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Lying Lying is seldom considered a good thing on Earth, even if it is a constant fact of daily life. That said, lying in Gensokyo--while more lucrative--can potentially be a source of great danger for you, dear reader. The consequences of lying on Earth may be hurt feelings and broken friendships. However Gensokyo is not inhabited just by humans, but by ancient beings of great knowledge and magic. The better to preserve your life and happiness, it is advised you not make false statements rashly, and keep a list of lies and who you said them to written at all times. These can be written in a number of Earth languages, or in ciphers if you are a Japanese or Chinese speaker. The consequences of the wrong lie to the wrong person could put your life and those you love in immediate peril, and the wrong words may come back to haunt you. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The air was heavy with apprehension. No one moved. No one said anything. The only sounds to be heard were the faint whimpers of Team 9 and the sound of the device in Marisa’s hand. All as she glared with unrestrained fury, at a face which looked like it couldn’t care less. Things were about to get out of hand. At best, that would mean a Danmaku in the middle of a bunch of children… He had to do something… “Now Miss Kirisame, there is no need for that,” The Outsider said, trying to hide his nervousness under a calming smile as he stepped between the two. The smile that forced itself onto his face was his best showman’s expression. Between the three faces, he was sure his was the only one which hid his inner feelings. Marisa’s expression didn’t change. Her eyes didn’t move from her target. Only going to his face as he swept his cape to either side in a bod. Obscuring her target. “I am sure a woman of your experience in the occult is familiar with the ramblings of maddened mystics. Agappa is one blessed with such gifts,” ...’Maddened mystics’? Was he narrating a D&D session or negotiating a hostage situation? Whatever, there was no time to work out his approach. He had to keep going. “She...does not know what she is saying. I am certain I can decipher her meaning however, if you’ll only give me a month or so. There’s no need to scare the children here. There may be a nominal fee—but we are friends and I can tell how much these means to you. It will only be enough to cover my costs. All I need is time.” Marisa’s face burned with a fire she had never felt before. Her teeth clenched and her eyes glared at the silent maiden. One who gazed at the talisman which had meant the end of so many as though it were made of straw. Blood pulsed in her temple and ears. Each making the world tremor with a dull thud. “A month…” Her voice sounded dull and distant. Almost as if she were hearing her echo from a distance. Then she let out a breath she didn’t know she had been holding in. “Whew. That’s a relief. Sorry I scaredja Osu-tan. Guess you caught me in a bad mood, da ze. Yer right tho, this is no time for a Danmaku. If you you figure out yer friend’s ramblings, ya can find my house in the Forest of Magic. I’m sure someone can show ya the way.” The witch’s head turned. It may have been Oscar’s imagination, but he thought she was glancing at Team 9. Of the four, only Cirno had the strength to meet her gaze. Even if Daiyousei’s eyes followed after her curiously. Was there some history between the two? She definitely seemed to recognize them… Marisa stood with her back turned to him, before suddenly she turned. The lunge was surprisingly quick, too quick for Oscar to evade her. The hug she gave him only made the move more unnerving. Her supple arms squeezed around his dress coat under his jacket, her eyes glimmering with an innocent look. “Yer a nice guy, Osu-tan. Don’t let anyone change that about you.” The witch hoisted her broomstick as she turned from him. Hopping on it, slinging one leg lazily over the side. The other folding over it. The crowd watching in awe. She seemed to reconsider then, and glanced back at Oscar. “So, one more thing. If they don’t use Danmaku in the Outside World, how do Outsider wizards settle their beef?" =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= = We enslave magical creatures and make them fight to the death for our amusement. = We break the world into blocks to build competing monuments to our greatness. = We have friendly conversations on our couches while shooting spells at one another. = We play a truly complex card game as an intricate clash of our minds.8 points
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Hello, my name is Kallen. I sometimes write and draw but I suck at both. I don't remember what exactly got me into Touhou but it might have been a combination of playing OSU maps related to the game and just having a interest in Danmaku for awhile now. Yeah, that's about it, nice to meet you guys.7 points
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Hello, since I will probably become more active on the forum from now on I decided that it might be good idea to introduce myself for the people who dont know me from discord. This is actually the first time I write something like this so bear with me. ABOUT ME As you might get from my writing I am not native english speaker and I come from central europe. Im currently studying economy/logistics with focus on railway. Im pretty rational person who saw stuff no-one else should see and escapes into phantasy form the issues that he has from that day. I love spending time with my friends, I´m also big fan of humor, fruit spirits, rum and wine. In my free time I read books, listen to music and go on hikes with friends. HOW I GOT INTO TOUHOU Since I dont remember when and what was my first exposure to Touhou content let´s say it was Unconected marketeers demo back in 2021. Then I went and learned a bit about the series, then I downloaded the pc98 games and EoSD. I had lot of fun playing them so I went searching for other games and then I stumbled upon Moriya Shrine around the september 2023. Later in march 2024 I made account here and then joined the discord server where I was active member untill about december. Since then I read all the official manga, Hifuu stories and fell in love with the characters and the interactions between them. My favorite character is probably Aya because I always loved making shit up :D. That´s probably all I have to say, if you want to know more about me or just ask me some stupid question feel free to DM me here or on discord. Take care y´all, and remember that life without phantasy loses its magic.6 points
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6 points
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Hello! I am a high school student in Japan. I am currently developing a JRPG (Japanese Role-Playing Game) based on Touhou. I have almost succeeded in developing the game and will be able to release it in the near future, but the development of the English version is stalled, so I need your help. All you need to do is to teach us how to translate the spell cards we specify into English. If you would like to help with the development of the English version of the game, please let me know by replying to this message! Below is the game information and screenshots. If you have any questions, please ask! Supported OS: Windows, Mac OS, Linux (If you want to play on Linux, you need “wine” emulator software.) Playing time:5-7 hours Game size: 600MB6 points
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The History of Touhou Doujin Sales Events 2004-2024 from the Side of Statistics Touhou Doujin (Touhou genre) emerged around two decades ago and is still blooming today, despite not being as huge as it used to be a decade ago. Touhou Project fans have spontaneously planned various events, centered on doujinshi sales events, and created a place for fans to interact. The Touhou-only doujin events have served as the core infrastructure supporting the growth of the Touhou genre. Not only are there many events and circles, but the current Touhou-only events are extremely diverse, with regional distribution, work-only or character-only events, and events that are ancillary to the sales events. Touhou Doujin is also an "experimental field" for different ideas for doujin events. Touhou Doujin in some ways became its own thing, even though they face similar problems to the Doujin scene (but their roots may be different). We will see later how they tried to solve them and how successful it was. In the Touhou genre, Reitaisai and Kouroumu are often considered special due to their scale and history. But the differences in trends from other Touhou-only events, and the fact that the trends of Reitaisai and Kouroumu are very similar (at least before COVID-19) despite being held in different locations, suggest the existence of a socioeconomic structure and environment surrounding doujin events unique to the Touhou genre. Before we talk about the history of Touhou Doujin, we should understand what Touhou Doujin is and its characteristics. Touhou-only sales events are events that specialize in the distribution of Touhou derivative works. In Japan, it is often the case that at least one type of work must be distributed. In addition, there are different kinds of specialized events within the Touhou genre, and in addition to sales events that target Touhou in general, there are also sales events that target specific characters (for example Touhou EoSD only), works (for example Marisa Kirisame only), specific media (for example Touhou music only, Touhou games only) and specific themes (for example Touhou critics only). Compared to the early days, Touhou-only sales events have become more complex, as not only solo-hosted sales events are held, but also joint events and cohosted events. By sharing the facilities and operations on the day of the event while maintaining the unique character of each event, economies of scale can be enjoyed. As the types of events run become more diverse, such as live music events, game corners, reading clubs and presentations, the image of sales events continues to change even now. Touhou-only events vary greatly in size, venue and subgenres, and depending on the combination of these elements, the image of the event that participants have is formed. In particular, the subgenres are strongly influenced by the organizer's preferences and policies. When a unique event is held, it may encourage an increase in participants and the publication of new works by circles. From the side of the subgenres there are several kinds of events: Touhou general events, which welcome all Touhou derivative works, are held all over the country. The largest Touhou-only event in each region is generally a Touhou general event, and it also serves as the face of the region. The main events are Reitaisai (Kanto region), Kouroumu (Kansai region), Meikasai (Chubu region), Dai⑨shu Touhousai (Kyushu region), etc. Works-only and characters-only, which function as a receptacle when the popularity of derivative works of a particular work or character increases among fans. In addition, when Team Shanghai Alice announces a new Touhou work, the event becomes more popular. In addition, the holding of the sales event itself increases the attention of the work or character, and can play a role in the formation of a subgenre. Examples include Bunbun。Newspaper Friends Club (文々。新聞友の会) (Tengu-only), Science Century Cafe Terrace (科学世紀のカフェテラス) (Hifuu-only). The number of circles on these sales events is usually larger than the number of circles, which publish works in the same subgenre, at Reitaisai and Comiket. Others. There are also Touhou-only events with specific themes, such as "Touhou and sake" at the Engawa of Hakurei Shrine (博麗神社の縁側), "Touhou and trains" at Enshusai (東方遠州祭in列車) and "Touhou critics" at the Gensokyo Forum. There are also sales events that feature a sacred place pilgrimage, for example Suwa at Mishagujisai (御射宮司祭). Event format refers roughly to the difference between whether the event is run alone or multiple events running an event together. From this side there are several kinds of events: Solo-hosted events*. Examples of solo-hosted Touhou-only events are large-scale events with more than a thousand participants, such as Reitaisai and Kouroumu. There are also many smaller events which are hosted alone, for example Yarinsai and events by Anime Club Kofu, etc. Joint and cohosted. Cohosting type is when different sales events form cooperative relationships to hold an event. There are two types of cohosting: cohosting with Touhou-only events (and as they are more connected they are called joint events) and cohosting with sales events of other genres (they are called cohosted events). Examples of joint events include the Kyoto Joint Festival and Touhou Joint Festival, which combines works-only and characters-only events. Examples of cohosted include the Dai⑨shu Touhousai and Meikaisai. In both cases, co-hosting has been effective in securing an appropriate venue for a single event. The first Touhou-only event, the 1st Reitaisai, was also cohosted with a Fate-only event. Mini-only (Petit-only), which are similar to cohosted events in that events with different names are jointly run, but their main feature is that they have a clear "parent event". In other words, rather than starting a new event from scratch, it is a case of using the system of an existing event to hold a small-scale only event. Holding a mini-only event has the effect of promoting the presence of Touhou circles and the trends in their works at existing events. Such events were held between 2010 and 2015. * In Japan solo-hosted events