Hi all, For those that don’t know me I am David Alexander but most people call me Dave. I am a sophomore in CS and due to incredibly shitty scheduling on my part I haven’t made it to a single meeting this year but hopefully I can fix that soon. Anyway over the summer I decided to start playing some bullet hells since it was a genre I had never really touched. Any way long story short I found touhou and 1CC’d all of the main ones and thought I would share my opinions on them.
6. Embodiment of Scarlet Devil
Main Game:
First and foremost make sure you download the vpatch before playing this one. If you don’t the massive input lag will make it much harder than it should be. In terms of pattern difficulty this is by far the easiest one in the series and is a great starting point for new players. Stages 1-4 are laughably easy and 5 and 6 aren’t much harder. The patterns are simple and the movement is the fastest in the series, but the controls still manage to feel tight. Also this is the only game in the series that lacks a hitbox but you quickly get used to it.
Extra:
Overall excellent extra stage. The patterns are tons of fun and just the right level of difficulty (except the retarded maze of love card). The only thing it could improve would be a better final card for the extra stage. Out of all the final extra attacks I have played in the series it is by far the most boring and least creative. It just doesn’t feel epic enough.
1cc difficulty: 4
Extra difficulty: 6.5
Notable music: Remilas theme- septette for the dead princess
Flandre’s theme- U.N. Owen was her
Favorite Card: Flandre – and then there were none
Least favorite card – Flandre – maze of love
Recommended character- Marissa B
7. Perfect Cherry Blossom
Main Game:
This game is huge step up from its predecessor both visually and in term of gameplay. This is where I feel the series really starts finding its identity. First of all the music in this one is fantastic and is by far my favorite overall score in the series. On top of that there are numerous situations in this game where the action is perfectly choreographed with changes in the music which makes for some really memorable moments. PCB has my favorite story mode in the series. As a whole it is very easy, just a small step up from eosd, but the patterns are just so much fun. This include the stages, unlike a significant number of stages in the series which are boring and mechanical, PCB’s stages are almost as entertaining as the bosses themselves. Also if you are looking for a good stepping stone into hard or lunatic difficulty this is a great starting point as I feel that the difficulty increases much less than in the other games.
Extra:
Unfortunately I simply do not enjoy the extra stage. The stage is very repetitive and I don’t find the boss patterns entertaining. You pretty much fight the exact same boss non-spell 10 times in a row. It is also by far the easiest extra stage. On my first completely blind run of the stage I was able to reach the 2nd to last card and then beat it my next time through. I haven’t had a chance to take on the phantasm stage yet, so I am hoping that can provide the missing ingredient to this excellent entry in the series.
Notable music: Yukari’s theme, Yuyuko’s theme, Stage 4 boss theme (too lazy to look up titles)
Favorite card: Yuyuko’s final card (the one before the final final card)
Least favorite card: probably one I will find in phantasm
1cc difficulty: 5
Extra difficulty: 5.5
recommended character: Sakuya (the one with the homing shot)
8. Imperishable Night
Main game: In my opinion this is easily the best game in the entire series and has become one of my favorite games of all time, as I type this there is a hard copy of the game sitting next to me. This game does everything right. The controls are tighter than any other game in the series other than 11, the music is fantastic, and the patterns are simply the best. One very noticeable change is the massive increase in deathbomb time. If you are playing as reimu and yukari and see that you get hit, you have time to get up, make a sandwich, change your twitter status to deathbombing, and then have plenty of time left over to decide if you want to bomb. While this does make the game significantly easier I feel it balances perfectly with the patterns that tend to always be a little tougher than their counterparts in other games. Barring a mediocre stage 5 boss the rest of the bosses and stages are all enjoyable. Another feature unique to this game is the spell practice mode. I honestly don’t know why this feature is not in every game in the series. I feel like it adds so much and takes away the frustration of figuring out some of the harder cards. But wait there’s more. After your done making lunatic your bitch you get to tackle the bonus last word cards. All of these are absolutely brutal and are just a blast to play and work great in the spell practice quick retry environment. Another feature that I think all the games should have is the bonus attack that all the bosses have. It adds so much to the levels to have them end on a particularly brutal card that doesn’t count as a death if you fail.
