An Analysis of Each Touhou Series' Game Titles

[Mеа]

I was finding stuff for this guy's question when I came across an interesting analysis of the titles of the games in Touhou in relation to the characters and plot of their respective games.
The original is in Japanese (here's a link if you want to read it raw or point out translation errors), so I'll be translating it here. Since the analysis goes only from EoSD to UFO, I'll be adding my own analysis of PC98 and UFO on

Below is the translated text until I say so:
[Translator notes in square brackets]

東方紅魔郷 (Tou-hou Kou-ma-kyou, EoSD, "Eastern Lands of the Scarlet Devil")
東方妖々夢 (Tou-hou You-you-mu, PCB, "Bewitching Eastern Dream")
東方永夜抄 (Tou-hou Ei-ya-shou, IN, "Eternal Night Vignette from the East")
風神録 (Fuu-jin-roku, MoF, "Eastern Wind God Chronicles")
地霊殿 (Chi-rei-den, SA, "Eastern Palace of the Earth Spirits")
星蓮船 (Sei-ren-sen, UFO, "Star-Lotus Ship of the East")
etc

Touhou's standard naming convention is '東方 X X X', where the 'X' is kanji. That these three kanji foreshadow the plot and relate to the characters of the games is common knowledge.
Excluding 紅魔郷 (EoSD); 妖々夢 (PCB) contains Youmu (妖夢) and Yuyuko's (幽々子) '々'; 永夜抄 (IN) contains Eirin's (永琳) '永' (eternity) and Kaguya's (輝夜) '夜' (night); 萃夢想 (IaMP) contains Suika's (萃香) '萃' (gathering); 花映塚 (PoFV) contains Eiki's (映姫) '映' (projection) and Komachi Onozuka's (小野塚小町) '塚' (mound). You can see how the title relates to the characters.
It would be interesting to consider whether ZUN decides upon the title name or the character names first.

Upon further inspection, I discovered that the titles of the soundtracks also have a tendency to borrow kanji from the title of their respective games.
Perhaps he uses the title as a constant theme throughout the composing process as well.

I'll list the relation between the game titles and the soundtrack titles from EoSD to UFO.

東方紅魔郷 (Tou-hou Kou-ma-kyou, EoSD, "Eastern Lands of the Scarlet Devil")
Title Theme:　赤より紅い夢 (A Dream More Scarlet than Red)
Stage One Theme:　ほおずきみたいに紅い魂 (A Soul as Red as a Ground Cherry)
Stage One Boss:　妖魔夜行 (Apparitions Stalk the night)
Fourth Stage Theme:　ヴワル魔法図書館 (Voile, the Magic Library)
EX Stage Theme:　魔法少女達の百年祭 (The Centennial Festival for Magical Girls)
Ending Theme:　紅より儚い永遠 (An Eternity that is more Transient than Scarlet)
Ending Credits Theme:　紅楼　～ Eastern Dream...  (Crimson Belvedere)

A scarlet devil, ie. a vampire. The enemy is located in the Scarlet Devil Mansion (紅魔館).
Vampires are from western mythology. The word 'magic; (魔法) itself has a very western vibe to it.
Red and Scarlet is the theme color. Apparently it's the most popular color too. Saying that it's the most popular may seem a bit inconsistent giventhe context of the setting, but red is apparently a very important color for humans. Anyway, red has a lot of meanings associated with it and this seems to be used in the soundtrack as well. A conscious effort on ZUN's part, I suppose.



東方妖々夢  (Tou-hou You-you-mu, PCB, "Bewitching Eastern Dream")
Title Theme　妖々夢　～ Snow or Cherry Petal (Mystic Dream ~ Snow or Cherry Petal
Stage 5 Theme　東方妖々夢　～ Ancient Temple (Mystic Oriental Dream ~ Ancient Temple)
EX Stage Theme　妖々跋扈  (Charming Domination)
Phantasm Stage Theme　妖々跋扈　～ Who done it! (Charming Domination ~ Who done it!)
Ending Theme　春風の夢 (Dream of a Spring Breeze)

A charming, bewitching dream. In contrast to EoSD's use of western mythology, PCB has many Japan-like Youkai appearing in it. Perhaps the '妖々' part of the title is meant to emphasize this? That the player would travel to the realm of the dead is rather like a charming, fantasy dream. Though I don't really understand the underlying theme given by the title, it's bound to be hidden somewhere.