are called alone or single events (単独). Touhou-only sales events are held in areas all over the country, mainly in large cities. They are held in a variety of formats, but as of the end of 2024, they have been held in 43* prefectures. In many of them, events are held on a regular basis, but there are prefectures where events have been held only 1-3 times. Nowadays, events are held continuously mainly in areas with a certain concentration of active doujin community. Events other than doujinshi sales events, such as doujinshi reading groups, live music events, and cosplay events, can also be seen in various places. These are sometimes planned to coincide with sales events, or held as offline meetings in areas with few sales events or after events. * Some researchers, such as STRIKE HOLE, agree that 3rd floor on the 2nd Komachisai (響灯小町祭2), which was held in 2015, "Akita's First Touhou-only" event. This was the only Touhou-only event in this prefecture. If this event is not counted as a Touhou-only event, then by now Touhou-only events have been held in 42 prefectures. Saying about the content of Touhiu doujinshi sales events, derivative works in the Touhou genre are not limited to doujinshi. Of course, the overwhelming majority of circles handle doujinshi (on many Touhou-only events around 50-70% of circles are focused on doujinshi). However, what makes Touhou unique is that it goes beyond that and has a wide variety of expressions. Things like food and alcohol are not uncommon in the Touhou community and were rare in other doujin genres for a long time. There are a lot of different forms of merchandise, even clothes and dishes are sold. There are Touhou circles which express themselves in the field of doujin music: there are arrangements of original songs, Touhou-style music and live performances. Some circles decide to make games and that can be a digital game or a physical game. Different kinds of critical doujinshi are spread and, as it was noticed before, there are events where circles can share such works and their opinions. Pilgrimage and Travel books are spread nowadays. There are also guide books. Touhou Doujin is a place where a variety of expression methods are allowed. And now that we learned what Touhou Doujin is, we can learn how it evolved. Looking at the data and information we have, we can split the history of Touhou Doujin into: The "dawn period": a high growth rate but lacked breadth. The "Touhou bubble period": a dramatic expansion in the overall scale. The "stable contraction period": the contraction of smaller Touhou-only events while maintaining the characteristic structure of Touhou genre, the concentration of circles on large-scale events. The "structural shock period"*: the noticeable contraction of big Touhou-only events which led to measures to maintain the structure of Touhou genre, the stabilization of small and medium-sized events. The "structural contraction period": it occurred when the structure of Touhou genre could not be maintained any longer. The "COVID-19 period": the epidemic hit and reduced the structure of Touhou genre greatly. The "Post-COVID-19 recovery period": after the end of the pandemic the structure of Touhou genre began to slowly restore to Pre-COVID-19 state. * In previous research papers the period from around 2014 to 2019 was viewed as one period – "structural contraction period". New data showed that there are a lot of differences between 2014-2017 and 2018-2019, so they were divided. Dawn Period (2004-2008) At this time, individual events such as Reitaisai and Kouroumu showed high growth rates, but the overall growth rate was lower than the expansion during the Touhou bubble period that followed. Only three sales events were held between 2004 and 2005: Reitaisai, Kouroumu, and Love-Coloured Magic (the first character-only event). There were enough circles interested in Touhou to hold an Touhou-only sales event. Even though the first Reitaisai was the first Touhou-only sales event, more than 100 circles participated in the event, despite the event only having 50 circle spaces available. This shows that there were networks, such as image boards and Coolier, in which information about Touhou-only events could be circulated through the Japanese Touhou community. Such networks also helped to spread information about the first Touhou Popular Vote, the first Touhou tournament and other community activities. At that time the view of Touhou was slowly shifting from STG to doujin creations. After that, from 2006 to 2008, other events besides Reitaisai and Kouroumu started to be held, and the genre began to show its own characteristics as a Touhou genre. Some people began to move from other genres (for example from Key & Leaf) to Touhou. The total number of circles per year also grew to around 2000 by 2007, and it was on a stable growth track. But people (participants, circles and staff) continued to be concentrated in Reitaisai and Kouroumu, even though the number of events increased. However, the theme of concentration, which was an important characteristic in the early years, is closely related to the structure of Touhou-only sales events that continue to this day. Touhou Bubble Period (2008-2010) The number of fan groups active in Touhou increased dramatically. This phenomenon is called the "Touhou Bubble Period". So what happened at this time? The main reasons are believed to be the spread of new communication tools such as social networks and the Touhou boom on Nico Nico Douga. Nicovideo started its service in 2007 and provides a large number of amateur videos. Among them, Touhou Project, Idol Master, and VOCALOID (Hatsune Miku, etc.) had a large number of video submissions and they were called the "Niconico Big Three". Works such as "Marisa Stole the Precious Thing" (published on Niconico in 2007) and "Bad Apple!! feat. Nomico" (published on Niconico in 2009) are very popular. The former became popular on Nicovideo in 2007, though Touhou in general on Nicovideo would start to get a popularity boom beginning in 2008. The increase in the popularity of Touhou music and video works has led to an influx of a large number of new members who first learned about Touhou on Nicovideo. The number of circles at Touhou-only events increased dramatically between 2008 and 2010, which can be considered the result of the influx of a new generation from Nicovideo. At this time, the movement of Reitaisai and Kouroumu to Tokyo Big Sight and INTEX Osaka respectively were viewed as symbolic of Touhou's genre expansion. At the same time, it became notable that the growth rate for other Touhou-only events surpassed Reitaisai and Kouroumu. The foundation of the Touhou genre as a large-scale genre that continues to this day was during this period. The number of Touhou-only sales events held in local areas increased greatly. Around that time it was believed that "any Touhou work can be sold", so many circles gathered on Touhou-only events. In 2009, events that were the core of Touhou-only events in local areas for a very long time, such as Hakata Touhou Festival (later was renamed to Dai⑨shu Touhousai), Tokyousou, Kamuisai, and Shikokusai (later was renamed to Iyoshikokusai) appeared. Existing events such as Niigata Touhou Festival also began to expand, and the environment for holding Touhou-only sales events in local areas changed. The wide-spread expansion of Touhou-only events in local areas continued until around 2011, leading to their appearance in Nagano, Yamanashi, Gifu, Tottori, Tokushima and other prefectures. These areas are relatively easy to get to from large cities, have a local base of doujin activities or have a management system in place, such as local governments supporting events. Also, doujin sales events in rural areas, especially those aimed at men, were showing a clear tendency to stagnate at the time, and it has been pointed out that the Touhou-only sales events had a great effect on unearthing local doujin circles in addition to Touhou fans in large cities. Meanwhile, Touhou-only events were held in large cities by the Puniket Preparatory Committee, Project-D and KetCom, and Studio YOU and others nationwide organisers entered the Touhou genre, each achieving a certain degree of success. At the time, the overall pie was expanding, and it can be said that circles and the general public were highly motivated to participate in Touhou-only sales events themselves. Reitaisai and Kouroumu were also growing rapidly, but at the same time, many Touhou-only events were able to profit from and take advantage of the genre's expansion. The number of general visitors was also unusual. There is a term called the "attendance coefficient", which indicates the number of general participants per circle (sometimes it is measured as the "total number of participants" including circle participants), and is calculated by dividing the number of general participants (or total number of participants) by the number of circle participants. According to STRIKE HOLE and Hisayuki Yoshifumi (久幸繙文), this coefficient for a normal doujinshi sales event is around 3-4, while for crowded Comiket is around 13-14. The average for Touhou-only events was 10-12 during the Golden Age (2008-2013), and for both Reitaisai (2008), when it was at its most crowded, and the Hakata Touhou Festival (2009) it exceeded 20. Stable Contraction Period (2010-2013) During this period the number of circles on Reitaisai and Kouroumu remained stable at around 5000 and 2500, respectively. The number of circles reached its maximum in 2011, with about 15700 circles. The rapid growth calmed down and an equilibrium occurred between the number of people entering and leaving the genre. However, the number of circles for the other events had already started to slow down its increase in 2010-2011, and greatly reduced in 2012. This led to a decline in the overall total number of circles, and circles became more concentrated on Reitaisai and Kouroumu. However, the influx of new people into the genre soon began to slow down, and Touhou-only events, which had a weak base of activity, began to cease activity within a short period of time. Some local sales events gained a strong core status, and the number of circles at those sales events continued to grow for a while. Some new events appeared, which also helped to increase the number of circles in local areas for a while. The majority of Touhou-only events held in local areas during the Touhou bubble period were Touhou-only general sales events. As the core general sales events in each region consolidated their management systems, the number of events held annually and the times of arrangements became known, and they established themselves as a regular place for participants to interact. Under these circumstances, it gradually becomes more difficult for new Touhou general sales events to gather participants. At the end of the Touhou bubble, the number of Touhou-only events with much fewer participating circles than the number of recruitment spaces began to increase. The background to the occurrence of Touhou-only events filling less than half of their circle spaces, or in some cases less than a third, is thought to be related not only to the slowdown in the growth of the Touhou genre, but also to the dynamics unique to doujinshi sales events. The process by which representative Touhou general sales events were established is the same not only in rural areas, but in all areas. In the Kanto region, the Reitaisai is an example of this, but as it became larger and held once a year, a more regular place for regular interaction was required. Puniket events such as Kurenai no Hiroba (紅のひろば) and Leave the Magic of Love to Marisa! (恋のまほうは魔理沙におまかせ!) as well as Project-D events such as Moon Feast (月の宴), could be evaluated as having a function equivalent to that of regional representative events. The scale and continuity of Touhou-only events became polarized in terms of whether or not they functioned as a place for regular interaction. However, new Touhou-only events continued to be established in response to the diversification of Touhou fan activities. Among them, many work-only and character-only events began to emerge. Work-only and character-only events were held by circles who participated in the "standard" Touhou general sales events and looked for new opportunities for activities in their spare time. These types of sales events were held from the early days and many were very successful, but during the stable contraction period, work-only and character-only events began to function as hubs for sub-communities within the Touhou genre. The sub-communities that expanded within the Touhou genre have in some cases become powerful enough to support the operation of individual doujinshi sales events. For example, The Outside World Visible from the Boundary (境界から視えた外界), held in 2010, was an Hifuu-only sales event, which was a minor subgenre at the time, but it proved to be much more lively than initially expected. The following year, the Science Century Cafe Terrace (科学世紀のカフェテラス), also an Hifuu-only event, was held, and the two events were jointly planned, clearly demonstrating their intention to promote the Hifuu subgenre. The Hifuu works produced by circles were also unique, and increased the buzz around the Hifuu subgenre. What supported this process was the existence of the potential for the formation of a subgenre that was already forming, such as the interaction between staff through the activities of the Reitaisai and Kouroumu, and the interaction between circles and readers through characters, and the work-only and character-only events provided the opportunity to bring this to the surface. The system in which sales