Miscellaneous Questions Thread 4 - Bring us your Questions!

[ToyoRai]

Sin sacks? To be honest, I don't know if any one has any idea where they come from. They are just there if they need some NPCs or just pervs.

I think Tenshi's mascochist comes from that she is bit too eager for getting into fights, asking people to beat her up.

Because they are easier to draw them? Besides, all except her original art shows her crystals being prism shaped rather than those dagger-shaped ones.

In battle, it can do stuff like shoot danmaku and one of Youmu's fighting game spellcards is turning it into a clone of her. Otherwise, dunno.

Pretty much, Reisen used to be Watatsuki sister's pet before she fled from the Moon. After that, they adopted another lunar rabbit and named her Reisen as well.

[Tengukami]

I've seen a lot of guys wearing white fundoshi and having white bag with kanji written on it over their head in many Touhou PVs. Is that some kind of japanese way to show background characters?

These guys are known as Sinsacks.

Why Tenshi is shown as a masochist? It's just fanon, because people need a SM fanatic?

It's from game dialogue, blown waaay out of proportion.

WHY PEOPLE DRAWING FLANDRE'S WING CRYSTALS MAKE THEM PRISMATIC? [/rage]

I have no idea what this question means.

Does Youmu's phantom half do something besides flying around?

Apparently can be used as a weapon, as seen in IN.

I've read somewhere that there are 2 Udonge's. Anyone can explain what's with that?

Believe this might explain it.

[Prime32]

I've read somewhere that there are 2 Udonge's. Anyone can explain what's with that?

The Imperishable Night character was originally called Reisen (in katakana), but Eirin gave her the name Reisen Udongein Inaba (in kanji) to better fit in on Earth. There's another, short-haired, moon rabbit in Silent Sinner in Blue, Cage in Lunatic Runagate and Inaba of the Moon & Inaba of the Earth - we don't know her original name, but the moon princesses named her Reisen (in katakana) after the original Reisen.

Reisen Udongein Inaba is sometimes called Udonge for short. "Reisen II" has never been called Udonge.

[Yookie]

Huge mass of text.

Nevermind I'm stupid. (Or maybe not because it resolved itself.)
Carry on.

[Fuyuumi]

WHY PEOPLE DRAWING FLANDRE'S WING CRYSTALS MAKE THEM PRISMATIC?

I meant there the colors, not shape (stupid me trying to sound cool using words that I don't quite catch the meaning). I mean, look at this:

RANDOMLY GOOGLE PICTURE

Since when Flandre's wing crystal suddenly change color and one of them (for each wing) becomes red?

[Sagus]

Since the person who drew the picture wanted them to have those colors.

It's fan art, dude. People will interpret the characters as they wish. Maybe they thought that color scheme was better. Maybe they wanted to try different colors on her. Maybe they didn't use a reference. Ask each individual artist for their reasons, 'cause sure as hell there ain't a unifying one : /

[Clarste]

Personally I've always been a fan of calling the second Reisen "Raysen" instead. It conveys the change in spelling while also indicating that it's not written like a Japanese name. Plus it lets you distinguish them in text without having to do stupid things like "Reisen II" which can also be misleading and inaccurate.

Incidentally, in case this wasn't clear, the implication with the moon princess naming her Raysen is that she's a replacement pet. They think of the moon rabbits as rabbits, so naturally they think nothing of owning them and naming them. The old rabbit ran away so she got a new one and named it the same.

[game2011]

Why Tenshi is shown as a masochist? It's just fanon, because people need a SM fanatic?

She's taunting people into fighting her.  Basically, she needs a reason to start a fight, which led to the fandom portraying her as...  You know where I'm getting at...

[Biakmon]

What Kaguya abilities means - Manipulation of eternity and the instantaneous?

