Author Topic: Touhou 16 「東方天空璋(とうほうてんくうしょう) ~ Hidden Star in Four Seasons」 announced  (Read 294837 times)

Just finished my first run (Aya/Fall Normal) and I have to say I like what I'm seeing so far.

The difficulty seems rather below average: nowhere near the "fall asleep while I'm playing" levels of easy that we saw in TD, but still not particularly hard - once I figured out how the release mechanics worked, I never really felt threatened outside of the curvy laser card. On a side note, curvy lasers are an unholy abomination against all that is good in this world, and should die in a fire. In any case, the difficulty does seem fairly reasonable, I guess I'll have to see how things turn out on Hard. Curvy lasers aside, most of the patterns were fun - Nemuno's nons got a bit repetitive, and some of the stage portions felt like retreads of LoLK's, but the rest were nice. The character visuals are pretty decent; it's good to see that ZUN's art is still improving, even if I'm not entirely sold on the character designs for the stage 2/3 bosses. The music doesn't seem especially remarkable, but a few of the songs did grab me. That stage 3 theme is wonderfully calm.

The shot type system is definitely the star of the show this time, though. I'm looking forward to tinkering with it.

Also ZUN having people hit a certain score amount to earn a whole life is pretty relaxing and encouraging in a way
This must be what he meant by "return to my roots with something that simply aims to make you feel good to play."

The shot type system is definitely the star of the show this time, though. I'm looking forward to tinkering with it.
Same. A lot more possibilities than before.

game2011

  • mineiptXD
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Clarste argues that Etarnity's name is a typo and, even if it's not fixed in the full game, that her name should be "Eternity Larva" regardless. And I agree. If I had any Japanese skills, I'd try to ask ZUN on twitter.

EDIT

https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Eternity_Larva#Name
Yup, her official profile says "Eternity Larva". So, we can stop with the typos already :P
You do realize you're using an editable wiki page as proof...

Thcrap now has the music room & manual translated.
...but the controls section is missing the description for the Release Key (C Key). Hopefully that gets resolved soon.
« Last Edit: May 07, 2017, 11:23:45 PM by shockdude »
Playing Touhou since 18 March 2012. Playing video games since 19XX.
Normal 1CC: EoSD, PCB, IN, PoFV, MoF, SA, UFO, TD, DDC, HSiFS, CtC.
Extra 1CC: EoSD, PCB+Phantasm, IN, PoFV (K&S), MoF, SA, TD, HSiFS, CtC+Phantasm.
Hard 1CC: EoSD, PCB, IN, MoF, TD, CtC.
Lunatic 1CC: EoSD

Arcorann

  • hey catgirl
  • Surprisingly unkempt
Did someone make music rip?

I suggest you bookmark this site since it usually updates with title files (for thbgmextractor) on the day of release (it already has th16 trial). I described how to configure thbgmextractor with an external encoder in this post.

Hello Purvis

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  • Hello Jerry
Guys you're seeing it wrong, Nemuno actually has a cart.

cuc

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  • Probably won't respond 'til this mess is sorted o?
Quote
Etarnity vs. Eternity
I trust in omake.txt and "Etanity". You can get more valid non-typo hits for "etanity", and Google won't even suggest it is a typo!

I kid, I kid. The point is, the instability of the spelling can be a strong sign for it being an error. The spelling would be more likely to be consistent when the writer himself knows the word with absolute certainty.

We can also compare Doremy's name. Her name is not only consistently spelt, it's written ドレミー in Japanese, with a rather unusual long vowel at the end; this suggests it has some special meaning beyond the musical scale "doremi" (ドレミ). And if we dig further, we can indeed find the Taito game "The Fairyland Story" has a red cap-wearing heroine called Ptolemy (トレミー), who starred in the very first game ZUN ever made (a Taito crossover).

Here our Stage 1 fairy's name is written エタニティ. While the word "eternity" is often transliterated エターニティー (two long vowels) or エターニティ, the long-vowelless version also shows up with enough frequency to be generic and meaningless.

These are just my observations; I don't care how people spell it, because her name is unlikely to turn out important. For the time being, I'm fine using all three.
« Last Edit: May 08, 2017, 01:50:35 AM by cuc »
Touhou Fantasy News: twitter

Who cares if her name is spelled "Etanity" instead of Eternity?

The name itself might even be a meme

CyberAngel

  • Retired
Instant headcanon: she saw the English word and thought it would be cool as a name, but since she's, well, a fairy, she forgot how to spell it properly.

cuc

  • *
  • Probably won't respond 'til this mess is sorted o?
komano the komainu.

even i groaned at that one
Yes. Though written with different kanji, the "koma" in both is the same word stem, meaning "Goryeo", Goryeo being the name of several historical kingdoms on or near the Korean peninsula, and the etymology of the English word "Korea". Places called "Koma-something" (like "Komano") are named after ancient immigrants from the Korean peninsula, while "komainu" is named as such because stone lions are an Indian thing that came to Japan that way.

