Submit your questions for ZUN at AWA 2013!

[Fonzi]

He visited Europe on his honeymoon. I think he was in Germany, but I don't remember for 100% sure.

I meant that more in a way of appearing at an anime con or a similar event.

[violumi]

• How are Merri and Yukari connected?
• Do you ever plan to make a book about it? (If he answers the last one)
• Are you tired of making touhou games?
• Do you like to draw your older characters?
• Are you happy with the way the touhou games are now?
• Would you consider a touhou MOBA? (probably not)
• Is TH14 the last game?

[Imosa]

Is there going to be some kind of organization to separate questions about ZUN from questions about Touhou? Should we be talking about what would be the most optimal questions to ask?

* If gods gain power from faith, and people try to seperate themselves from Hina, how does she maintain herself?
* Can you elaborate on the series of events that gave Okuu the powers of the yagarasu? What is the Yagarasu's opinion on the whole situation?
* What is the diffirence between the reaper shinigami, and a ferryman shinigami? (I wrote this down a while ago when I was already aware of the kishin thing, but now I can't seem to figure out where reaper shinigami are mentioned, I think it was WaHH).
* In Imparishable Night, how did Yukari know about the Human Village despite Keine using her ability on it? (We talked about this a bit, and I like our conclusion but I figure this is a good time to get it straightened out).

[Fonzi]

* If gods gain power from faith, and people try to seperate themselves from Hina, how does she maintain herself?

Isn't that already explained in SoPM? She doesn't need faith. Her power comes from gathering curses.

[Aba Matindesu!]

• I've noticed that none of the Touhou characters are sexualised in your games and official works. As a female fan, I really appreciate this. Was there a conscious decision behind it, or did things just turn out that way? (Obviously this question will need to be reworded slightly if the interviewer isn't female, lol).
• What's the funniest/stupidest bug you ever encountered during development?
• Do you ever worry about your liver?

These, pretty much.

[Drake]

How good is your English?
Do you ever plan on visiting Europe?
Why were the Lunarians so afraid of human astronauts when they could easily defeat an army of youkai?
Why is Byakuren's hair gradient?

-Nonexistent
-He went on a Europe trip to Germany -> Czech -> Italy just last year
-I don't think they're literally afraid of them, but rather just don't want the moon to be tainted with impurity. The Lunarians don't want to fight but apparently would if necessary, implying that humans merely coming to the moon poses a problem, which is pretty much what everything else points to anyways.
-Originally he wanted her black-white clothing design but it looked too depressing so he gave her blonde hair. Then he thought it was too bland so he gave her the gradient.

What is the basis of the season numbering in Gensokyo? In particular, what is the relation between the season numbering and the creation of the Great Hakurei Barrier? In addition, when does the season number change?

Was Remilia in Gensokyo during the Vampire Incident?
Might as well ask. After all, for some time it was claimed that Remilia entered Gensokyo after said incident, citing Akyuu.

It's a lunisolar calendar derived from the japanese calendar which was really derived from the chinese calendar. Gensokyo uses the creation of the Hakurei Barrier to begin the year numbering (Year 0), and they instead call the years "Seasons" (the term 季 can mean year). Of course, they still have the four seasons per... season.

They use a sexagenary cycle, which was also derived from the chinese calendar. However, instead of the chinese's cycle of ten Heavenly Stems and twelve Earthly Branches, it uses a cycle of the "three lights" (sun -> moon -> star), a cycle of the four seasons (spring -> summer -> autumn -> winter), and a cycle of the five elements (earth -> fire -> water -> wood -> metal). Each of these increment every year. By the Chinese Remainder Theorem both of these systems have unique combinations for every year, for sixty years:
Chinese: 10 = 2¹?5¹, 12 = 2²?3¹ -> lcm(10,12) = 2²?3¹?5¹ = 60 -> years have unique remainders mod 60; similarly
Gensokyo: 3 = 3¹, 4 = 2², 5 = 5¹ -> lcm(3,4,5) = 3¹?2²?5¹ = 60 -> years have unique remainders mod 60.

This cycle is described first in A Beautiful Flower Blooming Violet Every Sixty Years. You can get the current year in the cycle by taking our year in CE, minus 25, mod 60. Like this year is (2013-25)%60 = 8, which is the Year of Star, Spring and Wood. To get each individual attribute you can take the year minus 25, mod 3, 4 and 5 respectively.