[Sagus]

She possesses the ability to manipulate eternity and the instantaneous.
As eternity refers to a world with no history, it is also a world where change is eternally unknown.
No matter how much you may try to bring about change in such a world, it is futile in a world where time has essentially stopped.
It is believed that Eientei suddenly appeared in human history and began to experience the passage of time because she undid the effects of her eternity magic.
Under the effects of that magic, Eientei would probably have never appeared in the human world, forever remaining hidden in the Bamboo Forest of the Lost.
However, a perpetual world denies any sort of change.
She may have lived for a very long time without having changed at all.
Her other ability regarding the instantaneous is complementary to her manipulation of eternity and allows control over extremely short time durations.
It allows her to act just using aggregates of instants so short as to be imperceptible to human beings.
That time interval is composed of instants, so it cannot be perceived by normal humans, even though time progresses normally.
Using this time, she can have multiple parallel histories at once.
As both of these abilities are abilities to manipulate time, they far surpass what normal humans are capable of.

Pretty much means her timehax is, like, ten thousand times stronger than Sakuya's.

[Prime32]

As usual it's possible that Akyuu is going off false information or just making stuff up, but there's a few places we've seen Kaguya use her power:

• Assisting in the creation of the Hourai Elixir, which makes people "eternal".
• (Previously) hiding Eientei from the world and making it a Moon-like realm where things don't age or decay.
• Preventing a bonsai udonge from blooming (Kaguya says that once she sees it sprouting jewels despite her attempts, she can consider herself fully naturalised to Earth).
• Breaking the Imperishable Night spell.

[Tengukami]

Yeah, this is an instance of Akyuu being quite accurate, more or less.

[Sagus]

Come on guuuuys when Akyuu is wrong or exaggerating it's blatantly obvious because it's outright contradict elsewhere in canon. There is nothing contradicting Akyuu's info on Kaguya's ability anywhere else, so there really isn't reason to think she's making things up.

She's not Aya, ffs :V

[Tiamat]

Far as I can tell, most of the known falsehoods or suspect statements from Akyuu begin with some sort of mini-disclaimer, typically something like "It is said" (though some of those end up being correct, anyways) The stuff where she doesn't begin with "It is said" are usually correct, one major exception being Heaven being full.  Far as I can tell, Akyuu's nice enough to put in those disclaimers for things she isn't sure about (mostly stuff that Yukari told her, apparently, probably because she doesn't trust Yukari. A lot of the "It is said" stuff is stuff that only Yukari would know or bother talking about). She didn't include "It is said" for Heaven being full because Akyuu presumably trusted the Ministry of Right and Wrong's word.

......well, those are my own theories, at least.

[Sagus]

Far as I can tell, most of the known falsehoods or suspect statements from Akyuu begin with some sort of mini-disclaimer, typically something like "It is said" (though some of those end up being correct, anyways) The stuff where she doesn't begin with "It is said" are usually correct, one major exception being Heaven being full.  Far as I can tell, Akyuu's nice enough to put in those disclaimers for things she isn't sure about (mostly stuff that Yukari told her, apparently, probably because she doesn't trust Yukari. A lot of the "It is said" stuff is stuff that only Yukari would know or bother talking about). She didn't include "It is said" for Heaven being full because Akyuu presumably trusted the Ministry of Right and Wrong's word.

......well, those are my own theories, at least.

I agree, yeah.

Also, at heart, she is writting a book to inform humans on how to defend themselves against beings more powerful than they are. If she was as unreliable about the habits and powers of youkai as everyone likes to say she is, I don't think the villagers would've let her live for 9 reincarnations. Or at least have a feast everytime she's reborn.

At most, she might be exaggerating the strength of some of the youkai (just because she says some youkai asked her to do it doesn't mean she did, and even if that was the case, doing so does still fit the purpose of the book, seeing as building them up as undefeatable monstrosities will make humans avoid them), but so far we have no solid examples of her describing a youkai as being far stronger than they actually are.

[ExPorygon]

Ok, as a Touhou fangame developer (using Danmakufu) I have a few questions regarding ZUN's established guidelines towards derivative games (which I HAVE read btw).