Extra:
This extra stage is the whole reason I picked up touhou. I saw a youtube video of it and immediately needed the game. It is easily my favorite stage of all time so I won’t waste your time listing all the things it does right.
1cc difficulty: 6
Extra difficulty: 7
Favorite card: Eirin – astronomical entombing
Least favorite card: Extra – Fujiyama volcano
recommended character: reimu/yukari
This wall of text has gotten out of control so I will try to shorten all the following
9. Phantasmagora flower view
NOPE
10. Mountain of faith
Overall a solid entry but I have 2 major complaints. The movement in this one is awful. The distance you move when tapping the key is much larger than any other game in the series which makes small movements very difficult and is my main source of frustration with MoF. Also bombs are FREE. This is the first game with the new power/bomb relationship. You can literally bomb your way out of anything in the game. If a bullet gets within 10 feet of you feel free to bomb because 90% of the time the power you get from the dead enemies will be enough for another bomb. This bombing mechanic makes the game one of the easiest in the series. On my first blind run I made all the way to the stage 6 boss by just bombing through everything that looked remotely difficult. Fortunately the extra stage is excellent and is my 2nd favorite of the ones ive completed. It is also by far the hardest extra stage of all the games ive covered so far.
1cc difficulty: 5.5
Extra difficulty: 8
favorite card: Kanako’s last spell
11. Subterranean animism
My second favorite game in the series. This game perfects the bomb/power system started in 10. It is also by far the hardest in the series to clear on normal. None of the others even come close in terms of normal difficulty. This was the only one in the series that I had to sit down and put substantial practice into. Just remember Utsuho does not give a shit. She has an irrational fear of lives and does everything in her power to get rid of them. On my first legitimate 1cc attempt I was on her final black hole card. But when she blows up, there is a quick half second period where she does a final violent gravity pull and you can still die. So there I was with no lives and no bombs left. She blows up. I jump out of my chair fistpumping. I get sucked in and die. My fist go straight through my keyboard. One day and a new keyboard later I came out on top. I am working on the 11 extra right now and keep getting raped by phallic heart attacks.
1cc difficulty: 9
Extra difficulty: ?
notable music: stage 5 theme: lullaby of a deserted hell
favorite card: Utsuho – solar flare
least favorite card: stage 5 boss- ghost wheel
12. UFO
This is in my opinion the worst game in the series. The mix of the new power system and old bomb system simply doesn’t feel right. The main issue is simply that the game is cluttered. Power up pickups now add 1 power instead of 5 so you literally have hundreds of pickups on the screen at a time. The pickups have a hobbit of completely blocking out bullets leading to many deaths that you don’t feel like you deserve. On top of the this there are always stupid ufo pickups adding to the problem. Also this game has a curvy laser fetish. There are parts of stage 5 and 6 that feel like you are fighting the Microsoft screen saver
1cc difficulty: 7
Extra difficulty: ?
13. Ten Desires
Suffers from all the same problems as 12 only replaces the UFO’s with hundreds of spirit pickups. The only reason it is a step up from 12 is the addition of spell practice mode.
1cc difficulty: 6.5
Extra difficulty: ?
TL;DR
Touhou tier list
S: 8
A: 11
B: 10, 6, 7
C: 13
Gene tier: 12
That ended up taking way too long and the quality took a massive dump halfway through.
Cool stuff. I just finished 1cc’ing all the main games this summer on normal, and you’ve inspired me to go back for Extra completion (that, and Hard mode felt kinda boring). By the sounds of it you went from nothing to 1cc’in hard or lunatic in the space of the summer? If so, that’s impressive. I must be kinda bad or just too casual since it’s taken me a few months off and on to work up to hard.
EoSD was easily my least favorite (and thus the last one I bothered to 1cc on normal). The graphics were muddy and some of the patterns just felt unfair (in particular, Cirno’s opening nonspell comes out of fucking nowhere and Sakuya’s Eternal Meek is “hope you get a decent pattern.”) I’d also make a claim that Stage 4 is the most direct “l2stream or die” stage in the series (even though once you do laern it becomes incredibly trivial). The gme has a lot of iconic stuff going for it, though.
