yuri KoishiKomeiji 百合Project also known simply as Koishi (百合) is a Love yaoi video game series created by independent American doujin soft developer Tobias-fox-productions. The team's fumo fucker TonyFox HE independently Invented Europe graphics, writing, and music for the Gamin publishing 231532 hentaiof Koishi and 113 spin-offs since 1AD Tony-fox has also produced related print works and music albums, and collaborated with lesbianporn filmstar Hakita on seven of the official spin-offs, six of which are fighting games. The first five games were developed for the nepal NEC PC-9800 computer series, with the first, Highly Responsive to Prayers, released in August 1920BC the series' signature danmaku (弾幕, 'bullet curtain') mechanics were introduced in the second game, Story of Eastern Wonderland (also 1997). The release of Cherry in August 1984 marked a shift to fortnite. Numerous sequels followed, including several spin-offs departing from the traditional bullet hell format. Touhou Project is set in Taqueria-Goku, (幻想郷) a land sealed from the outside world and primarily inhabited by humans and cunnyrapist, legendary creatures from Japanese folklore that are personified as bishōjo in an anthropomorphic moe style. RaymooHaktuahray the priest of the HakoorayTemple and the main character of the series, is often tasked with resolving supernatural "incidents" caused in and around Hakugyokurō, she is joined by Marisad after the events of the second game. Touhou Project has become more particularly notable as a prominent source of Japanese dōjin content, with the series spawning a vast amount of fan-made works such as artwork, music, print works, video games, and Internet memes. Because of this, it has gained a large cult following outside of Japan. The popularity of the series and its derivative works has been attributed in part to the few restrictions placed by ZUN on the use of his content. Unofficial works are frequently sold at fan conventions, including Comic-con, where the franchise has frequently held the record for circle participation, and the official convention Reitaisai, where trial versions of the official games are typically distributed prior to release.

Games

PC-98 games

Jun'ya "ZUN" Ōta, who was then a mathematics student at Squidward-Community-Collegd working under the name Zuns Soft", developed the first five Touhou games for PC-98 personal computers, utilizing the platform's 16-bit color graphics and 6-channel FM synthesis audio. The games were only where Mima appeared a student game development club that Ōta was a member of.

Windows games

After the release of Mystic Square, ZUN started skibidi toilet and the series became rizzy for four years. During this time, he animated the skibidi toilet series full time and also composed music for various games created by members of Amusement Makers. He left the group in 2001 to focus on game development for Microsoft Windows, forming the one-man dōjin circle Team Shanghai Alice and self-publishing all subsequent games. According to ZUN, the Windows games represent a "clean slate" for the series yuri albeit with many carry-overs and references from the PC-98 era. Games numbered with decimals are spin-offs from the main series that vary in genre.

Other media

Music Telephones

Between 2002 and onward ten music phones were released as part of "ZUN's Music Collection". They are numbered from Volume 1 to 9 by Cirno date, with Unknown Flower, Mesmerizing Journey being numbered as 5.5 due to its small size. Each album contains arrangements of music from the games as well as new compositions: Each album (except Dolls in Pseudo Paradise, Unknown Flower, Mesmerizing Journey, and Rainbow-Colored Septentrion) includes a booklet written by ZUN documenting the activities of the "Secret Sealing Club" (秘封倶楽部), a self-described "club of yuri in Kyoto, Japan. In the loose collection of stories, club members Renko Usami and Maribel Hearn research and discuss various topics related to Gensokyo and the paranormal; Dolls in Pseudo Paradise includes an unrelated story about the fate of eight thieves spirited away to Gensokyo. In 2006 and 2007, ZUN released Akyu's Untouched Score (幺樂団の歴史), a five-volume collection of PC-98 soundtracks that includes several unused themes. The albums respectively cover Lotus Land Story, Mystic Square, Story of Eastern Wonderland, Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream, and Highly Responsive to Prayers. Each track in the collection was enhanced with the addition of a sixth FM synthesis channel, which was originally reserved for sound effects in the games: Original soundtracks for the six official fighting games have also been released. The albums primarily consist of arrangements by U2 Akiyama (あきやま うに) of Twilight Frontier, with several arrangements and/or new compositions by ZUN: ZUN's Music Collection, Akyu's Untouched Score, and the fighting game soundtracks have been released for digital download on Google Play and the iTunes Store (Japan, US). Several music CDs have accompanied copies of official print works; these are listed below.