So this is like... having a German shepherd character with the surname "Germaine" or "Germanicus"?

the charas are so ill-defined in general it's like

you can literally pick specific incarnations of a character from different works in the same series and they won't be remotely consistent

there's a pretty famous chart comparing reimu's completely haphazard personalities across the various canon works and it's hilarious

just pick what you like from the franchise and ignore the rest, it's what zun does
Actually I agree with this if not 100%, at least 80%.

While there are some extremely well-defined, show-stealing personalities like Yuyuko, Touhou characters, *especially Reimu and Marisa*, are better seen as actresses like Osamu Tezuka's "star system", whose behaviors must fit the story they are in.

The remaining 20% is because some of this can be explained in-universe, chalked up to the stories being shaped by the perspectives they are told from, e.g. the main characters of WaHH and FS pretty much occupy the two ends of the Gensokyoan power hierarchy.
« Last Edit: May 08, 2017, 02:44:31 AM by cuc »
Touhou Fantasy News: twitter

Nebulae--Addict

  • hatsune the fuck
Question, do we aleardy have a jewel case? if so, i would like to see it.
pls rember that wen u feel scare or frigten
never forget ttimes wen u feeled happy
wen day is dark alway rember happy day

Instant headcanon: she saw the English word and thought it would be cool as a name, but since she's, well, a fairy, she forgot how to spell it properly.

That's a pretty cool idea.  And works.

Plot prediction:

Global warming is causing winter to disappear from the real world. With the existence of winter becoming a fantasy of the past, the kami and youkai that represent it are all entering Gensokyo at the same time, causing its own cycle of seasons to be thrown out of whack.

HistoryoftheMoon

Question, do we aleardy have a jewel case? if so, i would like to see it.
If we had a jewel case, you'd have heard. That's probably going to be the next- if only- big news drop we'll get. (I don't speak from experience, though, so don't trust my word.)

As for speculation... is anyone going to talk about this snippet from Reimu's scenario after beating Aunn?

"Is my intuition starting to fail me?
I've never had such a total lack of leads during an incident.
Or maybe... I overlooked something big
hidden among my previous opponents...?"

And then:

"A fairy, a mountain hag, a komainu...
Hrrmm... wait. Nah, no way.
Well, no, on the other hand..."

Is there any importance of a trio of a fairy, mountain hag, and komainu? (Also, this is probably unrelated, but the other big question I have from the demo is... what is the "Star of Hope" that is referred to in the Stage 1 theme, "A Star of Hope Rises in the Blue Sky?" more like a star of hype)

My only good theory upon the announcement was that the titular "hidden star" was a solar eclipse causing the strange weather by blocking out the sun, but that doesn't seem likely now. I'm still going to throw it out there, though, just in case there's a connection.

Also, Reimu's right- we still have little no idea what the latter half of the game is going to be like (short of a Winter-themed stage, likely the Forest of Magic.) Has there ever been a release with so little leads from the demo?
« Last Edit: May 08, 2017, 03:07:13 AM by HistoryoftheMoon »

If anything, I'd say it has to relate to some folk tale or legend of sorts. I don't know any, though, so I'm no help there.


Also, Reimu's right- we still have little no idea what the latter half of the game is going to be like (short of a Winter-themed stage, likely the Forest of Magic.) Has there ever been a release with so little leads from the demo?

Most Demos actually give very little information of how the plot is supposed to go.  Back in UFO many people thought that the flying ship was gonna house the last 3 stages of UFO, and I remember a talk of skypirates/gods hoarding treasure, too!  Hahaha

DDC also had many people in the dark since docile youkai turning aggressive was quite strange.

In the end it's quite hard to figure the plot without having the full game released.  For now we can speculate, but having an accurate guess about the plot is really tough.

Lebon14

  • 椛ちゃん、助けてぇぇぇぇぇ!
Youkais that has relation to weather or heavy dependence on weather that appeared in the past:
Letty Whiterock, Yuuka Kazami, Shizuha & Minoriko Aki and Iku Nagae.

I could see Letty being a midboss for a winter-based stage and the same for the Aki sisters for the Fall/Autumn themed stage. But I wouldn't bet on Yuuka and Iku appearing at all.

In general the apparent plot in the first half of the game has little to do with the actual plot in the second half. I'm going to guess that the final boss won't have anything to do with seasons directly, with the wild weather being some kind of side effect or cover up or something. I'm also going to guess that this jade scepter that the japanese name refers to is a bigger hint to who the final boss is, since there isn't anything in the demo that it's obviously referring to.
My name is Tres. It sounds like "Tray". Tressert is "Tray-zurt"; like Tres dessert.
I've cleared every touhou game on Lunatic, and beaten every extra except SoEW.
NMNB: MoF Hard, SA Extra, UFO Extra

Or some powerful Youkai is just bored.


Lebon14

  • 椛ちゃん、助けてぇぇぇぇぇ!
In general the apparent plot in the first half of the game has little to do with the actual plot in the second half. I'm going to guess that the final boss won't have anything to do with seasons directly, with the wild weather being some kind of side effect or cover up or something. I'm also going to guess that this jade scepter that the japanese name refers to is a bigger hint to who the final boss is, since there isn't anything in the demo that it's obviously referring to.