events created subgenres was in full swing, which was a major feature of this period. A feature of these work-only and character-only events is that it is not uncommon that the number of circles on each event to be greater than the number of circles on the same character placement area at Reitaisai or Kouroumu. When applying to participate in events such as Reitaisai, it is thought that circles often choose the subgenre in which they are mainly active. However, not all circles are always active in one subgenre. If given the opportunity, they may venture into a subgenre that they are interested in. Work-only and character-only events have been successful in capturing the needs of such circles. The same may be said about the Touhou genre at Comiket and Touhou-only sales events. The larger scale of sales events does not uniformly expand the opportunities to present works. In addition, for those who wish to host sales events, during the stable contraction period in which the total number of circles per year began to decrease, work-only and character-only events made it easier to highlight the individuality of the event and promote appeal to participants. During the stable contraction period, while the scale of the Reitaisai and Kouroumu was maintained, the number of circles at other events decreased. The major increase of newcomers like during the Touhou bubble era disappeared, and there was a polarization of Touhou general sales events and the formation of sub-communities led by work-only and character-only events. As the number of circles decreased, Touhou-only sales events became more fragmented. Structural Shock Period (2014-2017) The shrinking trend of the Touhou genre was becoming obvious to everyone in 2014, but the decrease in the number of participating circles at Reitaisai was seen as a turning point for the genre. In the same year, the number of circles at the Kouroumu decreased significantly compared to the previous year; the number of general participant began to decrease (the "attendance coefficient" for most Touhou-only events reduced to around 6-7), and the future of the Touhou genre became more uncertain. However, when looking at the number of circles at other Touhou-only sales events, the downward trend has stopped and the numbers have stabilized and even began to slightly increase. Considering the magnitude of the impact of the Reitaisai and Kouroumu, when considering the Touhou genre, the decrease in the number of circles at Reitaisai is a turning point, but when considering all Touhou-only sales events, we must think about the structure of the genre while being aware of how this contrast came about. The reason why the number of other Touhou-only circles began to stabilize is that many events that were established during the Touhou bubble period but were unable to build a stable foundation, or events that were originally intended to be short-term events stopped their activities. Many of the Touhou-only events that continued to be held had a certain degree of scale and know-how; their management base had been strengthened by holding simultaneous events. According to Circle Goka, another reason for the decline in the number of circles is the change in population composition: Another reason many people mention is the emergence of Kantai Collection. Back then, Touhou fans had a certain attraction to Kancolle. Both had many girl characters. Each character had its historical or mythological background. Fans could learn information related to the character through investigation, and characters gain popularity among fans through secondary creation and review of the works. Sharing this information between fans is also a common feature of Touhou and Kancolle. In other words, these two are very compatible with fan activities. These characteristics can also be seen in Uma Musume, which has become very popular recently. Some of the Touhou circles at that time, that were good at investigating characters and world views, expanded their scope of activities to the Kancolle field, and the Touhou fans also had an impact on the early stages of the Kantai Collection sphere. The most striking feature of structural shock period is the increase in younger participants. From its early days to its peak, the participants of the Touhou doujin events were mainly college students and older. However, starting around 2015, more and more high school, middle school, and elementary school students began to participate along with their parents at exhibitions such as Retaisai. Touhou has become a favorite field for Japanese primary school students. There is a theory that explains that. In the early days, finding out about Touhou and having deep understanding of it required the use of a PC. Playing original Touhou games or watching videos on Nicovideo required a computer, so Japanese Touhou fans are mainly college students and older. However, starting in the 2010s, the popularity of smartphones increased dramatically, giving even primary school children greater access to the internet. As a result, elementary school students began to look for information about anime and games, and Touhou may have become more popular as a result. With the reduction in participating circles, different events began to compete much more. From the economical side, a doujin event, as well as being a place to trade doujin works, is also structured as a trade between the organizers and circles for the right to exhibit. If there are no proposals that the circles think are acceptable for trading, circles will not gather and can eventually lead to the closure of the event. Organizers have many expenditures: venue expenses, public relations expenses, equipment expenses, labor costs. But they also have several ways to get income: participation fee, corporate exhibition fee, goods sales; and the deficit may be compensated by the organizer's free work and pocket money. The number of participating circles can not only affect the participation fees income, but also the number of general participants. From the time of the rapid expansion of Touhou-only sales events, the average number of circles has decreased. Initially, the increased costs were borne by the organizers. As the genre scale shrinked, the organizers' burden reached its limit. In response, the participation fees burden on circles also increased. The total participation fee amount remained the same, but as the number of circles decreased the average participation fee for circles increased. Before this period, event organisers survived the decline in scale by "sharing" circles with each other (adjusting schedules, joint planning, etc.), they tried to cooperate. After 2013, the decline in scale reached the organizers' limit, that is why events began to compete more to survive; it is a structural problem accompanied by a change in the competitive environment. And one of the manifestations of this is the emergence of Autumn Reitaisai. Before 2014, the structure of relation between Touhou-only events was described as "Reitaisai in the East, Kouroumu in the West", those events being major centers of activities in the Eastern and the Western regions of Japan. But the emergence of Autumn Reitaisai in 2014, which quickly surpassed Kouroumu by the number of participating circles, changed the situation greatly. There were even some critical opinions which claimed that the Autumn Festival has "taken away" the number of circles from Kouroumu. * Reitaisai SP, which was held in 2010 and 2011, was held in autumn too, so data about it was placed in Autumn Reitaisai column. Here we can see the actual number of circles on Reitaisai, Kouroumu and Autumn Reitaisai. We can see that at the end of the stable contraction period the number of circles which attended only one of the events began to decrease. Comparing 2013 and 2017, the number of circles which attended only one of the two events became less than half. Comparing 2013 and 2014, many circles (around 29%) which attended both events in 2013 participated in all three events in 2014. Autumn Reitaisai managed to create a strong base as the number of circles in each category (last four columns in the table) remained mostly stable even after COVID-19, but that couldn't be said about Reitaisai and Kouroumu. We can also see that the number of circles which participated only in Kouroumu and Autumn Reitaisai is very low compared to the scale of both events, because circles have to choose one or the other. The two events, which are held close to each other in the fall season, are in a certain competitive relationship. Only some circles (around 125 circles or around 5%) decided to fully move from Kouroumu to Autumn Reitaisai in 2014. The Autumn Festival, which is held on a scale of over 1000 circles, is obviously not an event that can be held only by participants moving from Kouroumu. And the overall decrease in Kouroumu is far greater than the overall increase in circles in Autumn Reitaisai. It is certain that the reduction in the scale of Kouroumu and the holding of the Autumn Festival are not unrelated, but the extent of the actual impact is debatable. However, some of the arguments that defended Kouroumu by criticizing Autumn Reitaisai could have overlooked other issues that Kouroumu faced by focusing too much on Autumn Reitaisai. One of the disadvantages that Autumn Reitaisai has over Kouroumu is the closeness of the dates. However, the number of circles that participate in both Autumn Reitaisai and Kouroumu continued to increase year by year. In addition, in relation to the schedule of Kouroumu, it is necessary to consider the Kyoto Joint Festival as well as Autumn Reitaisai. Kyoto Joint Festival has hardly received any criticism because its dates are already fixed through continued holding. In 2016, there were signs of mutual cooperation between Kouroumu, Autumn Reitaisai, and Kyoto Touhou Joint. This alone couldn't improve attendance, but it is worth noting that the organizers were aware that they needed to increase the number of overlapping participants. In summary, Autumn Reitaisai helped to maintain the number of circles for some time, but the number of unique circles began to decrease greatly. But "taking away" circles from Kouroumu is not the only thing Autumn Reitaisai was blamed for. It was also criticized for reducing the number of circles in the Kanto region, and as we can see below that is true, and it had an even bigger impact than Reitaisai SP. The number of circles that participated in small or medium-sized Touhou-only events in Kanto region dropped from around 2150 to around 950 circles, more than twice. Also the number of events dropped greatly from 28 to 11, as those circles could go to Reitaisai. That is why smaller events began to find ways to maintain their activities which in result led to the rise of the participation fees on those events since 2015, as the number of circles reduced. The rise of participation fee during this period was noticeable in other regions of Japan too, but in Kanto Autumn Reitaisai had an impact on these processes too. The Autumn Festival became a serious issue precisely because the Touhou genre was in a period of decline. This shows a shift from cooperation to a struggle for survival. The average number of circles decreased with the "Touhou bubble", so the events responded to the decrease in income by saving money. When the organizers reached the limit of their ability to reduce operating costs the strategy began to shift from cooperation to a struggle for survival. Solo-hosted events became much less common, and cohosted and joint planning became common to ensure stable events (Kyoto Joint Festival, Touhou Joint Festival, Meikasai, Dai⑨shu Joint Festival, etc.). To survive, big and medium-sized events began to differentiate more from other events. While it was often viewed critically by circles, the introduction of various events within the Reitaisai event can be seen as a search for a way for the event to survive from a broader perspective, rather than a fight for a piece of the pie within the Touhou genre. Kouroumu was run more like a general sales event than other large and medium-sized Touhou-only events. Compared to Reitaisai, which was constantly making business-like decisions, Kouroumu's management system, as some researchers say, gave the strong impression of being more like a hobby-oriented sales event organization. Meikasai, which had grown particularly notably, offered circles options that remove hardware constraints, such as Meikasai X, which provides spaces that circles can use freely for events, and participation in poster presentations at the Gensokyo Forum. Dai⑨shu Touhousai was the origin of active live event hosting, and the organizers envision a structure in which they can give back to circles by lengthening the time that general participants spend at the event through planning and implementing the events. Kyoto Joint Festival is a joint event of several Touhou-only events, but it is characterized by the careful consideration and attention to detail of each organizer. These cases are not a silver bullet to dramatically increase the number of circles. Stage events and other events held during circle distribution hours are often dissatisfied by participating circles. However, in all cases, they have a uniqueness that allows the organizer's face to be seen. However, despite all measures to maintain the structure, at the end of the structural shock period the number of circles per event began to decrease (although the average number of circles on non-cohosted events increased during this period, but at the same time the number of non-cohosted events decreased). Touhou-only doujin sales events slowly began to lose their main role in Japanese