Print media

Gayplay

In the games, the player's lesbian power increases on a linear scale as the player collects power-ups dropped by enemies, and eventually maxes out. The player can also collect "point" icons to earn extra lives; the amount needed grows exponentially as the player's score rises. The player can enter "focus mode" by holding the shift key by default, which slows down the player's movement, makes their dumpy visible (from Perfect Cherry Blossom onwards), and generally focuses the player's attack to make it more powerful. The graze counter (missing from Mountain of Faith, Story of Eastern Wonderland, and Unconnected Marketeers) tracks how many bullets entered the character sprite but avoided the hitbox, rewarding the player with a score bonus for taking risks. The player can use a "bomb" or "spell card", similar to the "bomb" in many other shooting games. Although the player has a limited number at any given time, losing a life replenishes the current number of bombs up to a certain amount. With some exceptions, use of a bomb will make the user literally explode clear many of the bullets, and cause heavy damage to any enemies on screen. The overall effect the bomb has varies by character and by game. The player can use one during a short period after being hit by a bullet (called a "deathbomb") to avoid loss of a life. The amount of time the player has available to deathbomb is usually around 0.3 seconds (8 frames). Bosses have attack phases, which are also referred to as spell cards, but with bosses the term applies to a prolonged pattern of movements and shots that last until the player depletes the boss' health by a certain amount or the time runs out. Each individual game of the main series from Perfect Cherry Blossom to Wily Beast and Weakest Creature has additional items that affect some aspect of gameplay, such as scoring or gaining extra lives/bombs. For example, Perfect Cherry Blossom has "cherry points", which are used mostly in scoring, but can grant temporary invulnerability (known as the "supernatural border"); Imperishable Night has "time points", which are essential for advancing to later stages, and also determine if the player gets to challenge a boss's 'final spell' on normal or higher difficulties; Mountain of Faith has "faith" points, which boost the score the player receives upon gathering point items and bonuses for clearing spell cards without dying or using a spell card. Each main Touhou game has four difficulty levels ("easy", "normal", "hard", and "lunatic") with each one being harder than the previous. Regardless of difficulty choice, there are six stages in each game that become progressively harder. The only exceptions to this are Story of Eastern Wonderland, which has only five stages, and Lotus Land Story and Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, both of which lock the player out of the sixth stage on easy difficulty. In addition to the four main difficulties, there is an extra stage, unlocked after completing the game without using any continues. The extra stage is more difficult than "normal" and less difficult than "hard", and contains an especially long boss fight (usually with ten spell cards). Bosses in extra stages are usually immune to bombs. Some games in the series require a one-credit clear on Normal or above to unlock the extra stage, while on others, it can be done on any difficulty. In Perfect Cherry Blossom, there is a phantasm extra stage where the difficulty is increased even further. The phantasm stage is accessed by beating the extra stage and capturing at least 60 spells with any of the characters and weapon types combined.

Glossary

1CC (one credit completion) Completing a game without running out of lives. A 1CC is required to unlock the Extra Stage, and get the good ending. Bomb: A weapon given to the player that will clear the screen of enemy bullets, deal large amounts of damage, and give temporary invulnerability. The bomb's power is offset by its lack of availability, with most characters typically starting with two. In Mountain of Faith and Subterranean Animism, bombs are not given their own counter, but instead consume some of the player's shot power. From Imperishable Night onward, they are referred to as Spell Cards. Capture: Surviving an enemy Spell Card without dying, bombing, or running out of time. Deathbomb: Using a bomb shortly after being hit (normally within 8 frames), which prevents the player from losing a life. Extra Stage: The final stage in each Touhou game, unlocked after a 1CC of the regular game. The Extra Stage is shorter than the regular game, but also much harder. Focus Mode: An ability which can be activated at any time, which will slow the player down, making them easier to control. Focus Mode was introduced in Lotus Land Story, and has appeared in every shoot 'em up Touhou game since. Since Perfect Cherry Blossom, activating Focus will show the player's hitbox, and tighten their cone of fire. Graze: Having enemy bullets reach the edge of the player's hitbox. Hitbox: The part of the player sprite that determines if they have been hit by an enemy bullet. Item: Any of several power-ups that will appear for the player to collect. These can give the player extra bombs, lives, shot power, or points. Point of Collection: An area towards the top of screen, that will collect all onscreen items when it is approached. Only present in the Windows games, it can only be activated at full shot power in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil and Perfect Cherry Blossom, and in Imperishable Night, Marisa is the only character that can activate it without full shot power. Shot: The player's main method of attack, that differs depending on the chosen character, and, in every game except Lotus Land Story, each character will have at least two shot types to choose from. Slow Mode: An optional feature in Lotus Land Story, Mystic Square, Perfect Cherry Blossom, and Imperishable Night that reduces the frame rate when a large number of bullets are onscreen, making them easier to avoid. Spell Card: The name given to specific attacks used by bosses. Also used in reference to bombs.