Remilia was "the vampire" in the Vampire Incident. I'm not sure where you think Akyuu says otherwise, but whenever she refers to "the vampire", she does mean Remilia. It's made clear when she says the first time the spell card rules were formally enacted was during the Scarlet Mist Incident with that vampire, and is further supported during other works when Remilia and Yukari refer to contracts.

[Zakari]

So here it goes.

- Why Touhou 14 Double Dealing Character has too many anime influence?
- What kind of Youkai are you trying to make on your next game?
- What is the reason why did you bring back Alice and Yuuka?
- Why Touhou 6 The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil is too western theme?
- What kind of new Danmaku spellcards are you trying to make for your next game?
- Before i end this, i will recommend you to play both of these game ''The Last Comer'' and ''Mystical Power Plant'' and i want to see your impression.

[Letty Whiterock]

Well, if you're about "To start, ZUN does not know English. At all." then it's not really that much true. He uses some veeeery simple but still English in his games. For example, if I don't know writing Japanese, I can't write even a single Japanese word. That's what I would call "don't know at all". Though it's possible that it was done only by using dictionary.

This came directly from the people who got him for AWA. They are hoping to teach him enough English to address the crowd one-way. If you want to argue semantics, then sure, he knows that English is an existent language and that romanized letters can form words that mean things to native English speakers.  He knows loan words. But his English is on a level where if you literally said the words "Double Dealing Character", he may struggle to understand what you said and why it would be remotely relevant to him.

At that point, might as well go with Drake's "nonexistent".

[Arcorann]

It's a lunisolar calendar derived from the japanese calendar which was really derived from the chinese calendar. Gensokyo uses the creation of the Hakurei Barrier to begin the year numbering (Year 0), and they instead call the years "Seasons" (the term 季 can mean year). Of course, they still have the four seasons per... season.

Already known (as the main maintainer of the Gensokyo Timeline article on the wiki it is my duty to know these things) except that nowhere in canon does it say that the creation of the Hakurei Barrier is the epoch of the numbering system (which is why I asked the question in the first place). The best we can say with certainty is that it fell between 1872 and 1912.

They use a sexagenary cycle, which was also derived from the chinese calendar. However, instead of the chinese's cycle of ten Heavenly Stems and twelve Earthly Branches, it uses a cycle of the "three lights" (sun -> moon -> star), a cycle of the four seasons (spring -> summer -> autumn -> winter), and a cycle of the five elements (earth -> fire -> water -> wood -> metal). Each of these increment every year. By the Chinese Remainder Theorem both of these systems have unique combinations for every year, for sixty years:
Chinese: 10 = 2¹?5¹, 12 = 2²?3¹ -> lcm(10,12) = 2²?3¹?5¹ = 60 -> years have unique remainders mod 60; similarly
Gensokyo: 3 = 3¹, 4 = 2², 5 = 5¹ -> lcm(3,4,5) = 3¹?2²?5¹ = 60 -> years have unique remainders mod 60.

This cycle is described first in A Beautiful Flower Blooming Violet Every Sixty Years. You can get the current year in the cycle by taking our year in CE, minus 25, mod 60. Like this year is (2013-25)%60 = 8, which is the Year of Star, Spring and Wood. To get each individual attribute you can take the year minus 25, mod 3, 4 and 5 respectively.

Already known, irrelevant to question.

Remilia was "the vampire" in the Vampire Incident. I'm not sure where you think Akyuu says otherwise, but whenever she refers to "the vampire", she does mean Remilia. It's made clear when she says the first time the spell card rules were formally enacted was during the Scarlet Mist Incident with that vampire, and is further supported during other works when Remilia and Yukari refer to contracts.

I was referencing the claim once found in thwiki.info's timeline and on ja.wikipedia.org's page on Gensokyo (since removed from both).

[Formless God]

- wich 2hu wud u fug
- What other SHUMPS do you play? What is your biggest SHUMP achievement?
- How long did it take to build each engine from scratch?
- Are you aware that deedeecee is basically three games in one?

[Drake]

Already known (as the main maintainer of the Gensokyo Timeline article on the wiki it is my duty to know these things) except that nowhere in canon does it say that the creation of the Hakurei Barrier is the epoch of the numbering system (which is why I asked the question in the first place). The best we can say with certainty is that it fell between 1872 and 1912.
Already known, irrelevant to question.