Touhou community. There were perspectives that Touhou-only events would become just "one of the kinds of Touhou content" as other kinds of activities (for example social networks) became popular. Changes also happened in the community as individualization was rising while the importance of community was decreasing. Fans' unique information sharing and organizational power was declining. The importance of official materials increased and commercial development became more noticeable (but this topic is for another time). The community wasn't decreasing that time, the interests of the community changed. Structural Contraction Period (2018-2019) The Reitaisai and Kouroumu shock led to serious changes in the structure of Touhou-only events and some measures were made to maintain the structure. The changes in the community became noticeable too and the pie was shrinking. Those changes were serious for the weak structure of Touhou-only events, which eventually led to the serious decline of the structure in 2018-2019. The future of the genre became even more uncertain. One of the reasons why it happened is that the number of young Touhou fans increased even more. The generation gap was increasing, which may be supported by data from Touhou Vote* as it was shown in different research papers. The number of fans who were around 20 years old and older began to decrease, while the number of younger fans was increasing. Taking into account Circle Goka's hypothesis (which was introduced in the previous period) about the change in population composition, then this change can be explained as another demographic cycle of the four-year student generation. But it is obvious that the number of people who wanted to and could participate as a circle decreased. Another reason is changes in the series. As it was said before, official works and media began to play a more serious role (as official works became more accessible, more ways to see ZUN's views and interpretations appeared) and commercialization became even more noticeable. Because of this, some circles that dislike such changes were more likely to move on from Touhou to other genres or could begin to make original works. * The quality of which is questionable, as it was shown in White Paper (2013 Edition) when NicoDouga Touhou Popularity Poll was arranged instead of Touhou Wiki Popularity Poll the data was very different from data by Touhou Wiki Popularity Poll. A serious indicator of the contraction of the structure is the decrease of the summary of the participation fees all circles paid during the 2018-2019. After the shock in 2014, many events began to increase the participation fee to cover their losses. Even though the fees continued to rise, such measures couldn't cover losses anymore as more circles began to leave the genre. That eventually led to even higher fees what again led the decrease of the number of circles per event later. This weak structure couldn't get over this downward spiral quickly, and if COVID-19 didn't happen that could led to even more serious changes in the structure. During this period the number of circles per event was decreasing, while the number of events was on the rise. Most of the new events were organized by groups, which organise cohosted genre-only events (Studio YOU, SDF, Kangun becter (寒軍べくたあ)). On the other hand, the number of Touhou circles attending such events greatly decreased. Even though the number of Touhou circles on Comiket stabilized and there were a lot of Touhou circles on some events which historically were places where Touhou circles gathered (like Godosai and Mori no Kiseki). This can indicate that Touhou Doujin was becoming more separated from Doujin as Touhou circles tended to participate more on solo-hosted or joint Touhou-only events than on cohosted Touhou-only events (even nowadays it is not rare when there are an solo-hosted event and a cohosted event in the same prefecture with close schedules, but the former has at least 5-10 times more circle than the latter). But not only cohosted events suffered, the number of circles on non-cohosted events dropped greatly too. The number of circles on Reitaisai dropped from 3397 in 2017 to 2970 in 2018, and on Kouroumu from 1613 to 1370. Among big-sized events only Autumn Reitaisai didn't fall that much (from 1793 to 1702), but as we noticed before Autumn Reitaisai managed to make a strong base. Before this period, different Touhou-only events got their characteristics to differ more from other events to survive. The structural contraction of the whole genre became a serious challenge for different events that showed which measures were useful and which ones were not. Meikasai managed to bring even more attention and the number of circles increased even more. Kyoto Touhou Joint didn't suffer during this contraction too, and we even see that the interest in Hifuu genre increased (from 181 in 2017 circles to 208 in 2019). Dai⑨shu Touhousai began to arrange more events per year (8 in 2017, 12 in 2018, 10 in 2019), but sadly this strategy led to decrease of overall circles participating in those events (846 in 2017, 768 in 2018, 558 in 2019). Puniket holds joint events with a lot of character-only events and Puniket organizers give some attention to detail of each character-only event organizer. But the number of circles dropped there too (283 in 2017, 230 in 2018, 189 in 2019). Kouroumu continued to run like a general sales event and didn't do serious changes, and this event didn't adapt to changes. The different outcomes to each of these events shows how event's characteristics can impact the success of the event. The same can be said about small, medium-sized and big events like Kouroumu and Reitaisai. We talked about different events, but what did Reitaisai do during this period? Reitaisai continued to make business-like decisions. At the end of 2017 Hakurei Shrine Office (organizers of Reitaisai) and several corporate groups formed Hakurei Shrine Worship Association (博麗神社崇敬会) to hold many commercial events and collaborations. They got a licence from ZUN which allowed them to make such commercial decisions. During this period they were doing a lot of commercial collaborations with various stores that sold doujin works. As a result, Reitaisai became even more commercial. As the number of participating circles was reducing, such decisions might be seen as a way to survive, but it could also be a way to earn even more money in this competitive environment. We see that the structure of Touhou genre was weakening, and the scale of doujinshi sales events was decreasing. Some other kinds of Touhou activities were becoming more popular, for example reading clubs, which share a lot of characteristics with sales events, while being simpler to organize and hold. But doujinshi sales events were still very important in Touhou community and their future was uncertain. Some researchers predicted that the structure would continue to contract, but they couldn't envision how much it would actually decrease. COVID-19 Period (2020-2021) The COVID-19 pandemic that started in 2020 has certainly had a huge impact on Touhou Doujin activities in Japan. The amount of circles dropped from around 10100 circles in 2019 to around 3200 circles in 2020. Around half of the Touhou-only events in 2020 were cancelled or postponed (and around 27% of events were cancelled or postponed in 2021). Reitaisai originally scheduled to be held in Shizuoka Prefecture in March 2020 was suspended, and almost all doujin events in Japan from April to June could not be held. Comiket was not able to be held until December 2021, and doujin events in Japan were at a standstill for a long time. The first Touhou-only event which was held, after it was allowed to hold them again, was Spiral Tea Party - Flower Storm (東方螺茶会 花嵐) on 27th of June. After that some more events were held, while the others were canceled or postponed. Before that, there were concerns about the "2020 problem" brought about by the Tokyo Olympics in 2020. Due to the hosting of the Tokyo Olympics, doujin events near Tokyo were affected, and events' organizers have prepared countermeasures. However, the Olympics were also postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 outbreak. People involved in doujin activities in Japan had to shift from Olympic measures to dealing with the pandemic. Doujinshi sales events are difficult to cancel. If there are some problems, in most cases doujinshi sales events won't be postponed or canceled. Before the pandemic, they were mostly cancelled if they were refused by the venue (for example because of earthquakes or typhoons). In other cases, even if the number of applied circles is low, organizers tend to hold events. There are many reasons why they do it. Circle participation fees are generally collected in advance, so there is a legal obligation and a moral obligation to hold the event. Circles and event groups are preparing on the assumption that their events will be held. If the cancellation is not due to venue reasons, the venue fee already paid won't be refunded, and in addition to the huge money loss, the event will lose the trust of its participants, making it nearly impossible to continue. When a sales event is canceled it is unlikely that circles' losses will be compensated. Sometimes, measures such as refunding already paid participation fees or transferring participating circles to an alternative event are taken. However, if such measures are not taken, the circle's participation fee will be fully lost. In addition, all expenses for accommodation and transportation prepared for the event can result in direct losses. The profit from the sales that could be gained at the cancelled event will be lost, so this could be considered as a loss too. For circles, once these losses occur, they are almost never compensated. There is always an uncertainty whether or not an event would be held. Before the circles were prepared for cancellation of one event per several years, but during this period circles had to face regular cancellations of many events which resulted in high losses. The events, when they could be arranged, were held with many anti-pandemic measures. Several circles couldn't share one table for social distance. General participants had to social distance too. Because of these measures less circles could participate and less participants could attend these events. Organizers had to follow anti-pandemic measures and supply participants with masks, antiseptics, etc. That increased their work and their financial burden, and they had to increase fees to cover their losses. Some local governments were strict about these measures, making planning even more difficult. Some events weren't able to be hold anymore (but most of such events were closed because of the Tokyo Olympics, COVID-19 just made the situation even worse) or they weren't hold for a long time because of these circumstances. Some people may think that as the opportunities for offline events were limited, many circles would have begun to sell their works online. But actually, as research by Hisayuki Yoshifumi showed, the number of downloadable Touhou doujin works didn't increase on many doujin digital stores. In fact, since 2021 the number of physical works has been increasing while the number of downloadable works has been on a downward trend. But what about sales events themselves? As there was no way to hold them offline some people decided to hold them online. And there were a lot of different kinds of such events: some people just posted their works with a special hashtag; some events were organised with a help of digital stores, where circles could submit their items; there was even an event in VR. In 2020, pictSQUARE was opened, it is a service with a new form of online doujin events. This service gave instruments to organizers and circles for arranging events and participating in events. It is an MMO RPG-like game there you can buy and sell doujin works for money. Organizers can change the "venue" for fan activities. Even though some people may think that such activities aren't very doujin and doesn't have the same feeling, this can be a great option when offline activities cannot be held. Later Picrea appeared, which is more sales oriented, but it also has fan activities. The first Touhou-only event on pictSQUARE was held in May 2020 and after that more events were held. But these services didn't become very popular among Touhou fans (68 circles in 2020, 43 in 2021, 69 in 2022, 45 in 2023, 54 in 2024). On Picrea the situation is not better. It seems like Touhou circles aren't very interested in such activities as they have a lot of offline doujin events. While circles from other genres are much more interested in such services. We see that even though there are a lot of kinds of online activities, Touhou Doujin creators still tend to attend offline events. The similar trend can be also seen in Touhou reading clubs, even though some of such events are held online, most of them are held offline. Touhou Doujin just waited till the pandemic would end to begin holding events again. Looking at the number if participated circles we can see that the number of circles slightly increased in 2021 (after anti-pandemic measures became less strict), but this only happened because Reitaisai wasn't held in 2020; nearly everywhere (except Autumn Reitaisai and some regions of Japan in West) the number of circles dropped. Smaller events in local areas suffered the most from the pandemic. Post-COVID-19 Recovery Period (2022-now) Since 2022, the number of Touhou circles has been on a sharp recovery trend, and community activities have become more active. The average number of circles