東方永夜抄 (Tou-hou Ei-ya-shou, IN, "Eternal Night Vignette from the East")
Title Theme　永夜抄　～ Eastern Night (Eternal Night Vignette ~ Eastern Night)
Stage 1 Theme　幻視の夜　～ Ghostly Eyes (Illusionary Night ~ Ghostly Eyes)
Stage 2 Theme　夜雀の歌声　～ Night Bird (Song of the Night Sparrow ~ Night Bird)
Stage 4 Theme　永夜の報い　～ Imperishable Night (Retribution for the Eternal Night ~ Imperishable Night)

In IN, the protagonists use various methods to stop the night and set out to resolve the incident of the fake full moon. As such, the night is the setting. Even so, this setting ends when the player enters Eientei. As you can see above, the songs end at stage 4. Perhaps a night setting only works when under the night sky?



東方風神録 (Fuu-jin-roku, MoF, "Eastern Wind God Chronicles")
Title Theme　封印されし神々 (Sealed Gods)
Stage 1 Theme　人恋し神様　～ Romantic Fall (A God that Loves People ~ Romantic Fall)
Stage 2 Theme　厄神様の通り道　～ Dark Road (The Road of the Apotropaic God ~ Dark Road)
Stage 3 Theme　神々が恋した幻想郷　(The Gensokyo the Gods Loved)
Stage 5 Theme　少女が見た日本の原風景 (The Primal Scene of Japan the Girl Saw)     [lol lost in translation]
Stage 6 Boss　神さびた古戦場　～ Suwa Foughten Field (The Venerable Ancient Battlefield ~ Suwa Foughten Field)
Ending Theme　麓の神社 (Shrine at the Foot of the Mountain)
Ending Credits Theme　神は恵みの雨を降らす　～ Sylphid Dream (The Gods Give Us Blessed Rain ~ Sylphid Dream)

It's immediately obvious that the kanji for 'god' (神) is used abundantly. Though the setting is the Youkai Mountain, you're going up against a god, and so the theme is faith.
You will also notice that only 1 of the boss themes use one of the 3 kanji themes. As if to compensate for this, Kanako's theme's first letter is 'god' (神).
Considering that the boss themes represent the characters themselves, it would be fair to say that the theme of the game is carried through by the stage, title, ending, and ending credit themes.
Kanako herself represents the title perfectly. Needless to say, this was probably intentional.
So there's a lot of instances of the kanji carryover here. Perhaps the soundtrack was given extra polish as the first of the new trilogy. [I assume he's grouping 6~8 and 10~12. Personally, I'd say 12 is a bit of an oddball, not fitting in 10/11 or 13/14]



東方地霊殿  (Chi-rei-den, SA, "Eastern Palace of the Earth Spirits")
Title Theme　地霊達の起床 (Awakening of the Earth Spirits
Stage 6 Boss　霊知の太陽信仰　～ Nuclear Fusion (Solar Sect of Mystic Wisdom ~ Nuclear Fusion)
Ending Theme　地霊達の帰宅 (The Earth Spirits' Homecoming)

The Palace of Earth Spirits (地霊殿, Chireiden), the building full of subterranean ghost-like things. Apparently they're vengeful spirits. So earth spirits and vengeful spirits are the same? Though it doesn't really seem like it. Are those spirits with faces on the title screen also earth spirits? These earth spirits, they get up in the morning to prepare for the day and then return home from work.
Similar to MoF, the stage 6 boss theme has the same kanji as the title. Some say the two themes even sound alike. Very few examples in this games.