Wow man, you really should rephrase or add to the question then. That's really darn specific and as it is I doubt the speaker, the translator or ZUN would know what you mean just with that and you'd get an irrelevant answer or just an explanation of the calendar in general (again). "Season number" would probably also get lost in translation without extra context.

With that explanation I would join in wanting to know the answer. I think it's pretty safe to assume the barrier was formed in 1885 without extra info though.

[Necrotek]

This came directly from the people who got him for AWA. They are hoping to teach him enough English to address the crowd one-way. If you want to argue semantics, then sure, he knows that English is an existent language and that romanized letters can form words that mean things to native English speakers.  He knows loan words. But his English is on a level where if you literally said the words "Double Dealing Character", he may struggle to understand what you said and why it would be remotely relevant to him.

At that point, might as well go with Drake's "nonexistent".

Ah, ok.

[Kilgamayan]

• I've noticed that none of the Touhou characters are sexualised in your games and official works. As a female fan, I really appreciate this. Was there a conscious decision behind it, or did things just turn out that way? (Obviously this question will need to be reworded slightly if the interviewer isn't female, lol).

Related to this:

- Why was Hopeless Masquerade so sexualized? The sprites for Reimu, Byakuren, Futo, an to a lesser extent Miko were a pretty jarring deviation from the norm.

[Helepolis]

I am not exactly sure if I can phrase my question correctly, it probably is a mix of question though I am mainly curious about this.

High priority
- What was exactly your involvement / motivation to work along on the game: Uwabami Breakers? As part of the drinking group (known/friends), you have provided them your engine and helped out with the final boss song. This seems like a rare gesture.

Less priority:
- Are the characters appearing in the game aware of Gensoukyo and each other? Example: Asama knowing Renko / Maribel. Tenji seems to speak as if he knows, I am extremely curious.
- Joke question: Is Isami Asama a reflection of you/your drinking group in real life?

[TrueShadow]

Related to this:

- Why was Hopeless Masquerade so sexualized? The sprites for Reimu, Byakuren, Futo, an to a lesser extent Miko were a pretty jarring deviation from the norm.

Uhh, what was sexualized about them again besides Byakuren's bouncings? And wasn't it because the sprites were done by different people?

[Arcorann]

Wow man, you really should rephrase or add to the question then. That's really darn specific and as it is I doubt the speaker, the translator or ZUN would know what you mean just with that and you'd get an irrelevant answer or just an explanation of the calendar in general (again). "Season number" would probably also get lost in translation without extra context.

With that explanation I would join in wanting to know the answer. I think it's pretty safe to assume the barrier was formed in 1885 without extra info though.

Thanks for the feedback, the second calendar question is indeed a very specific question that probably needs some context:

It has been believed since the release of Seasonal Dream Vision and its CD that the "year" in Gensokyo (here defined as the period given the "Season X" label) begins not in January or the corresponding lunar month, but rather in the fourth month. However, there seems to be some confusion as to whether it's supposed to be based on the lunisolar calendar or the solar calendar. Thus, when does this "year" in Gensokyo start, and is it different for humans and youkai? Admittedly, it's probably only relevant to one or two events...

The other question is still worth asking, though, if only because 78 years is closer to a century than a half-century.

[T3hCoM]

- Will we see more relationships (whether friendships or rivalries) between characters from different Touhou games, like Mystia/Kyouko?
- How come some characters (Rumia, Cirno, Nazrin, Sekibanki, etc.) don't have last names?

That's all I can think of right now.

[Kilgamayan]

Uhh, what was sexualized about them again besides Byakuren's bouncings? And wasn't it because the sprites were done by different people?

Reimu and Futo have shorter-than-normal skirts, and each has at least one attack with a few frames that are upskirt enough to suggest they aren't wearing underwear.

Miko's sprite very obviously has breasts, which is something IaMP/SWR/Soku didn't really do outside of some of the portraits (and isn't consistent with her portrait, as can be seen under my username). They're not huge, but they're obvious. This, though, is less sexualized than the other three I named and was more surprising than anything else.

Obviously different spriters worked on different characters, but ZUN presumably green-lighted all of it. To see all of it come at once is bizarre considering the only other in-game sexualization that comes to mind is Yukari's defeated portrait in IaMP.

[Necrotek]

I guess I'll ask something too. Though it's possible that it was already asked/answered.

Is there some grand plotline which covers the whole Touhou series (and future works) and leads to some kind of conclusion in the end?