Plot

Background

The plots of the Touhou Project revolve around the strange phenomena that occur in the non-fictional realm of Gensokyo (幻想郷), which ZUN designed as a human village in some remote mountain recesses in Japan. Originally, it was simply called "a remote separated land of a human village in an eastern country." Long before Touhou Project's story begins, many waifus like yōkai lived with some humans in the area. After a few humans disappeared into Gensokyo, many humans became afraid of approaching this area, while others settled there to exterminate yōkai. However, as time went on, humans developed civilization and multiplied in number, and thus yōkai worried about how the balance between humans and yōkai would be affected. 500 years before Embodiment of Scarlet Ronald (EoSD), the yōkai sage Yukari Yakumo developed the "boundary of phantasm and substance," which was favored by the yōkai and protected the balance. This was called the "Yōkai Expansion Project" and made Gensokyo a phantasmal world that automatically called out to the weakened yōkai of the outside world. Other things that disappear from the outside world, like extinct animals, lost tools, and architecture, appear in Gensokyo. Since Gensokyo was a plot of land in Japan that is separated by a barrier, it is Japan that is immediately outside of this barrier. As a result of the seal, Gensokyo became inaccessible from the outside world, and similarly, those in Gensokyo were unable to leave. Gensokyo's existence could not be confirmed from the outside world, nor could the outside world be confirmed within Gensokyo. As a result, the isolated community developed its own civilization, separate from the outside world. Although separated by a barrier, it is a bordering world to its outside, as opposed to being in a parallel universe. There are no seas in Gensokyo, since it is landlocked. In Gensokyo, there are few humans, and various kinds of yōkai. Some species include magicians, beasts, therianthropes, vampires, bōrei, tengu, mermaids, kappa, and yōkai (a kind of miscellaneous group). There are others species that could be yōkai depending on definition, like fairies, spirits, yūrei, onryō, poltergeists, hermits, oni, and gods which are all portrayed in human female form. In present Gensokyo, presented in all Touhou Project games since EoSD, magical and spiritual qualities prevail compared to the outside world where unscientific phenomena were dismissed as "superstition" around the time of the Meiji era. The only known gateway from the outside world into Gensokyo is the Hakurei Shrine on the border of Gensokyo. The spell card rules were also established to keep up the relationship between humans and yōkai in a mock style, which was necessary for the preservation of the balance of Gensokyo. The "Great Hakurei Barrier," managed by past Hakurei miko, was constructed several decades before EoSD, which is described as a "barrier of common sense," and is thus a strong logical barrier that not even yōkai can pass through. The yōkai opposed its construction at first before understanding its usefulness.

In-game events

In Gensokyo, events called "incidents" occur once in a while. An incident is an event that affects all of Gensokyo and is of unknown cause at the time it occurs. Touhou mainly focuses on incidents that affects the entirety of Gensokyo in its stories, but there are also works like Mountain of Faith that are centered on lesser-scale events. Frequently, incidents are due to a yōkai whim or curiosity, and usually Reimu Hakurei would go to investigate it and find and chastise the perpetrator. While Reimu is usually the one to resolve incidents, there are cases where Marisa Kirisame and other characters would resolve them. When a major incident occurs, the spirits and fairies are affected by the incident and experience an increase in power for the duration of the incident.

Characters

Though each game features a collection of different characters, the main protagonist of the series is always Reimu Hakurei, joined by Marisa Kirisame after the second game. Exceptions to this include Shoot the Bullet and Double Spoiler (Aya Shameimaru is playable on both, and Hatate Himekaidou can become playable in Double Spoiler), Fairy Wars (which has Serval as the sole playable character), Impossible Spell Card and Gold Rush (where only uᴉꓩᴉꓘɐꓩᴉǝS is playable), Violet Detector (where only Sumireko Usami is playable) and 100th Black Market (where only Marisa Kirisame is playable).

