didn't select still exist, just don't expect to hear from them until the ending.

** In a broader sense, the entire series itself has next to nothing resembling sexual or romantic content, but you would ''[[Rule 34|never]]'' guess that from the fandom.

** [[Bare Your Midriff]]: Fanart often shows the blouses worn by characters such as Reimu, Marisa, Flandre or Sanae riding up when they raise their arms.

** Many, ''many'' references to ''[[Alice in Wonderland]]'', including a character named Alice.

** ZUN is an admitted fanboy of ''[[Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure (Manga)|Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure]]'' and as such there are ''lots'' of shout outs to that series. Sakuya performing [[Memetic Mutation|ZA WARUDO]] is one such example.

** Three different characters have references to the works of [[Agatha Christie (Creator)|Agatha Christie]].

** Stage 6 of ''UFO'' has rows of fairies that move in a zig-zag pattern and fire bullets straight downwards, as a reference to ''Space Invaders''.

** One strip in ''Inaba of the Moon and Inaba of the Earth'' contains a reference to the ''[[Wizardry (Video Game)|Wizardry]]'' series. Also, a certain weapon in the comic is labelled [[Monty Python and The Holy Grail|"HHG of Aunty Ock"]].

{{quote| '''Akyu:''' [[Killer Rabbit|Is it true that you decapitate your prey with your front teeth?]]}}

** In ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', most times when you defeat and enemy, the game will call them a DEAD PARROT. [[Monty Python's Flying Circus|Hmmm, I wonder what that could be a shout out to...]]

** A few of the bullet patterns seem directly inspired by patterns from other [[Bullet Hell]] games. [http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Touhou_influences Look at this list and decide for yourself.]

** It was repeated in stage 4 of ''Imperishable Night'', which has you fighting either Reimu or Marisa, depending on the team you choose.

** Much of the story of ''Immaterial and Missing Power'', ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', and ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''.

* [[Follow the Leader]]: ''Phantasmagoria of Dim. Dream'' was made shortly after [[Twinkle Star Sprites]].

** Seihou was rather obviously inspired by Touhou.

[[Category:Touhou]]

[[Category:Video Game]]