[helvetica]

FYI I am reserving interviewer's discretion on deciding which questions that will be asked. If I skip your question, it's probably not because I thought it was terrible, but more because I'm trying to aim for a good and balanced interview. So don't be surprised if I don't do all Touhou questions as frankly I feel like he'd far more enjoy questions about himself and his motives and thoughts than discussing nothing but canon. Considering this is likely a once in a lifetime opportunity for a lot of western fans to try to connect with him, I want to get to know a side a lot of people tend to ignore.

Sorry if this deflates some of your hopes to get your burning canon questions answered, but a good interview has balance between the subject matter and the interviewee, and I want to be honest about how I'm going to steer my part of the Q&A. And there's LOTS to explore with the interviewee and his passions and motivations, whereas I feel like the canon questions in some cases (especially the more specific ones) will simply only appeal to a smaller subset of fans.

[ToyoRai]

I guess for a question what focuses more on ZUN than Touhou is how much do you read on average? (Though I hope you pick my question on waht way he designs the characters).

[helvetica]

I'm not saying I won't take canon questions, but they'll likely be more generic ones and/or something extremely unique but not too narrow/difficult to explain. Realize we're going to be translating these from English to Japanese, and while I trust Sola's skills, it's still going to be a bit of work crossing language barriers so the clearer the question the better!

[ToyoRai]

I am just a guy who can bend to stuff if I want something. Besides, I planned to post that question earlier, but didn't.

[Kilgamayan]

(Also, not to spoil the whole facade, but Sola's just going to ignore whatever TSO says and ask questions about the GFC anyway.)

[helvetica]

(Also, not to spoil the whole facade, but Sola's just going to ignore whatever TSO says and ask questions about the GFC anyway.)

pls

[Maiden Synnae ミ☆]

Okay, it seems like people already asked some of the stuff I'd like to ask myself, but I only have one question:

"have you ever considered remaking the first 5 games, maybe if someday you end up facing trouble to get ideas for new titles?"

Many of your ideas come from events and people from ancient Japanese history. Is there any person or event from this history that you've wanted to incorporate into a game, but haven't found a way to yet?

I'm really curious about this as well, that's certainly something interesting to ask.

[Sky_Paladin]

- Will you be using more Fuedal period inspired characters in future Touhou games, e.g., samurai, ninja, geisha, and so on. 
- It seems that most of the characters are female.  Is there a reason for this? 
- We've started seeing customisation of characters in the more recent games, e.g., Double Spoiler's sprites differing depending on weapon choice, and Hopeless Masquerade's in depth spellcard selections, and different character palette options in all of the fighting games.  Have you considered complex customisations for the shooting type games?

About the third question, I'm sure it can be phrased better.  I was logging on to play Warcraft and thought, "I wonder if Zun ever considered giving the player the option to outfit the girls with different equipment - clothes, weapons etc - to suit a certain playing style?  Or talent choices and so on."  Maybe the appeal of Touhou is that you can jump on and get right into it without any real thought.  So perhaps it's a stupid question. 

About the first question - I live about ten minutes from the largest castle in Japan, and teach English to the tour guides.  Japanese history is extremely long and colourful, especially so during the fuedal era.  I wondered why Zun hasn't really used fuedal style characters (Youmu and Sekibanki being notable exceptions) when it's such a major part of Japanese history.  Perhaps, that's why. 

About the second question - My wife and I like to cosplay Touhou characters at events, but there's not much choice for male cosplayers who don't have the option of wearing female garb and still be canon.  I want to organise a Touhou panel at a future con in Australia, this question is bound to come up.  I'd like to be able to give a good answer. 

[Zil]

-Are you willing to make another Phantasmagoria game in the near future?

^

Photography games as well.

[Maiden Synnae ミ☆]

Photography games as well.

It's almost guaranteed that more photography games will come in the future. I presume we'll get one after touhou 15, since:

Shoot the Bullet consisted of four shooters and a fighter: EoSD, PCB, IaMP (Suika only) IN and PoFV.

Double Spoiler had three shooters and a fighter: MoF, SWR (let's not forget Iku and Tenshi) SA and UFO.

So... following this logic, I suppose having three danmaku titles and a fighter already gives enough characters for another photography game, and we'll have this quantity by the time Touhou 15 comes out: GFW (the three fairies), TD, Hopeless Masquerade (Kokoro only), DDC and "insert th15's name here".

[Sagus]

Dunno if this was already asked but:

-What are your favorite myths/legends?