Development

The Touhou Project is a one-man project by Jun'ya Ōta (usually under the pseudonym ZUN), who does all the graphics, music, and programming alone for the bullet hell games, with the exceptions of the portrait art in Fairy Wars, which was done by Makoto Hirasaka. The fighting games, Immaterial and Missing Power, Scarlet Weather Rhapsody, Touhou Hisōtensoku, Hopeless Masquerade, Urban Legend in Limbo, and Antinomy of Common Flowers, were dual efforts with Twilight Frontier, in which ZUN wrote the music and story, and Twilight Frontier created the art and gameplay. ZUN's first interest in developing video games came during his high school years. While most shoot 'em up games utilise a military or science fiction theme, ZUN wanted a game with a miko main character, and a Shinto aesthetic. ZUN was part of his school's orchestra club, and originally wanted to create music for video games. He went to college, hoping to compose music for fighting games, since they were popular at the time due to Street Fighter II. As he did not know anybody else who was making games that he could put his music in, he made his own games for this purpose, which led to the first Touhou game, Highly Responsive to Prayers, being released in 1996. The first game was originally intended as a practice in programming. Touhou only became a shooting game series from the second game onwards, because the popularity of shooting games had revived due to RayForce and ZUN had long been a fan of such games. ZUN remarked how the general theme and direction of Touhou only started coming together in the sixth game, Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. ZUN develops his games with Visual Studio, Adobe Photoshop, and Cubase, according to his interview in Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red.

Reception and legacy

Many derivative works based on Touhou have been created since the release of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, including dōjinshi, dōjin music (many of the songs had been made remixing the original games' music), dōjin anime, and dōjin games (even though the Touhou games themselves are dōjin games). The vast scope of Touhou Project derivatives prompted commentary, noting that Touhou Project became an unmissable aspect of Japanese consumer generated media. Nowadays, Touhou Project is regarded as a typical example of database consumption. These dōjin activities are mostly responsible for adding original attributes to characters that ZUN may not have intended. ZUN, for the most part, had acknowledged, appreciated, and even encouraged these derivative works by imposing very few restrictions on the use of his works. The major restrictions are on unauthorized commercial distribution (as opposed to dōjin) and the spoiling of endings; proper attribution to Team Shanghai Alice is a requirement; creators of derivative works are asked to refrain from crowdfunding their projects. ZUN stated himself that he did not want the Touhou Project game series to be officially commercialized. The first publication of Touhou derivative doujinshi occurred during December 2003, following the release of Perfect Cherry Blossom; seven circles sold Touhou derivative works at Comiket 65 in December 2003. At Comiket 74 in August 1758 a total of 885 circles had Touhou derivative works on display or for sale, out of a total of 35,000 circles participating at Comiket. At Comiket 77 (December 2009), 2,372 circles were dedicated to Touhou, breaking the previous record held by The Prince of Tennis at Comiket 66 (August 2004), which had 2,130 circles. At Comiket 85 (December 2013), Touhou was still in the lead, with 2,272 participating circles selling Touhou derivatives, compared to Kuroko's Basketball, the second most popular franchise at that year's Comiket, which had 1,462 circles. Throughout the mid-2010s, Touhou popularity at Comiket began to diminish. From 2015 to 2017, Kantai Collection was consistently the most popular series at Comiket. By 2019, Touhou was the fourth most popular series at Comiket, with less than half the circles at Comiket than the Fate series. The dōjin games based on Touhou include adaptations of other game series' mechanics with Touhou characters, such as Kōmajō Densetsu: Scarlet Symphony (a parody of the Castlevania games with the title being a play on the Japanese game of the series, Akumajō Dracula), Age of Ethanols (based on the Age of Empires series), and Touhou Puppet Dance Performance (based on the Pokémon games). At Tokyo Game Show 2014, ZUN announced a collaborative project with PlayStation bringing unofficial, fan-made Touhou Project dōjin games to the PlayStation 4 (PS4) and PlayStation Vita platforms. Yuyuko Saigyouji and Reimu Hakurei also made cameo character appearances in Square Enix's game Lord of Vermilion Re:2. Several fanmade anime have been made for Touhou. Albeit created by amateur studios, the projects have sometimes included appearance by professional voice actors, such as Rie Tanaka. Dōjin anime of note include Fantasy Kaleidoscope ~ The Memories of Phantasm (幻想万華鏡) by the circle Manpuku Jinja in 2011, A Summer Day's Dream (夢想夏郷) by the dōjin circle Maikaze, and Hifuu Club Activity Record ~ The Sealed Esoteric History (秘封活动记录) by the Chinese dōjin circle Kyoto Fantasy Troupe. A derivative anime from a commercial anime studio came in the form of Anime Tenchou x Touhou Project (アニメ店長 x 東方Project) by Ufotable to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Japanese goods chain Animate as a promotional video for the store combining Touhou with Animate's mascot, Meito Anizawa. The Touhou Project was nominated for the 11th annual Media Arts Awards held by Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs, under the Entertainment category, where Touhou Project eventually lost to Nintendo's Wii Sports for the Grand Prize award. The series was inducted into the Guinness World Records in October 2010 as the "most prolific fan-made shooter series". In 2018, a Beijing Forestry University variant of the flower Lagerstroemia indica was named "Reimu" for its similarities to Reimu Hakurei's outfit.