東方星蓮船 (Sei-ren-sen, UFO, "Star-Lotus Ship of the East")
Stage 4 Theme　幽霊客船の時空を越えた旅 (Interdimensional Voyage of a Ghostly Passenger Ship)

And that's it.
The Palanquin Ship (星蓮船) is the setting of stages 3 and 4. You get on and head off into Makai. Despite being the enemy's base of operations, its relevance fades after you get off. The Palanquin Ship later becomes the Myouren Temple.
There's a lot of Buddhist elements in UFO. There's a teaching in Buddhism, that all things are transient. Perhaps this explains the dwindling importance of the ship. There's even less examples in UFO than in SA. The title is starting to become meaningless. Or perhaps I'm reading too deeply into the matter.
At the very least, the Palanquin Ship (星蓮船) is still the enemy base. Rather than becoming the theme of the game, the title seems to reveal the alignment of the character cast.


The characters and plot of Touhou are intertwined and can't be separated from the other, this is the impression that I get.

The titles have meaning.
It reveals the important aspects of each title.
Originally, the title revealed the plot, but gradually began to relate the cast.
I can't say that there's a definite pattern here.
After all, Touhou Project's most valuable asset is its characters.


Translation End

The following will now be presented entirely by me

東方神霊廟 (Tou-hou Shin-rei-byou, TD, "Eastern Divine Spirit Mausoleum")
Character-wise, the only character that has any of the 3 kanji is 豊聡耳 神子 (Toyosatomimi no Miko). She's the final boss, so I suppose it makes sense. Since Futo and Tojiko were somewhat based on real-life counterparts, I suppose it could also have been a bit harder to coordinate names for them.
Now for the music:

Title Theme　欲深き霊魂 (Spirit of Avarice)
Stage 1 Theme　死霊の夜桜 (Night Sakura of Dead Spirits)
Stage 5 Theme　夢殿大祀廟 (The Hall of Dreams' Great Mausoleum)
Stage 5 Boss　大神神話伝 (Legend of the Great Gods)
Ending Theme　神社の新しい風 (A New Wind at the Shrine)

Surprise! Despite the game being entirely about her resurrection, there is no mention of her anywhere (aside from her name). Because of this, I guess the combo of stage-6-boss-themes-having-a-kanji pattern is broken. Instead, Futo takes the spotlight (and Tojiko too, I guess). This game is quite interesting. On the one hand, it seems to continue the recent trend of titles leaning more toward revealing the characters than the plot. In this case, Ten Desires is obviously a reference to Miko. But how about the Japanese title? The Divine Spirit Mausoleum is pointing at the setting of stage 5 and 6, and the location of Miko's resurrection. So apparently mausoleum means a building full of tombs. Always ironic that people resurrect at grave sites. I do have to say that I quite liked the build up of stages 5 and 6 to the battle with Miko; it had a very somber yet important feel to it. Appropriate, given the setting, I suppose.



東方輝針城 (Tou-hou Ki-shin-jou, DDC, "Eastern Castle of Shining Needles")
Following the trend from TD, it seems that Sukuna (少名 針妙丸), the stage 6 boss, is the only character that has kanji from the title in her name.
Now for the music:

Stage 5 Theme　空中に沈む輝針城 (The Shining Needle Castle Sinking in the Air)
Stage 6 Theme　針小棒大の天守閣 (The Exaggerated Castle Keep)
Stage 6 Boss　輝く針の小人族　～ Little Princess (Inchlings of the Shining Needle ~ Little Princess)

I find it interesting that this small list of 3 themes reveal where the core of the plot takes place. I suppose it's obvious that plot needs to happen at the end, but I like how cleanly it lines up in this manner. The Shining Needle Castle is the setting of stage 5 and 6. Not as many examples as 13, but more than 12, so that's good. DDC has the same interesting quality that TD had. That is, the Japanese title refers to the main setting of the plot, the Shining Needle Castle. But then, the English title has a bit of a twist. Double Dealing Character, if anything, seems to be referring to Seija, the mastermind behind the plot. I find it interesting perhaps mostly because she isn't the final boss, she's stage 5, and yet the title decides that this game is about her. It would have been as surprising if TD was called Silent Sinner in Blue (literally) or something like that.