First:
I remember reading that ZUN fordids people to use game data in their game works and that they should make their own assets. This is the reason that Concealed the Conclusion had completely original game assets, including music, graphics, and sound effects. However, The Last Comer and Mystical Power Plant both use very obvious sound effects from the official games. This puzzles me, as there are no other instances of ZUN's game data present within the game (that I know of). Like CtC, the games use original graphics, music, and many sound effects. Does this mean that the clause forbiding the use of game data does not apply to sound effects or are the makers of TLC and MPP simply ignoring this rule as their games are not for profit?

Second:
I am aware that ZUN is not ok with developers selling derivative Touhou games on services such as Steam and the Xbox Live Marketplace. However, do his guidelines forbid ANY for-profit digital distribution? For example, what if I were to sell a Touhou fangame on a personal website directly without using any sort of online store. Assuming the work does not contain any copyrighted material and it followed the rest of ZUN's guidelines, would that be possible? From reading his guidelines, I was initially under the impression that any for-profit distribution of Touhou derivative material outside of "traditional doujin channels" was forbidden without special permission. I'm only making sure that this is the case because he made a point to single out Steam and the Xbox Live Marketplace in the guidelines IIRC.

Third:
If special permission is indeed required for the above, how likely do you all suppose it would be for an English-speaking Westerner such as myself to get such permission? Is it even something worth bothering to try?

[Tengukami]

As questions if this nature have come up a lot, I think maybe this ought to be copy-pasted in its own TARC thread and stickied or something.

Apart from that, yeah, in all likelihood TLC and MPP are simply ignoring the guidelines. Seems more believable than ZUN granting them a personal exception anyway.

As far as contacting ZUN goes, well, you might wanna try his Twitter? He seems to respond to folks there. That, or the handy contact form he posted in the guidelines post from his blog.

[Camilo113]

Does anyone knows how to extract .DAT files from Touhou games (especifically Portrait Images)? I've downloaded every toolkit and tried million of times but: or it doesn't extract anything or the extracted files contains no images at all. 

So please, can anyone tell how to do it, give me a quick guide or something? Thanks.

[ExPorygon]

I have read those expanded guidelines before but I must have forgot the clause requiring ANY sale of Touhou derivative works to have ZUN's permission. That makes my other questions irrelevant as I'll likely find out if I ever contact him.

Does anyone knows how to extract .DAT files from Touhou games (especifically Portrait Images)? I've downloaded every toolkit and tried million of times but: or it doesn't extract anything or the extracted files contains no images at all. 

So please, can anyone tell how to do it, give me a quick guide or something? Thanks.

There are tools to do it yourself, yes, but Drake has already gone through the trouble of uploading Touhou image extractions here. You might find it easier to just download them from there.

[Tengukami]

I have read those expanded guidelines before but I must have forgot the clause requiring ANY sale of Touhou derivative works to have ZUN's permission. That makes my other questions irrelevant as I'll likely find out if I ever contact him.

He does specify "commercial" works and channels, i.e., you're more than an independent person selling something you made through your personal blog or something.

[Camilo113]

There are tools to do it yourself, yes, but Drake has already gone through the trouble of uploading Touhou image extractions here. You might find it easier to just download them from there.

Ok, that makes it much easier. Thank you very Much!
But one of the problems I have is that I really want to extract the Profile Images from DDC and it seems the post doesn't have it yet  ; that's why I wanted to learn how to do it and because the image quality of the portraits that already exist in the internet don't match the quality that are presented in the game.

[Tengukami]

Edited the Welcome to TARC sticky wrt ZUN's policies.

[ExPorygon]

Ok, that makes it much easier. Thank you very Much!
But one of the problems I have is that I really want to extract the Profile Images from DDC and it seems the post doesn't have it yet  ; that's why I wanted to learn how to do it and because the image quality of the portraits that already exist in the internet don't match the quality that are presented in the game.

I believe Touhou Toolkit is what you're looking for. You can find that and other game modification tools here: http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Game_Tools_and_Modifications
Disclaimer: I have never used the program myself so I'm not 100% sure that it's what you want. But it's likely that what you want is somewhere on that page at least.

[Sagus]

Is that lake near the Moriya Shrine that we see in Stage 6 of Mountain of Faith intended to be Lake Suwa?