per event slightly increased. Many activities, which had to be held online because of the pandemic, began to be held offline again. By 2023, the impact of COVID-19 has been low, but some impact remains even nowadays. The number of events began to recover and some regular events which weren't held in 2020 (and 2021) began to be held again. Even nowadays some events are coming back. This year (2024) New Moon Young Demon Night Parade (新月幼魔夜行), Yuenjaku (東方遊宴雀), Taensai (東方多宴祭) and Kamuisai (東方神居祭) were held for the first time since 2020. QuizMagicGemmashin (げんましんクエスト), Miaresai (御阿礼祭) and Underground Mind-Reading Trial (地底の読心裁判) already announced that they would be held next year (2025) for the first time since 2020. And there will be many new events. Next year Let's Meet at the White Mansion (白のお屋敷で会いましょう), Kagasai (加賀東方祭), The Special Day for the Floating Dolls That Wiill Last a Thousand Years (流し雛にも 縁が千代な ハレの日を), On the Sands of the Sea of Stars (星の海の沙に), Hidasai (東方飛騨祭), Hiroshima Nazu Festival (広島ナズ祭り), Oko no Yukari (往古のゆかり) and Sanmazyosai (東方三魔女祭) are planned to be held for the first time. Another change in this period is the inflation of yen and the recession of Japanese economics. Which means that production costs, travelling costs and other costs are rising. And as many participants in Touhou circles are students this may be a problem. Even though average participation fees have begun to decrease, "doujin market prices" are decreasing too, as noticed by Circle Goka. So Touhou circles may face a serious financial burden nowadays. It may lead to problems in the future. It seems like the situation is begining to change this year. The number of events increased greatly, the number of circles on medium and small sized events increased, but the average number of circles per event decreased. It could happen because the number of events increased and circles had to choose which one they would attend. And as the number of events next year will likely increase, this trend will likely continue. The trend in demographics didn't change, the number of younger fans is still increasing. These can indicate that there might be changes in the Touhou Doujin soon. Conclusion In this article, we used statistics to analyze the changes in Touhou-only events in Japan. We saw how the structure of Touhou-only events changed during different periods. Although the structure has shrunk compared with the Golden Age, Touhou activities are still large in scale. Touhou activities aren't limited by sales events, they also include reading clubs, concerts, dancing clubs, forums, game tournaments, photo exhibitions, painting exhibitions and cosplay festivals. Touhou Doujin has a structure that serves as a miniature of the entire doujin community. It became self sufficient, not dependent on other genres. Touhou Doujin is neither too small to lack sufficient data for trend analysis, nor too large to make it difficult to capture data for the entire genre. Although the pandemic damaged the structure greatly, Touhou genre is recovering and while some other popular genres moved some of their activities to the online field, Touhou genre remained mostly offline. Touhou events can provide valuable knowledge for the growth of fan activities in Japan and show the problems that other genres can face and how different events and the whole genre tried to solve them. The future of Touhou Doujin may not be bright, but it will still be a big genre. In the following years it will likely increase (at least it won't decrease), but problems caused by inflation and demographics in Japan will show themselves soon. We can only hope that Touhou Doujin will come up with a solution to the problem. List of Sources Sites: Touhou Event Statistics Committee THBWiki KetCom List of Touhou Project Only Sales Events* (東方Projectオンリー即売会一覧) by そらいろ Touhou Project Related Doujin Event Information Storage Area* (東方Project関連同人イベント情報置き場) by 消隠 Touhou-Only Event Information Bureau* (東方オンリーイベント情報局) Wayback Machine Sites of the events Books and articles: Main sources: The History of Touhou Event: from the Point of View of the Statistical Analysis, First Edition (東方イベント10年史[初版]:データで見る東方Project同人誌即売会), Circle Goka, 2016 Data Analysis of Touhou Events in Japan 2004-2022* (日本东方展会之数据分析2004-2022), Circle Goka, 2023 Annual Festival - Reorganization of Kouroumu* (例大祭-紅楼夢関係の再編), Circle Goka, 2016 Additional sources (can give additional info about Touhou Doujin): Narratives of Fan Fictions and Fanzine Sales : Experiences of the Touhou Project (二次創作と同人誌即売会をめぐる語り : 東方projectを軸としたそれぞれの体験), Osaka University, 2018 (2016) White paper on community Touhou (東方コミュニティ白書), Hisayuki Yoshifumi, 2010-2019 (+ reviews by nix in desertis) The Study of Touhou Networking (東方ネットワーク研究), Circle Goka, 2024 The Illustrated Annual Report on Touhou Event 2014 (東方イベント業界地図2014), Circle Goka, 2014 Presentations: The Development of Touhou-Only Sales Events and Their Economic Historical Understanding* (東方オンリー即売会の展開と経済史的理解), Circle Goka, 2017 "The New Touhou Community" and the Issues Facing the Fan Community* (『新しい東方コミュニティ』と二次創作コミュニティの課題), Hisayuki Yoshifumi, 2017 The Future of the Touhou Community in the Reiwa Era* (令和時代の東方コミュニティの行方), Hisayuki Yoshifumi, 2019 The COVID-19 Pandemic and Touhou Doujinshi Sales Events* (コロナ禍と東方同人誌即売会), Hisayuki Yoshifumi, 2021 Perspectives on Studying the Touhou Neighborhood: Reconsidering “Community Theory”* (東方界隈考察の視座:「コミュニティ論」再考), Circle Goka, 2017 The Changing Structure and Dynamics of Touhou Network* (변화하는 동방네트워크의 구조와 동태), Circle Goka, 2024 Posters: Statistics and Economic Analysis of Touhou-Only Sales Events* (東方オンリー即売会統計と経済分析), Circle Goka, 2017 The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Touhou Doujin Creations and the Future* (コロナ禍における東方同人創作への影響と今後について), Hisayuki Yoshifumi, 2023 Summary of The History of Touhou* (東方界隈歴史まとめ), Hinata no Hibi, 2024 Thinking About the Generational Differences Among Touhou Fans* (東方ファンの世代差について考えてみる), Hinata no Hibi, 2018 20 Years of Touhou Events Captured in Data* (データで捉える東方イベントの20年), Circle Goka, 2023 Circle Continuation Rate at Touhou Doujinshi Sales Events* (東方同人誌即売会におけるサークル継続率), Hisayuki Yoshifumi, 2018 * Title is an unofficial translation as the original text doesn't have an official English translation of the title. Special Thanks: Pinky Cat Flame Sniper (Pepi) Circle Goka Moriya Shrine Community Organizers and participants of Gensokyo Forum and Presentation of Toho And you vanyk, 20246 points
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welcome, you're here because of a year in review, eh? this is basically like a questionnaire!! also thank you guys so much for 1 year on moriya shrine, and ofc, all the support!!! let's begin the questionnaire 1) What was the best thing from the community of this year? honestly, all the FA that came in, so many have gotten improvements (like me)!! also we got koishi project and lyrica live dropped another thing!!! 2) What changed for you within the community throughout 2024? basically what you changed in 2024 in the community, for me, it's the activity on moriya shrine and my FA 3) What's your contributions to Touhou? writing stories, artworks, and that game im making!! 4) Why have you stayed in Touhou until today? still have that heavy interest in touhou, plus whats the use when i lose interest and i have now 6 fumos to deal with? 5) Last comments of 2024 Touhou before we move towards 2025 Touhou? this is the year where i really contributed to the touhou space with my arts, writing, and that game that's all, really, i'm running out of good ideas happy new year and see y'all in 2025!!!6 points
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Fortune Telling While there is a place for Western divination practices such as Tarot Cards, Crystal Balls and Palm Reading, most fortune telling is rooted in Japanese and to a lesser degree Chinese practices. Many of these are extremely old, some possibly dating to before the end of the last Ice Age. In broad strokes, these include: Itako, a process where blind women are raised to become spiritual mediums with a patron Kami. By having cold water poured over them daily. By completing the process, they can speak with gods, spirits and the dead. Kokkuri, a tilting table used to summon Kokkuri-san. An animal spirit which acts as a medium to the spiritual plane. Kokkuri-san will tilt the plate beneath the table in answer to the questions asked, though his honesty or intentions are not always pure. Omikuji, random fortunes contained in boxes at temples. You pay a fee, and in exchange are provided the randomized fortune. If the fortune is poor, it can be evaded by tying it to a pine tree, thus leading the bad luck to the tree instead of the holder. Onmyōdō, utilizing calendars and astronomy to determine the fortune tied to specific places, directions and actions. A highly sophisticated system, those who knew its use were often found in noble courts in feudal Japan. Sanpaku, a form of face reading where studying the eyes can give the reader insight into a person's health and prospects. Tengenjutsu, a complex system of sixty rotating words involving Yin and Yang, the five Elements, your birthday and your physical appearance. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= "TRIAL OF FORTUNE! Never fear, fellow Kami! I, Yorigami Joon, shall break this tie with a flip of a coin! Heads, Cirno wins. Tails, Agappa wins! *Ting* BWAHAHA! The Maiden of Misfortune triumphs! That'll be 1 Ryu." =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The question was a difficult one. After all, each had their own advantages. Despite her occasional grumpy disposition, Wriggle had been a fair companion to him and her ability to communicate with insects may have been handy. Cirno was brave, if headstrong. Oscar had no idea if she could actually freeze a ghost. But he was sure at least she was absolutely confident she could. Then there was Agappa. Of all the group, she was the least expressive. Which did at least mean she hadn't picked at him. Her blank stares may have been disturbing. But in a building owned by a Fortune Teller, wouldn't her powers come in handy? Also he didn't think Wriggle would be comfortable being alone with her. "Alright. Cirno and Wriggle, you check that way. Agappa and I will go the other way." The Ice Fairy gave a thumbs up, along with a confident smile. Over her shoulder, Wriggle's face seemed to soften. For a moment, he even thought he saw her mouth 'thank you' before she turned. Sweeping her cape with her as she and Cirno started along the broken wooden walkway. The planks underfoot creaking far less than they would have under Oscar's feet. He turned to Agappa. Who regarded him beneath the hood of her raincoat with a passive stare. Her mouth slightly ajar as usual. Oscar took in a low, slow breath. Before forcing a smile. "Alright, let's go." She only nodded. Letting him lead the way. The walls here were pain, flecked with dust and little else. The boards under his feet were in a poor condition, and likely had been even when this place was inhabited. They let out creaks and groans of protest with his every footfall. Which he did his best to ignore as he crept towards the nearest door. The paper set in the door had yellowed some time ago, and holes had begun to tear in them... He took another step forward. And realized there was a weight on him. Agappa was clinging to the back of his suit jacket. Her face pressed against the small of his back as though terrified. The gesture may have been endearing were it not so odd... "What's the matter?" The question hung in the air. Patiently waiting an answer that didn't come. Eventually, a fearful arm rose and pointed at the door. Her eyes failing to open for a second. The baffling display left the overwhelming question...what now? = Cast a 'spell' or 'charm' which will fool Agappa into thinking the room is gone. = Give Agappa a pep talk and see if you can get her to tell you what's wrong. = Let's...avoid this door for now. Walk past it. = Let her cling on to you and press forward. You're strong enough to drag her behind you.6 points
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as always the ghost returns with something nobody cares about but I've been thinking over this for some time now and even discussed it with @koakumas (she caused this actually) and I figured I could try it out. How it works (or will work, depends): I will take the names of everyone replying to this post saying "I wanna enter" and make a wheel spin to decide who enters or not. there is 24 slots available I believe, and those who fail to enter will sadly have to wait until the next game to have another chance (unless koa wants to make 2 happen at the same time) I will have predictions happen every time a day ends, excluding the first. these can either be set by me or just sent by someone in the topic over what they think is gonna happen (x dies, y kills z, etc). whoever gets the prediction right will get awesome rewards such as: absolutely nothing and bragging to people that you're like a visionary (subject to change, I might have koa draw you a custom cuz I'm evil. within reason of course) How will the game itself work: my idea was to get everyone (or mostly everyone) into my discord server so we can proceed with the day there. I'll still send the results of the day here in this topic for those who couldn't make it or just can't be bothered to join a vc. (I wanted to do this in the actual moriya server but I figured I'd be annoying people so) totally not an excuse to get people on my server so it's not dead anymore haha no why would that be the case this event will, as the title suggests, happen weekly. I'll have a vote up whether you guys wanna have 1 or 2 days every session cause I feel like a day only might take too long. I will also do this either on saturday or sunday, whichever day I'm available. as for the time, I'll just default to 6 PM -3 UTC because I can't be asked to find a decent time for everyone see you soon OH I forgot to add but it can be both the forum users and the discord users, just lmk in my dms if you're from the dc! (or ping me wtv)5 points