Ugh I'm tired, it's almost 2 here. So I'm going to sleep and see if I feel like doing the rest in the tomorrow-ness.


EDIT: Continuation, ho!

Before I get into the PC98 games, I'll do PoFV first because I missed it last time

東方花映塚 (Tou-hou Ka-ei-dzuka, PoFV, "Eastern Flower Viewing Mound")
I already mentioned character names in the translated text, so I'll skip straight to the music:

Title Theme　花映塚　～ Higan Retour (Flower Viewing Mound ~ Higan Retour)
Sakuya Izayoi's Theme　フラワリングナイト (Flowering Night)
Pre-Battle Conversation Theme　花の映る塚 (The Mound where the Flowers Reflect)
Pre-Boss Conversation Theme　此岸の塚 (Mound of Shigan)
Ending Theme　花は幻想のままに (The Flowers Remain in Fantasy)
Ending Credits Theme　魂の花　～ Another Dream... (Flower of Soul ~ Another Dream...)

Two honorable mention awards:
First one goes to Yuuka Kazami's Theme 今昔幻想郷　～ Flower Land (Gensokyo, Past and Present ~ Flower Land), because it contains a title drop of the game she's from, 東方幻想郷, which is read 'Touhou Gensokyo'.
The second one goes to 魂の花　～ Another Dream... (Flower of Soul ~ Another Dream...). I don't trust my memory, but I could have sworn PoDD also had something like 'Another Dream' in it. Maybe it was 'Next Dream' in between the fights. Regardless, it's clearly a reference to PoDD, which I have to address.

I already mentioned character names, but I'd like to add a bit more thoughts. Medicine loves the suzuran flower, and Komachi is heavily associated with the spider lily. Both are flowers, and flowers is the theme of this game. I'll also note that Youmu is a gardener (who is also half dead, fitting both themes of the game), Reisen's name (Undonge) refers to a type of flower, and Yuuka is the youkai of flowers. Sakuya's name literally means 'flowering night', which contains the kanji for blossoming. Needless to say, flowers is the theme here. There's also a second theme, death. The plot involves spirits that run away into flowers, causing them to bloom. The player crosses the Sanzu river over to the side of death and judgement. Youmu is half dead, Sakuya serves what's essentially the lord of the dead in other pop-culture usages, and Reisen buried her past identity. There's a lot of interpretive value here. If we just take the title for what it is, it describes the plot in a really simple sort of way. The juxtaposing of the rather romantic and lighthearted action of flower-viewing with the second theme of death creates a rather beautiful but sobering expression.



東方靈異伝 (Tou-hou Rei-i-den, HRtP, "Eastern Wondrous Legend")
So the strange thing about HRtP is that all the enemy character names are romanized, that is, they have no (official) kana. Even then, the majority of the cast have very weird names. The western ones obviously have no possible kanji and the Japanese ones have weird names. The names don't really match up to the title. That is, all but one name, our heroine: 博麗靈夢 Reimu Hakurei (靈, rei for spirit). You would be interested to know that this 靈 'rei' kanji is different from windows-era Reimu's 'rei' in that this one is an older version of the more common form of 'rei' (霊).
Music:
Second Boss Theme　天使伝説 (Angel Legend)

An honorable mention goes to 東方怪奇談 (Eastern Strange Discourse) where, in addition to being the first song he wrote for a game,  ZUN mentions in his comments that he took the 東方XXX naming convention from this song's title.

I considered adding the Legend of KAGE to the list, but ZUN mentions he wasn't referring to HRtP in his comments. This is possibly the only main series Touhou game where the cast isn't related to each other in any sort of way (Mima doesn't count, as that was revealed later). Quite possibly because of this, the music titles don't really match up either. Or it could just be that he didn't really have connecting themes in mind when creating his first game. Still, how appropriate that Reimu's name should match up! A shrine maiden solving weird incidents; it really sets the tone for the entire series in general.