PCB … I don’t remember all that much. Mostly I just remember border/bomb/death spamming my way through Yuyuko’s ressurection.
IN is absolutely the best place to start with the series. ZUN finally figures out how to not make the game look entirely like a muddy mess of pixels, there’s a(n overly) generous deathbomb window, solid-yet-not-overwhelming spellcards, and as you mentioned, Spell Practice. Being able to just rapidfire test out strategies on different cards is great, and part of the reason I loved StB/DS so much. Easiest in the series by far, which makes it a great stepping stone into the series or from difficulty to difficulty. If only I could manage to not be so freaked out by Marisa’s star bullets…
PoFV: Hahaha yeah
MoF was ridiculously hard for a while. Then I found out you should ignore Peppy’s advice regarding bombs. Much easier after that. I’m still sore about how the hitbox on Kanako’s shard bullets is a little off (rectangle vs. oblong shape) leading to ridiculous amounts of clipdeath on her patterns.
SA. Ah, SA. For when you think you’re getting good at Touhou, and need a little humility. By ghost wheel, I take it you mean Orin’s Needle Mountain card? If so, I’m totally with you on hating that thing. Worse than curvy lasers when it comes to reading it in peripheral vision. Speaking of …
UFO does have a curvy laser fetish, and I really hate it for it. Probably a bigger problem, IMO, than the glut of pickup items. Not that that wasn’t an issue too; I remember my early attempts at stage 5 being plagued by bullets hiding in clouds of score cards. Not fun. I loved Byakuren’s theme; easily my favorite in the series.
TD is getting a bit of a rough shake from you, I think. It got rid of the curvy laser fetish, and the spirt pickups are at least a noticeably different color and shape from any existing bullet (and they don’t move, either). It was nice to have spell practice back, though, so hopefully ZUN keeps that in for 14.
If I had to pick a favorite … I guess I’d go with Imperishable Night as well. Everything (levels, patterns, bombs, characters, music, gimmick, spell practice) is just so solid.
david · October 1, 2012 at 1:45 am
Based on your response I guess I came off sounding better than I actually am. I am not even close to 1cc’ing all of them on hard. I think i have only done 6,7,8 on hard and no lunatic yet, but i have come pretty close on 7. I just love playing on the higher difficulties. 90% of my play time in the games comes from practice mode. My usual pattern is blind run, couple practice runs on problem stages, 1cc normal, extra, unlock all stages on harder difficulties burning all continues in the process(or being hella persistent on games like SA with weird continue system), then just play random stages in practice mode and never touch the main mode again. And you are right i was pretty harsh on TD, but i was too tired of typing to add anything positive. I still think it is fairly weak overall, I just didn’t find any of the patterns particularly fun, and most of the stages felt like a waste of time. But nearly as useless as the UFO stage 6 and its incredibly boring 3 minutes of mindless space invaders. But i did love stage 6 of TD and its pretty much the only thing I touch whenever I start that one up. As for Marissa in IN just keep doing Milky Way card and Non directional laser until you can do both 5 times in a row and then you will never have trouble with star bullets again. I used to hate that fight but now i rarely die at all
david · October 1, 2012 at 1:45 am
@Jack
Based on your response I guess I came off sounding better than I actually am. I am not even close to 1cc’ing all of them on hard. I think i have only done 6,7,8 on hard and no lunatic yet, but i have come pretty close on 7. I just love playing on the higher difficulties. 90% of my play time in the games comes from practice mode. My usual pattern is blind run, couple practice runs on problem stages, 1cc normal, extra, unlock all stages on harder difficulties burning all continues in the process(or being hella persistent on games like SA with weird continue system), then just play random stages in practice mode and never touch the main mode again. And you are right i was pretty harsh on TD, but i was too tired of typing to add anything positive. I still think it is fairly weak overall, I just didn’t find any of the patterns particularly fun, and most of the stages felt like a waste of time. But nearly as useless as the UFO stage 6 and its incredibly boring 3 minutes of mindless space invaders. But i did love stage 6 of TD and its pretty much the only thing I touch whenever I start that one up. As for Marissa in IN just keep doing Milky Way card and Non directional laser until you can do both 5 times in a row and then you will never have trouble with star bullets again. I used to hate that fight but now i rarely die at all