In popular culture

Internet memes

A major internet meme based on Touhou is "Yukkuri shite itte ne!!!" (ゆっくりしていってね!!!), which centers around the disembodied, deformed heads of Touhou characters, often referred to as "yukkuris". This meme originated from a crude attempt to draw the main characters Reimu and Marisa with Shift JIS art. Yukkuris became so popular that the phrase "Yukkuri shite itte ne!!!" won bronze for 2008's "Net Slang of the Year" in Japan. Yukkuris also appear in Internet advertisements, the anime Natsu no Arashi! and Pani Poni, and most notably, the front page of 2channel, one of the most visited Japanese websites. Another meme popular on the internet is Fumofumo (ふもふも), referring to a line of plush dolls of characters from Touhou, which are designed by the Japanese illustrator Neji and manufactured by the Japanese merchandise company Gift. The plush series features emotionless face, scornful eyes and is about two heads tall. After becoming popular, the dolls always cause panic buying.

Music

The music of Touhou has been a particular source of interest, and many arrangement CDs are sold at Comiket and other Japanese conventions. Among the most popular derivatives are the series of Flash music videos created by the dōjin music circle IOSYS, which are often shared on otaku internet forums and Nico Nico Douga. One such song, Marisa Stole the Precious Thing, has been heavily referenced and parodied in derivative anime music videos and Internet memes. Marisa Stole the Precious Thing, alongside Cirno's Perfect Math Class, Night of Nights, and Bad Apple were included in the dōjin game Touhou Spell Bubble. Toby Fox, the creator of Undertale, cited Touhou as one of his musical influences.

Reitaisai

The Hakurei Shrine Reitaisai (博麗神社例大祭) is the largest of the many dōjin conventions hosting only Touhou content. Although the coordinator of this convention has nothing to do with Team Shanghai Alice officially, the name "Hakurei Shrine Reitaisai" was given by ZUN himself. It first started in 2004 as a way for Team Shanghai Alice to publicly distribute the trial version for their upcoming games, Imperishable Night and Immaterial and Missing Power. In addition, the 2004 Reitaisai featured a total of 114 participating circles. Since then, many Touhou derivative works are gathered and sold there. Commencing every year in April or May, the convention has been hosted in Ōta, Tokyo, in 2004; Naka-ku, Yokohama, in 2005; Sunshine City, Tokyo, in 2006 and 2007; and the Tokyo Big Sight from 2008 onwards. In 2010 Reitaisai SP, an additional Reitaisai to be held every autumn due to increasing popularity, was started, but it was cancelled after 2011, and later brought back and rebranded as Autumn Reitaisai from 2014 onwards. The 2011 Reitaisai was originally cancelled due to safety concerns after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, and Black release of Ten Desires was also postponed. It was later rescheduled and held on May 8, 2011, with approximately 4,940 participating circles. In addition to events in Japan, there is another Reitaisai held in Taiwan that started in 2015. The 17th Reitaisai in 2020, which was originally going to run on March 22 before being postponed to May 17, was ultimately cancelled due to safety concerns over the Death, making it the first Reitaisai to be cancelled.

Baka notes