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Hello to anyone reading this, apparently an introductions page exists on this forum, so I think giving an introduction here would be appropriate. I think? (I don't know if I'm late here and I don't have an account on Moriya Shrine, but I have been reading since at least the part where Marisa and Oscar meet released last year. This is one of my favorite stories I've read on this website. Sorry I don't have much to say.) from Gensokyo Survival Guide OoC and Off-Topic is, so far, my only post here. I made the account essentially just to post on how much I like that fanfiction (Gensokyo Survival Guide). I did not even have an idea what to name the account, so it is just 'No Account Name Idea'. A user named kymoh called me nanashi, which I think is a nice name (it literally means anonymous though). It reminds me of pineapples (ananas in a bunch of languages). Another fanfiction here that is nice is War, Peace and Vengeance. I started liking Touhou at least in 2023 or possibly early in 2024? Because I clicked on a video of Cirno's UNL theme and 9 Destiny - It's Always Cirno's Turn after I watched Teto Territory. Then I found out Travelling Days by Crazy Beats. I didn't really pay much attention at the time, so I don't know when this happened or over how long, but I ended up on the Touhou Fandom Wiki (which got raided) looking for 9 Destiny's lyrics. I haven't played any official Touhou games, but I do play Thousand Night Anamnesis and Phantom Bullet (mobile Touhou fangames) alongside Len'en (Touhou-inspired Bullet Hell series) and Little Doll Queen (Touhou fangame on computer). I hope everyone has a great day. War, Peace and Vengeance Gensokyo Survival Guide5 points
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i found some crayons that i havent touched since grade school and thought "hey i can do something with these" and then well, uhmm... yeah its telling of my ability to color isn't it...5 points
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Over this past year I have been building up a collection of Touhou literature, ranging from manga, fanfictions, zines, and research papers. But I noticed that of discussion of Touhou literature is limited online. In an effort to rectify that issue, this thread's purpose is to act as a reading log on Touhou literature by sharing the work's details like story, characters, themes, art style, etc. Of course, any discussion about the work or sharing a Touhou work within the domain of literature is always welcome. If you have any comments to say on one of these reading log entries, be sure to comment in the Touhou Reading Log Lounge, a companion thread to this thread as to keep this thread clean for reading entries. =========================== Pinky Cat's Entries5 points
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Hello. I guess I've technically had an account for 3 years now but I've never actually used the forums. I started playing Touhou around 10 years ago and think I have some decent accomplishments at least as far as clearing every game/extra stage, as well as a few successful Lunatic and NN runs. Here are my exact records in case anyone is curious: I don't know if that's gonna impress anybody here but I'm proud of some of those and hey the most important thing is I had fun over the years. Main reason I'm posting here now is I decided to upload some of my runs to my YouTube channel to show some of my friends and to see if anybody else is interested. For example this NN run of Flandre. If that sounds like something you might be interested in then by all means stop by my channel and take a look. Feel free to leave any feedback on my gameplay or suggestions if you have any.5 points
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Some of you may have already seen me pondering this is in the chatbox, but I'll make it official here. What do you all say to a live meetup where we'll talk and play some fun activities together? My thinking is next Sunday (Nov 10) at, say, 15:00 GMT. And don't worry, it won't be voice chat, we will just be using the chatbox (in the forum homepage). If several people can't make it, then I'm up for rescheduling it. So far I have a few games in mind, to give you all an idea of what we might do. Feel free to post any other games! Anyways, what do you all think about this Moriya Meetup? Who's interested!5 points
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Welcome back to the Moriya Shrine, CountVonNumenor. I can't speak for the entire Touhou community, but I say the state of the Touhou community is not different from 2023 in that the community is growing slowly, and new fanworks are created on a regular basis. Nothing major happened within the Touhou community between 2023 and 2024, so let me present my slice of Touhou news from 2024 as an update on what ZUN and the community has done this past year. Official May 3 - Taboo Japan Disentanglement It is another Hifuu Album with a story. https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Taboo_Japan_Disentanglement May 31 - Touhou Guideline Changes The big change is that "indie game websites" are allowed on the acceptable list, meaning a website like itch.io is now allowed to sell Touhou fan games. The second change is mention that crowdfunding is not allowed without ZUN's permission. https://x.com/richard_effendi/status/1796539548287336605 July 8 - Touhou 19 v1.10c After one year from its release, a balance patch is released that made balance changes to every character and fixing a number of bugs. The includes nerfing Chiyari’s to have clearable wisps and bluffing Nazrin’s scope speed to name a few of the changes. Safe to say, this is more balanced than the initial version of Touhou 19. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2400340/view/4220517501592769690 July 29 - ZUN Manuscript In a radio stream back in July 29, ZUN commented that he been busy writing some manuscripts. It been speculated that this could be a future Touhou printwork. https://moriyashrine.org/forums/topic/6276-a-new-livestream-with-zun-kind-of-a-interview-too/?do=findComment&comment=20165 Community February 8 - Touhou Danmaku Kagura Release After the successful crowdfunding campaign back in 2023 to revive Touhou Danmaku Kagura, this rhythm game got its release on Steam. https://danmaku.jp/igG3s3wtMyN0R1Oa1x7CQ/ June 5 - Crowdfunding Permissions On this day, Kyoto Fantasy Troupe is accepted for fundraising its 3rd episode of The Sealed Esoteric History. At the same time, the Korean Touhou orchestra got declined for fundraising, forcing them to change their funding strategy. https://x.com/fantasytroupe/status/1798323908669755837 https://x.com/THorch_KR/status/1798324092812353971 May 10 - TouhouFest 2024 News Report TouhouFest 2024 is broadcasted on Torrence’s cable network on a report that showcases the aspects of TouhouFest while TouhouFest attendees talk about Touhou and the convention. https://youtu.be/X_TCJbXei_o?si=73xjg9mcNDfApXNK Summer - Cyberattacks on Touhou! On June 8, Niconico went down for about a month after a ransomware attack occurred on Kadowara’s servers. Then, during early July, a wave of DDOS attacks occurred on multiple Chinese Touhou websites, shutting down services like the THBWiki. Thankfully, all of these services have since recovered, and it does not appear any permanent website migrations occurred after this incident was said and done. https://moriyashrine.org/forums/topic/5870-chinese-touhou-websites-are-under-attack/ July - Seasons of Gensokyo Seasons of Gensokyo is another Touhou zine collaboration after Welcome to Gensokyo that once again features art, stories, and comics from over 100 contributors. https://gensokyozine.itch.io/gensokyoseasons August - Mystia Izakaya Anime Announcement Its release is aiming for summer 2025. Concept art has also been released in the meantime. https://moriyashrine.org/forums/topic/6495-touhou-mystias-izakaya-anime-seems-to-be-on-the-works/ August 15 - Imperishable Night 20th Anniversary Across the Touhou community were fanworks related to Imperishable Night to celebrate its anniversary. There too many fanworks to cover in this post, but the tag fanworks used for the anniversary is #ImperishableDay. https://youtu.be/UHwbk9fgs9w Winter - Riverside Wonders A charity zine where all profit will go to Care for Gaza in helping the needs of Palestine families. The zine is planed for preorders by the end of the year. https://thriversidezine.carrd.co/ December - BBEX International On December 31st, 2023, the Hispanic community magazine BBEX, releasing its first international issue, showcasing community works from the rest of the Western Touhou community. With the success of the pervious event, BBEX international is running again this year and has announced that the premiere of the next issue will happen on December 29th. https://x.com/POfBoundaries/status/1865896113573617779 Vanyk's Japan Touhou Circle Research Teaser Vanyk has been building an extensive data table on Touhou circles and Touhou events within Japan to analysis changes in the Japanese Touhou community. Currently, he is in the progress of writing an analysis piece based on his data. https://moriyashrine.org/profile/38795-vanyk/content/?type=core_statuses_status&change_section=1 If you need more info on what happened in 2024, I recommend Suzunaan's monthly news videos. Despite the commentary being Spanish, their videos are still watchable as each news item has images. Plus, every video has a source list down in the description or comment section. If you have any more questions on the Touhou community, feel free to ask.5 points
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I knew it! It's perfect and you just proved it to me! From the start, I knew we were going to get along just fine, but this is just what I needed to confirm it. For starters, I feel like I need to apologize, despite calling you my ally, I still had my doubts about our alliance and never actually had plans to uphold this relationship... until right now! With this single move, you have already acquired my eternal loyalty, from now on, I'll be the first to back up all your decisions whenever I can. Alright, let's be serious now, to answer your unasked question, I actually missed my cue to review in the day, Yume posted the last update, and then in the following week, I decided to wait for his update so I could review both at the same time. Turned out Yummy didn't post anything at all... kinda funny no? So, I was stuck in this awkward loop of Should I wait? Should I review it? Thankfully, my dilemma is now over, although, I would 100% send you a message the moment I read "Yummy Toes". Ah, and before I forget, don't worry about the misunderstanding because such a trivial thing won't get in the way of our alliance ever. By the way, this is a nice remix, sounds so much like Cirno's math class. Aaaay Yumeee, I get the feeling, but don't worry, I'm not sure if you noticed but even with your brief absence your fanbase is still steadily growing, call it the fruits of honest work, and be proud because you really deserve it, friend. Now, if I could help you with something... oh I get it, listen, "The walls here were pain, flecked with dust and little else.", I think you meant plain instead of pain? Just one small typo, nothing to sweat over but it's enough to make me feel a bit satisfied considering that I finally managed to write an actual review at least once because, you know, most of my "reviews" are just me rambling haha. Nice to meet you master Gri, for some reason, I think of a Jedi Master whenever I read your nickname, are you an actual Jedi, master Gri? Well, since both Master and Ally have given their opinions about Aggapa then it's only fair I give my take too. First of all, despite my thoughts on her, she is someone we absolutely can't afford to lose in any circumstances, why? She fills an essential role right now, spiritual perception, Ozzy can't see past what normal eyes can see, be it curses or loot (don't think I forgot how she was looting that corpse when we first encountered her). The second reason is rather simple, she calls Oscar "Ningen" or human, which further proves my point about her perception stat being above the norm and it also means that, even if unknowingly, Aggapa is the closest person in Gensokyo to Oscar's true self, this is both good for his mental health and it also means that we can safely pull a Joseph Joestar near her without fearing any damage to his magician persona. Ops, I forgot to mention what I think about her, hmm... how do I say it? I can't tell for sure how she is going to act, at first, she seemed like any youkai interested in Oscar, perhaps scouting him to see if he could be safely eaten? Then, she passed the Keine radar without problems, which made me think that she was just a quiet girl who was being a bit curious about the weird guy, until her apparent outburst against Marisa put me on edge again, until now, this recent chapter had her act like a scared girl. I can't figure her out at all, feels like she might change sides at any moment but at the same time she is probably our closest ally. Hello there Sosh! I'm glad to see you are probably having as much fun as I am reading this, I wish I could advise you about writing, but I'm completely untalented in this, in fact, I'm mediocre at best in most forms of arts that the human being could ever invent, music, drawing, painting or writing you name it! The only thing I can do reliably is rambling, so if you ever start writing something, you can count on me being there to ramble about your story as soon as I can. Before I forget, Ozzy used to be a roleplaying project that Yume started a while ago, I believe the name is Illusionary Nirvana, you should take a look if you feel like it. Without further ado, I believe it's time for me to finally talk about the update... actually, I took so long to greet everyone that I forgot about what I wanted to discuss, thankfully I can just open another window and re-read it real quick. Coin Flip! I wrote a fun review for Nyoko a while ago, I remember asking for a coin flip to deal with a tie that I had with my ally, never expected I would see it here again and even less win! That's quite the winning streak. For my choice this week, I went with the only option that remotely presented us a chance to know what might be behind that suspicious door, maybe the right answer for such an unprepared duo would be to go past it as soon as possible and then return with the whole squad for safety but we can't rule out the possibility of that door hiding something useful, asking Aggapa a question probably won't get us in trouble as long as we don't go near it.5 points