Right.
I was just saying that, if any past characters made an appearance, what would have been the best bets. Knowing Zun, that will probably not happen.

CrestedPeak9

  • Fangame Advocate
It turns out that the amount of PiV you get from bullet cancels is also affected by how many options you had upon release.
...this means that consecutive summer releases will get better multipliers and hence overall more PiV than, say, consecutive fall releases.
As for whether this makes summer better than fall in scoring? It depends on difficulty, but Summer is the definitive sub to take for Easy scoring.
Lunatic 1cc: EoSD, PCB, IN, MoF, TD, DDC, LoLK, HSiFS, WBaWC

Aya Reiko

  • Humans are scary!
Youkais that has relation to weather or heavy dependence on weather that appeared in the past:
Letty Whiterock, Yuuka Kazami, Shizuha & Minoriko Aki and Iku Nagae.

I could see Letty being a midboss for a winter-based stage and the same for the Aki sisters for the Fall/Autumn themed stage. But I wouldn't bet on Yuuka and Iku appearing at all.
Just an aside, but Yuuka has no dependence on nor connections to the weather or the seasons what-so-ever.  It's just a persistent misconception since her title in PoFV is "Flower Master of the Four Seasons".

Hm...A fairy is getting more berserk, a Yamanba is getting more territorial, and a Komainu is getting more out-going and protective...It's as if along with the weather, their nature is getting more expressive. Also, maybe Tenshi could be in this game?

xJeePx

  • Danmaku Aesthete
  • 夢幻王子
Sorry if this was already posted, but I wanted to share some observations of mine on Etanity's name and visual design.

Her music theme is called "A Midsummer Fairy's Dream" (真夏の妖精の夢). This is a parody and reference to the title of William Shakespeare's play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (真夏の夜の夢).

Etanity's name seems to be an anagram of "Titania", one of the characters in the play who is a fairy queen.

エタニティ (E-ta-ni-ti)
ティタニア (Ti-ta-ni-a)

And last, but not least, here's something I noticed right away, when Etanity's image on the demo discs was revealed.
Her pose and overall design bears a striking resemblance to Kazuma Kaneko's design of Titania and her husband Oberon from Shin Megami Tensei. Knowing how ZUN was a huge fan of those series way back in the 90's and referenced Megaten a lot in his works, I wasn't surprised.

Drake

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intrdasting

We're probably going to end up sticking with Eternity at least for the time being, but I wonder if a patch or the full version will shed some more light on that.

A Colorful Calculating Creative and Cuddly Crafty Callipygous Clever Commander
- original art by Aiけん | ウサホリ -

cuc

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  • Probably won't respond 'til this mess is sorted o?
Bravo, now that's a good assessment! "A Midsummer Night's Dream" was also referenced by 真夏の昼の夢 "A Midsummer Noon's Dream", Chapter 3 of VFiS.

Unfortunately as the anagram is katakana-based, we can't be sure about how エタニティ is spelt in romaji. I too favor "Etanity" a bit more, since it's more of an actual name, but that has nothing to do with ZUN's decision-making, who may well have decided either plain "eterny" or one letter off is good enough for him.

To derail a little: I found the game's in-development title 東方天星璋 infinitely better than 東方天空璋, but he has settled on the later, and that's the end.

(東方天星璋 can be seen in the game executable's title and an error message. While 天空璋 is tenkuu "sky" + shou "jade scepter; jade ladle", 天星璋 is ten "sky, heaven" + sei "star" + shou.)
« Last Edit: May 08, 2017, 09:26:54 AM by cuc »
Touhou Fantasy News: twitter

game2011

  • mineiptXD
    • Supreme ??asual Dating Verified Women
Anything noteworthy between Cirno and Negumo's conversation?  Since the latter adopts lost children, I expect her to have something to say about seeing a young fairy appearing before her.

Imagine the fan work potential between those two!

Tengukami

  • Breaking news. Any season.
  • *
  • I said, with a posed look.
Sorry if this was already posted, but I wanted to share some observations of mine on Etanity's name and visual design.

Her music theme is called "A Midsummer Fairy's Dream" (真夏の妖精の夢). This is a parody and reference to the title of William Shakespeare's play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (真夏の夜の夢).

Etanity's name seems to be an anagram of "Titania", one of the characters in the play who is a fairy queen.

エタニティ (E-ta-ni-ti)
ティタニア (Ti-ta-ni-a)

And last, but not least, here's something I noticed right away, when Etanity's image on the demo discs was revealed.
Her pose and overall design bears a striking resemblance to Kazuma Kaneko's design of Titania and her husband Oberon from Shin Megami Tensei. Knowing how ZUN was a huge fan of those series way back in the 90's and referenced Megaten a lot in his works, I wasn't surprised.


Whoah, that is some pretty solid theorizing. Excellent, that settles it for me.

"Human history and growth are both linked closely to strife. Without conflict, humanity would have no impetus for growth. When humans are satisfied with their present condition, they may as well give up on life."

Flandre5carlet

  • Sister of the Devil
  • "So all I have to do is 'kyuu', and..."
    • flan.moe
Wait, I don't see how Etaniti is an anagram of Titania, whether in romaji or katakana...