Youkai Mountain is a single mountain, right? The Yatsugatake Mountain range are said to be what remained of the legendary Yatsugatake, so it stands to reason that before Sakuyahime tore it down, it was only a single mountain, and since Youkai Mountain is the Yatsugatake from legend... also, it's the only mountain in Gensokyo, right?

I ask because I was thinking about Gensokyo's size, and these two particular features of its geography are quite large (Lake Suwa alone has 13 km? in area, and the Yatsugatake Mountain range is 30 km in length, so Youkai Mountain has to be big enough to be able to be broken down into all these peaks, not to mention big enough to house Lake Suwa). I originally thought that Gensokyo had at most 15 km? or something in area, but this seems way to small now...

[Camilo113]

I believe Touhou Toolkit is what you're looking for. You can find that and other game modification tools here: http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Game_Tools_and_Modifications

But I've already told that I used every toolkit I found in internet and none them worked for me. The only thing I want to know is how to use them properly, with a guide or a video or anyting... Or if someone could hint me how to use the Touhou Toolkit because a tried to extract with it and it didn't worked for me at least. Thanks.

[commandercool]

I apologize if this has been asked before (and I can't imagine that it hasn't been, but I can't find it), but what exactly do and don't we know about the timeframe of Touhou? Specifically the events of the games and manga?

I have an impression that the games are supposed to take place roughly in real time based on the date of their release, but when I thought about it I realized I had no idea where that impression came from, so I may have just made it up. Is there an intent that Reimu and Marisa have aged 11 years between EoSD and DDC? In fact, do we have any references to people aging physically ever in Gensokyo? Is it safe to assume that the games even take place in chronological order? I suppose none of this really actually makes much of a difference the way Touhou is set up, but it would be interesting to know for context if there are canon answers for any of it.

[Sagus]

A good indicator of the passage time is the newspaper's articles written by Aya and Hatate. For example, from them, you can see that Yoshika appeared on Myouren Temple's graveyard in 2009, but TD proper only happened in 2011 (going by the fact that both Miko and Seiga's articles only happen that year).

The games do roughly happen as they're released, which can also be seem from the articles (for instance, the collapse of the Hakurei Shrine caused by Tenshi happened in 2008, the same year SWR was released).

The games unquestionably happen in chronological order; after all, the events of the games from MoF to TD are directly tied, and even before that, there were references to previous games (the teams in IN [Reimu didn't meet Yukari until PCB, so IN couldn't have happened before it], for instance). The manga also show time passing, and comment on the most recent incidents (like Reimu and Marisa discussign the events of DDC with Sanae in WaHH, and Sanae stating that they hadn't even entered in the previous incident [the events of HM] to Kanako).

Finally, all games happen in different seasons, which's of course another indication of time passing.

As for whether or not Reimu and Marisa age... IIRC ZUN said he doesn't plan on aging them, so even if 20+ years pass they'd probably remain in the same vague "late teens - early twenties" range. However, we do know that people age in Gensokyo; after all, Akyuu has aged and died nine times and all. It's likely that zunart wouldn't show age differences, anyway.

Although Reimu did seem to have finally grow visible breats in DDC :V

[Drake]

The seasons and precedence of events all match, with minor variations between release date and game timeframe. The newspaper articles that reference game events also match up in season and year. PoFV also implies WWII was during the last sexagenary cycle, which matches that sixty years after 1945 is PoFV's release.

Fairy Wars isn't in chronological order, though, having happened before SWR.

This should probably help: http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Gensokyo_Timeline

[commandercool]

Hmm, fair enough. Thank you. So I did get that from somewhere, I just didn't remember where. I need to start just flipping through Symposium Of Post-Mysticism every time I have a question, because the answer seems to invariably turn out to be in there and I just forgot.

[Drake]

But I've already told that I used every toolkit I found in internet and none them worked for me. The only thing I want to know is how to use them properly, with a guide or a video or anyting... Or if someone could hint me how to use the Touhou Toolkit because a tried to extract with it and it didn't worked for me at least. Thanks.

thtk doesn't entirely work on th14 anyway. Here are the enemy portraits.