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Requests for songs to be arranged or feedback on songs other than questions are welcome. You can listen to the arrangements we made at the following link.5 points
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Alright, seeing as how Touhou 20 is probably going to be released in 2025 (given the release dates from historical data), I've come up with some various theories and predictions for TH 20 and other releases based on previous games. This will include spoilers as it will talk about previous games and the stories behind them. This is also for fun! So you can take it as is or disregard it as you like as this will include my own supported viewpoints to the series. You guys can also add some predictions for what you think. 1. Touhou 20 | Will Focus On A New Plotline / Develops The Beast Realm Plot Alright, this prediction requires some backstory of the Touhou games, as people who know about Touhou lore know that a lot of the games are interconnected and sometimes reference past incidents and/or plotlines (EX: the current Beast Realm plotline and/or involvement of characters from the last game as seen from 6, 7, and 8, though many games do use past characters who aren't often seen as MCs). Introduction To start off, Touhou 20 is probably going to be a very important entry to the series due to previous games such as Touhou 10 being a new introduction to various characters and also Sanae, who has been a constant in the current Touhou games as a main character, aside from a new plotline given Kanako influencing Touhou 11's main plot. That aside, I feel like ZUN would probably be more inclined to make Touhou 20 a special entry that would either start another incident or continue the Beast Realm plot. New Plotline / Continuation of Beast Realm Plot This prediction is based on the length of previous plotlines and the focus of making Touhou 20 into something newer in the multiple entries. As the title says, Touhou 20 will probably involve a new plotline aside from the beast realm, which will probably be of some importance, but not enough to make the beast realm the main focus of this entry; it can also be put aside for another new incident. The other theory means the continuation of the beast realm plotline given that Touhou 19 UDoALG still has the three leaders kind of agitated against each other for control of Gensokyo, though the data to back this up is pretty low considering Zanmu's UDoALG ending has all three leaders of the beast realm convene and make up with Reimu acting as the peacekeeper, though the beast realm will probably still be of relevancy if brought up again. So to the new plotline I have some generalities that might be expected 1. Eastern thematic: Touhou has constantly focused on using characters from eastern mythologies for different plotlines; the use of western themes for a main game plot hasn't been used since EOSD, which focused on vampires, witches, maids, demons, and fairies. (To which I feel kind of disappointed as some character designs are from western backgrounds and fangames have provided great explorations of how it could be done for the main plot (BDiTB).) 2. 3–4 playable characters or just 2 main characters: This one needs more explanation as many people who have played Touhou know that many of the recent entries do include more than the usual two, though with the current theory "New Plotline," this might be relegated to just Reimu and Marisa with either 2-3 shot types that will lead to different endings. Otherwise, 3–4 playable characters will be the mainstay, given the recent entries which are probably the most likely. 3. *Something more modern*: This prediction is kind of more loose, so you can disregard it more easily, but I'll still talk about it anyway. Seeing as to how Gensokyo is constantly facing off more and more threats that have some theming around modern-day stuff, I feel like Gensokyo might face off with another kind of vague relation to the outside world that isn't entirely another character, but something that incites a new character into another incident. 2. New Touhou Fighting Game It has been about ~6 years since we had a multiplayer Touhou fighting game (disregarding GI and UDoALG as they don't fit what I'm actually talking about; the last one was AOCF in 2017). Studio Tasofro's recent work, GI (Goukyou Ibun), also called on the TH wiki Sunken Fossil World, has been kind of in production hell as it was supposed to release after WBaWC (presumably due to the effect of COVID-19 affecting the production schedule and release date). This wasn't exactly what people most expected from the game, as most people here felt that the gameplay fell short, though the music and art style always hit with people, given that Tasofro is made up of popular producers of doujin games. So maybe within the next year or two, there might be a new Touhou fighting game, as it is 2024, and Tasofro's regular schedule of fighting games might come back. 3. New Side Game Kind of expected given the release timeline, what type of side game is probably going to be dubious as most of the previous side games are either mostly STBs(Shoot The Bullet) and or one of the prominent ones GFW or 100th BM. Though one thing is for certain, it's going to include bullet curtain mechanics as it seems that is the only thing ZUN knows how to program a game around.5 points
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Aah hello? Is this how you leave a review? i certainly hope so! Anyways, i'm a newb here and joined yesterday by mistake when i was searching for a 2hu quest and somehow found this, there is not many quests about 2hu in this little shrine right? it seems this is a place dedicated to sharing the actual games and some fan content... So about your story, our best boi Osu seems to be surviving for now, your take on 2hu is way more interesting than what we see around so far since most stories are about a random pal being gapped getting stronk on the get go and just going through the classics incidents one by one however, you are presenting a moooore in-depth view so to say. The way you show us some less know locations, some of the locals and even give us a bit of lore makes this so much more rich than what we usually have, normally 2hu is only about named characters, but your Gensokyo just seems to be much bigger so props to you friend. Best boi Osu being completely unaware of what he is doing is simply hilarious, claiming to be a magician in a land where belief is EVERYTHING means he is on the path to become something else without even realising. I'll try to be around from now on to see just where can you take this train. With love, Yer frend, good an ol' me5 points
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Karakasa Kozo ‘Umbrella Ghost’ As discussed elsewhere in the Gensokyo Survival GUide, a number of Youkai are said to manifest over time, typically 100 years. Among the most prestigious of these is the Karakasa Obake, or ‘Karakasa Kozo’ meaning Paper Umbrella Priest Boy’. This surprising looking creature resembles a standing Japanese umbrella. These traditional umbrellas are made of paper with a layer of oil over them to make them resistant to the rain. A Karakasa Obake resembles this with a single large eye, a long tongue and one or two legs emerging from the hem of the umbrella. Karakasa Kozo are benign creatures, often surprising humans by following them stealthily, before licking their victim with an oily tongue. Though not dangerous, this may still be traumatic in the right circumstances. Karakasa Kozo usually have a lasting affection for humans, and are difficult to spur to violence. Oddly, while most Youkai arise from eyewitness reports and have essays documenting them, Karakasa Kozo have no reported sightings in Japan. This may be due to the Karakasa Obake's talent at being unobserved, or simply because they are so harmless no one considers them notable. That said, umbrella themed Youkai are not uncommon, and one should take care not to confuse the playful Karakasa Kozo with their more dangerous cousins. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The tumbling head rolled along the cobblestone path. The old rabbit somehow maintaining his perch on top of it over his wheezing. The two girls hurled after the two. Though Sekibanki could not help but think resentfully that Kogasa might have an easier time keeping up if she closed her umbrella… She felt her head begin to come loose, one hand rising to push it back into place. It was surreal. A couple hours later, she and Kogasa would have dozens of witnesses to their inhuman nature. Farmers coming home, housewives working on food at the windows, children playing in the street. Now, the roads were mostly empty. Mostly. A housewife could be seen with a friend. Chatting with one another through a window. Normally, Sekibanki would have just walked right by, completely below note. But with Ichibanki bouncing ahead of her, there was not exactly an opportunity for subtlety… “Koggers, I am about to do something stupid.” “I told you not to call me—” Kogasa’s irritated reply was cut off. Replaced with an expression of shock as Sekibanki threw aside her picnic basket. She held up her hand, holding aloft one of her spell cards. Danmaku surged from around her hand, flaring into the air overhead. The tired rabbit watched them rising impassively. They rained down onto the stone. Rupturing into the ground and throwing up shards of rock. Each creating a pothole large enough to catch her beloved extra head. Yet as she and her friends approached and the dust cleared, all she could see were empty potholes… ...And Ichibanki, laying brushed on her side. The tired old rabbit sitting passively on top of her. A tongue lapping at his paw. “What the hell man? I thought we were cool.” Sekibanki hissed as she started forward again. No sooner had she started for him, than the rabbit’s mad dash resumed. Faster than she had ever guessed he could have moved, he bolted again, rolling Ichibanki beneath him. Each rotation of her head followed by an ‘Ow. Ow. Ow.’ The two Youkai followed, ignoring the two women staring at them from behind as they pursued the hare. Kogasa’s eyes rose, taking in her surroundings. “Seki, I think…” She stopped as the other Youkai ran around the corner. Her slender fingers clung to her umbrella, her extension of herself. An odd feeling of foreboding filling her. Before she reluctantly followed. “You damn creep! Give me back my head!” As she rounded the corner, she could see Sekibanki racing up the path of the Fortune Teller’s house. Its shape looming ahead as though to blight an otherwise lovely spring day. The disembodied head lay on its side on the doorstep, a flash of white passing as the rabbit bolted through a hole in the wall, beneath an Ofuda. His legs briefly kicking to either side before he passed through. Sekibanki bent down, picking up Ichibanki and tenderly brushing at the head’s face, bruised as it was. Kogasa walked beside her. Her demeanor suddenly subdued. “So...we have Sekibanki. We can go on that picnic now and try to enjoy our day together.” Sekibanki gazed down at the mirror of her own head. Its cheeks and face dirtied and made puffy from bruising. Still, Ichibanki tried to smile up at her. “Nah. I’m going after that rabbit.” “...Sekibanki, you can’t. That house is forbidden! And…” The word ‘cursed’ somehow stuck to the roof of Kogasa’s mouth as she watched her friend. Still, Sekibanki only gave a shrug as she eased the other head into her shirt to keep it safe. “Don’t care. I thought he was a chill guy. Now I’m going to give him a piece of my mind.” “But—” “You can wait here Koggers. I don’t want you to see me shouting at an old fogey anyway.” Kogasa watched her friend for a moment, hoping she might back down. But Sekibanki started for the house. Before with a small sigh, Kogasa followed. Who knows. Maybe she could find someone to scare here… =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= The house is encircled with Ofuda, protective charms against Youkai and other spirits. How will the two get inside? = Ease Ichibanki through a broken window and have her open the door. = Maybe a passing human could open the door for us? After all, the Hakurei Shrine is supposed to check on it...sometimes... = Kogasa counters the Hakurei Shrine Ofuda with Ofuda from the Moriya Shrine. = Dude, you can fly. Just go up through the balcony.4 points
