Well, HELLO THERE, PROGRESS. HOW ARE YOU TODAY?
I'M FINE, THANK YOU.
I can't believe I'm actually getting somewhere with this. Jumped a coding hurdle with ease that I thought would be a beast to decode, managed to dig up very nice looking Kana and Akyu portraits to use (The out-of-place Kana one, as nice as it was, is now gone), spellcards are working great except for one little issue I still need to deal with, and I came up with an answer to the items system which is actually fairly simple, but allows the player a great deal of rewards.
Basically, a certain NPC in the game offers her fluffy magic shop early in the game, where the player can trade in accumulated points. Did I say points? Yes, I did. Instead of enemies dropping gold, enemies can now drop either Faith or Point items, among other things (rare equipment, other item types). Faith points work as the score multiplier in previous games - as you build up more and more Faith items, the value of your individual Point items increases, to a maximum based on your current floor. Then, each point item you turn over to the shopkeeper is refunded for that value of points. These points can then be used to purchase items - but what you're getting is up to fate! She sells items based on the furthest floor you've completed, and can sell almost any item you could find on that floor... but what she gives you is random from all of that junk! Still, you might get some valuable stuff.
There's other items you can collect too, including Power/Gauge items which can be used on the field to restore health or MP when there's no healing around. There's other goods that serve other purposes, including a bartering system with other NPCs later on, or affecting certain points in gameplay. Suffice to say there's a lot of stuff being used from the previous Touhou games, and a lot of stuff to find, all of which eventually turns into access to additional challenges, spells, equipment, and items for you to use.
On another note, I decided to get rid of "Gaining spells by levelling". Characters will start off with their full spell arsenal now, excluding their Last Spell, which must be learned through a specific method that is completely related to the aforementioned 'other item types'.
Also, once I actually go back and recode enemy behaviour patterns and especially the bosses, this game will actually be playable up to the end of the first floor.
...Christ, suddenly I feel like I'm getting somewhere with this!
