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"Mai waifu" - Kimura-sensei, Azumanga Daioh (2002) This is a very old question, yet which only came to my mind recently. Why do we like "waifus" so much, and find them so interesting? For a very long time, I was not interested in such a thing and was pretty much un-phased. However, in the leading year to finding Touhou, something had changed. I started become increasingly more find of one fictional character or another, without having a clear understanding why. Few months later, I got into Touhou. Not even now do I know if I did so for the cool music, story/worldbuilding, or just because the girls are pretty (greatly emphasized in the fanart). And the whole "waifu" thing went full-throttle recently, as I discovered new series to supplement Touhou and avoid a burnout. I have talked in some measure about that in my recent thread about anime and its artstyle, so I will spare repeating the same points. Which at some point made me start to question if I started getting into series just because I like how a character looks and acts (basically "I came her just for/because of..." argument). Be it Kaoru for Amagami, Yelan for Genshin Impact, Byleth for Fire Emblem, Female Commander (Gentiane in the manga) from Girls' Frontline, Yamashiro and Bismarck for Kancolle or Prinz Eugen for Azur Lane (luckily, I am still in the phase of deciding whether to get into any of the games mentioned, right now just staying aside and enjoying fanart). And just recently, as I discovered Azumanga Daioh (credit goes to @sodaodaoda and @SoundOfRayne), I also stumbled upon the original use in media of the word "waifu". From there, going down a rabbit whole, I ended up discovering what can basically be described as The 4chan Manifest of Waifu-ism. Since it is an old document, things are actually quite interesting to read: With this in mind, we are coming back to the original question: what is a waifu, and why do we like them so much? It's been more than 20 years now, and yet there still are people who are confused and wonder where does their appeal come from (or better said, how and why we end up liking them so much)... And even more so, do you have any character from any series that you are very fond of?

Yep, 10 continues hurts a bit. My worse run was UFO on Hard with 11-12 continues (in a month and a half, I cleared all shot types, including the awful Marisa B). Here's are a few tips for SA: If you haven't done so already, reduce the difficulty to Easy (pretty sure it gives you the good ending if you 1CC). That difficulty will allow you to have an easier time learning the various boss spells. When increasing the difficulty, some spell can be dodge using the exact same trick, except that there's a bit less space to dodge, or more bullets just to "show-off". For shot-types, use either Reimu-Yukari or Marisa-Nitori. Both are easy to use (only 2 spell you need to watch out with Nitori's slow missile). Reimu can trivialize half of stage 6 with her warp ability (and some rare boss attacks), while Marisa's shield can protect you while you try to dodge the bosses spell, making dodging "stress-free". Marisa also gets an easier stage 4 boss. Keep doing runs until you get to about 2-3 continues. At first, you'll improve fast, then you'll improve slowly until you get 1CC (In my UFO run, I had gone from using 11 continues, to 9, to 6, to 5, to 3, to 2, 1, 1 but only needed 1 extra life, then 0) If you don't have it, install thprac. This is a tool that replace the practice mode of any Touhou game with an actually good practice mode that allow you to practice every stage segments, boss attacks and boss spells with the amount of resources you want (from 1 to 9 lives, from 0 to max power). Once you get to 2-3 continues and you can't seem to beat certain parts of the game, use thprac to practice it. Speaking of practice mode, It is very disappointing that Zun never improved the practice mode in future games after TD. While most boss have simple non-spell attack, almost every stage 5 and stage 6 bosses have non-spells that are just as hard, if not harder, than spells, so practicing these would have been nice (being allowed to only practice spells just doesn't make sense). Try to finish the runs you started, unless you just feel like you can't focused or have a "bad touhou day" (this happens sometime. When this happen, don't take the end result of your run too seriously). To avoid getting sick of the game, try playing 1 game a day. This is just enough to not get rusty, and not too much that you burn yourself out. Don't give up. With each game, you are getting closer to 1CC. Took me about a week (7 games) on normal to get my first 1CC. Other 1CC took me less attempt, as I knew the boss pattern (stage do require adjustment since each shot-types behave pretty differently).

I don't have a lot to say about this game, the difficulty is just too much for me to have fun at the moment with the game. Just recently i got a chance to finish the games with continues thanks to a thcrap mod that restores the old continue system. I probably approached the game wrong, as i counted 10 continues to beat the game. I have a mental block with this game, so I'm keeping it brief. The atmosphere of the game is wonderful, you get a constant sense of danger thanks to the combination of the music and stage design. It's brilliant to have Lullaby of Deserted Hell on stage 5 while the background is literally on fire as you get closer to the living reactor Utsuho, only being stopped by the cat that was following you since Stage 4, only to reveal she can take a human form with a BODY CART and Orin absolutely carried me in the cart to some hellish fire, lol. Honestly, i feel this game is being let down due to its mechanics. If it used either Point Device like 15 or restored the old continue+power system... One can dream. The story is among the best and the idea to have partners gives the dialogs a lot more depth. I played Reimu+Yukari and Marisa+Alice. I didn't like Yukari here as she felt like a tutorial constantly explaining what's going on. But Alice like always complements Marisa's dialogs, behaving more like friends who tease each other and less like Yukari trying to act as Reimu's Mom.

What is a waifu? A miserable little pile of pixels.