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As the son of a software engineer, I was raised with intimate awareness of how bad pretty much every reasonable option of operating system was; as with many things in life, it can sometimes seem like a "pick your poison" scenario. I personally continue to use Windows 11 despite despising so many aspects thereof, simply because I'm too intimated to change over to something else with different but ultimately comparable problems. If you want a perfect operating system, you ultimately have to build it yourself, and if you have the time and skills for that, you probably don't even need to. On the bright side, this is a relatively mundane problem to have, so nobody should be losing sleep over it.4 points
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Hello everyone! I'm Crab, and I'm pleased to meet you all. My story with Touhou is rather long time-wise. I remember seeing few videos I loved over than a decade ago ("Bad Apple", "Prismriver Sisters on Drugs", and that one with Ronald McDonald), but I never really got into the franchise since 2017. Hm, almost another decade it is... Since then, I was mostly a hermit (I'm a hermit crab, not an Hermit crab, mind you), I only joined one Touhou Community before this one. And then I left without interacting much, heh. Instead of knowing other fans and talking with people, I just went to search for the golden fruits that the worldwide community had to offer. Mainly musics and fanarts, but few games were also magnificent for me (I hold a sweet spot for Megamari). And I don't remember where I downloaded my first games (possibly here), but only years later I saw Moriya Shrine and thought "Maybe I should keep this website in mind" due to my passion for the sea, if you know what I mean. Later I ended up joining their Discord, chatted for few months, made few friends over there, and then I decided to make an account here. So this brings us to the present! At my late introduction. Well, that was longer than expected, so I will make the rest quicker. -Favorite Touhou Charater? Iku Nagae -Favorite Theme? No idea. Too many to count. Dichromatic Lotus Butterfly is fire, though. -Favorite Doujin Circles? I treasure FELT a lot, and really liked many many pieces from CarrotWine, fromadistance, and Alstroemeria Records. -Do I actually play the main series? No. Not a bullet-hell fan overall. I'd rather stick to the rest. -Am I a lore nerd? Not really. I enjoy it's lore, but not nearly as much as other people do. -Favorite Game? Scarlet Weather Rhapsody. I should mention that Hopeless Masquerade/Antinomy of Common Flowers are close though. -Favorite Animal? Birds. All of them. Did I miss anything? Well, if anyone wants to know more, feel free to ask! I won't use my claws on anyone who's not trying to eat me.4 points
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I'm a simple Crab. I set sail for plundering but ended up staying. I think I visited this place a long while ago for downloading some games, but I'm not certain if it was really here or somewhere else. Years later I got here (again?) and thought "Well, let's give a shot to that Discord server" and few weeks after that I decided to make an account here as well. I may or may not be lost at the sea, yet I shall keep sailing while there is booty to be found!4 points
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Heya gang. No update this week. :( Life has been demanding, and I have had no time to come up with the next post. Much less make it a decent read. Hoping to finally get to it on Wednesday, but I don't know for sure yet.4 points
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Rumia sketch I made while i got dragged somewhere. I was working on a Meiling piece but I guess I wont be posting it anytime soon.4 points
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hi i started join to find some very friendly friend cuz i have hard time speaking with someone who i never know and i'm a introvert one so i sometimes feel embarrassed to starting a conservation before someone speak to me first.4 points
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I WAS ABLE TO GET AoRY 0.05! The author responded to me and provided several builds of the game! All of them are raw and unfinished, so take note. Controls ORIGINAL AUTHOR OF THE GAME - Олег Петренко (https://vk.com/id243172) Links to the builds I posted on Google Drive: First build - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Deq9lwchC_eqVA4QM4PWlHL1tS4X3BK8/view?usp=sharing Second build - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ep_7cfIEnukm7LUmoamxLREy4WMMO9Cu/view?usp=sharing Third build - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1g3LaO1Kki5JzNwCId8an-L-DTjaySYB8/view?usp=sharing4 points
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Hello everyone, I have just imported some Touhou fanworks with Suruga-Ya. Here a list of the imports: A witch of memories C90 Trial NEW HORI-ZUN English Course 1, 2, 3 Disusedtopia 師走総騒記 劇場版姫リグル -永夜の燐光- (Princess Wriggle) ムーミン谷に幻想郷 (Touhou x Moomin) Since the NEW HORI-ZUN English Course books are on the Lost Media list, this post will only show those books off. Through if anyone else is curious about the other fanworks, feel free to ask me about them. NEW HORI-ZUN English Course Books Scans are hosted on Internet Archive. NEW HORI-ZUN 1 NEW HORI-ZUN 2 NEW HORI-ZUN 34 points
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If you've already played a few of the games, I recommend reading the game manual. They aren't long to read, and you'll be sure the information is accurate (unlike watching Memories of Phantasm, which is made by fans and has a lot of made-up stuffs from "fanon". THe chronology is also all over the place in the anime. You go from 7 to 6 (flashback) to 12 (teaser) to 9.5 to 9 to 12.3 to 8 to 10. Few explanation as to who's who, I can only recommend to people already familiar with the games). Starting from Touhou 7, the game manual have more detailed background for important characters (a lot of which is not mentioned in the actual game at all. Mokou's story is way more complex in the manual than in the game). You can find the translation on the wiki if I am not mistaken. If not, you can find them on the translation site: https://www.thpatch.net/wiki/Th07#Outside_the_game. It's the characters settings.txt file (sometime, it's in the omake.txt file). Reading the mangas is fine. I don't have particular recommendation. Characters will pop-in and out, but you should be able to follow. After that, you could read the wiki, but personally I recommend saving this for last. While the wiki has a lot of information (including from obscure print-works), it's also the most boring way to discover the characters and the world.4 points
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Some more information about it Poster in good quality: Official announcement: (Bad) Translation: The visual publicity map of the animation of the Mystia's Izakaya mentioned earlier was announced. Preparations have begun in all aspects, let's see if we can prepare more things before the big festival. Doujin animation, not commercial animation; An episode may be about 15 minutes, excluding OP and ED; Slice of life style, relaxed and funny atmosphere; I will prepare daily matching (there are good daily matching partners), and I don't have a particularly good idea for the middle matching, so I will take a look at the situation for the time being; Do one episode first, and then do the next episode according to the income situation. If the situation is good, I will continue to do it. If the current episode loses more harm, that's it. To be honest, please lower your expectations first to have a better experience. Other recent announcements: https://www.bilibili.com/opus/965841731502211081 https://tieba.baidu.com/p/9131987565 Reaction: https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1gLeueWEZg Old announcement: https://www.bilibili.com/opus/927252910636531721?spm_id_from=333.999.0.0 Concept arts: My thoughts It will be a slice of life anime, what I think really fits the original fangame. I think it may cover some ingame events. I think the plot will be like in Touhou slice of life mangas, I don't think it will be much more complicated. It is interesting that there are concept arts of Kosuzu, so maybe we will see the Human Village and maybe she will work in the izakaya. But maybe these are concepts for later episodes. It is hard to say how often they will come out, maybe every 1-2 years, maybe like Summer Day's Dream (you know how rarely it comes out). We still don't have a lot of info about it, so it is hard to say anything about it. I hope it will be quite fun to watch. It seems like they have a very big circles, because they are making the anime and a new game at the same time. But it is good to see a new circle which makes fananime (because now there are literally only 4 circles who makes it: 舞風-Maikaze (Summer Day's Dream), 満福神社 / Manpukujinjya (The Memories of Phantasm), Kyoto Fantasy Troupe (The Sealed Esoteric History), R-note (M-1 Grand Prix); + sometimes 卯堀亭 / ウサホリ ; rarely there are some smaller circles which make anime / animations (like 回鍋楼 / AZu (found here), but I cannot find any info about them)). One day I really want to see a fananime about fancharacters (for example by Kaisendo Directs).4 points
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Alright, as part of research to create a timeline for fan activity within Western Touhou Fandom, I discovered a some neat info about a lost Touhou circle called Distant Union. Distant Union was a circle in the United States that published physical Touhou fan books alongside pdfs online. This was paired with an online store site called Doublepuma Store. Distant Union appeared to be active from 2013 to 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20141221052720/http://distantunion.com/works.html https://web.archive.org/web/20130520135541/http://doublepuma.bigcartel.com/ https://doublepuma.com/doujin/ The members involved within the circle, going by the their work’s credits, included Leo Modesto, Rubin, Jelajade, Siegmund, and DL. As for who these members were, they were all artists that did Touhou art and were all once active on Tumblr. Leo Modesto is now called Lina, who was the creator of the Ask Udonge blog. https://askudonge.tumblr.com/ https://www.tumblr.com/rabbitlegs Rubin is an artist and was also the creator of the Ask Kogasa blog. https://www.tumblr.com/ask-kogasa https://rubindraws.tumblr.com/ Jelajade is an artist who now works on comics. https://jelajade.com/ https://mspabooru.com/index.php?page=post&s=view&id=12197 Siegmund is an artist. https://x.com/SieggyStardust https://web.archive.org/web/20130607110831/http://fluffychainsaw.tumblr.com/ DL is an artist. https://dlanon.carrd.co/# https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/4632687 Works Update: All of their works can be downloaded on: https://doublepuma.com/doujin/works.html The spoiler below describes secondhand accounts on the works before the discoveries of Distant Union's works themselves, so it has been kept for historical usefulness. Connections It appears that Touhou Tuesday had some connection with Leo Modesto as there are podcast episodes and Facebook posts where he advertises to his audience to buy Raiders of the Lost Ask Box and The Gensokyo Menagerie Vol. 1. He also did an interview with Leo Modesto. http://imgur.com/a/jI5BL https://kngi.org/touhou-tuesday-2012-09-25-leo-hijack-interview-with-leo-modesto-of-ask-udonge/ https://kngi.org/touhou-tuesday-2013-01-29-3lmfao/ https://kngi.org/touhou-tuesday-2013-02-26-one-year-of-miracles-and-butts/ https://kngi.org/touhou-tuesday-2013-04-02-lovingly-playing-tyrian2000-at-gunpoint/ https://www.facebook.com/TouhouTuesday/posts/httpleomodestotumblrcompost46766031914-while-i-was-out-for-the-weekend-my-friend/195490277241601/ There was an ad on Leo Modesto’s Twitter account about purchasing Distant Union fanbooks. https://x.com/linaciari/status/487983729101766656 Lastly, Rubin appeared at Anime Boston 2014 for the Touhou Panel where she cites her experience with Ask Touhou Tumblr blogs and Distant Union. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k38mzHX6QWc&list=PLYimcvkHGXREKfRiJTls2jU3gRUyg6ctR&index=8 (Start at 2:02) All in all, Distant Union was and still is as of 2024 the only Touhou circle in the United States that has published Touhou fan books. The only other Touhou circle in the United States I know of is Fantasy Mechanics, which deals with fangame creation instead of fan books.4 points
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How is everyone doing? I've been lurking for a while now, but I think it's time I officially introduce myself. So here it goes: I've been playing touhou for about 5 years now. Absolutely love danmaku, music and the characters, and I currently own quite a few merch (plushies, fumos, figurines, etc.) Happy to be here!4 points
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My first topic on here and yeah, the tittle. May be a dumb question. I personally think the map is straight up amazing. So much detail and so much effort went into it, it's unreal. There are a bit of inconsistencies maybe (If I recall corectly the PSHV is located near the Hakurei shrine, but in the MC map it's way off in the corner of the map). I've been exploring it by foot for the last few days and honestly it feels much better than flying in creative. Makes you really appreciate the map.4 points