東方封魔録 (Tou-hou Fuu-ma-roku, SoEW, "Eastern Recorded Sealing of a Demon")
Name wise, we have two biggies,  魅魔 Mima and 霧雨魔理沙 Marisa Kirisame. Master and servant. It would be pretty interesting if Mima attached kanji to Marisa's name and she's actually not from Japan, like as a sign of her servitude, like Remilia and Sakuya. The wiki mentions Five Magic Stones, but because that's a fan nickname,  it doesn't count.
Music:

Title Theme　東方封魔録　～浄土曼荼羅   (Eastern Record of the Sealing of a Demon ~ Pure Land Mandala)
Stage 5 Theme　東方封魔録　～幽幻乱舞 (Eastern Record of the Sealing of a Demon ~ A Phantom's Boisterous Dance)
Unused　封魔終演 (Sealed Demon's Finale)

Lot's of title drops this time around. Kind of like they want to hammer in the point, "we're going to be sealing demons in this game". Which obviously can only refer to Mima and sealing her away. So far the titles seem to be referring to the plot, like the older windows games.



東方夢時空 (Tou-hou Yume-ji-kuu, PoDD, "Eastern Dimensional Dream")
For whatever reason, the title has always sounded quite cute to me. Another single character name match, 岡崎夢美 Yumemi Okazaki, the last boss of this game (and also the only human final boss in the entire series, how badass). In a similar vein to how TD has character titles involving 'desire', PoDD has character titles involving dreams (It's too long to list here, so view it for yourself).
Music:

Title Theme　夢は時空を越えて (A Dream Transcending Space-Time)
Marisa Kirisame's Theme　Dim. Dream
Kana Anaberal's Theme　夢消失　～ Lost Dream (Vanishing Dream ~ Lost Dream)
Rikako Asakura's Theme　夢幻遊戯　～ Dream War (Visionary Game ~ Dream War)
Chiyuri's Theme　Sailor of Time
Common Ending Theme　久遠の夢 (Dream of Eternity)
Unused　時の風 (Winds of Time)
Unused　スターボウドリーム (Starbow Dream)
Unused　Phantasmagoria

Quite the dream motif we have here. Once again, I'll compare this to TD's desire theme. Unlike TD though, the dream motif doesn't hold up too much plot relevance. The title, in my opinion, seems to be more about the dream-like coincidence of the many unique characters gathering in one location in space-time to duke it out. It also refers to Yumemi and Chiyuri's involvement in the plot. So like the last game, the title seems to forecast the plot and the final boss group's identities.



東方幻想郷 (Tou-hou Gen-sou-kyou, LLS, "Fantastic Land of the East")
Gensokyo, right there in the title. Though apparently, it wasn't used as the name of the setting of Touhou until EoSD. The only name with a kanji from the title is 幻月 Gengetsu, this game's extra stage boss. I don't know anything about her since I never got that far, but she seems to have no relation to the plot much. Setting wise, we have a match in 夢幻館 Mugenkan, Yuuka's residence. I can't seem to get the impression that the title has much of any relevance to the game in this one, aside from perfectly describing Touhou's setting; fantastic/illusionary land of the East indeed.
Music:

Title Theme　幻想郷　～ Lotus Land Story (Gensokyo ~ Lotus Land Story)
Stage 4 Boss A　少女綺想曲　～ Capriccio (Maiden's Capricio)
Stage 5 Theme　Lotus Love
Extra Stage Theme　メイド幻想　～ Icemilk Magic (Illusions of a Maid ~ Icemilk Magic)
GameOver Theme　幻想の住人 (Those Who Live in Illusions)
Unused　Lotus Road

Once again, I'm not sure how the lotus theme ties into the game. The flower meaning of lotus has a lot to do with Buddhism: enlightenment, prosperity, wisdom, purity of mind/soul, etc. Not sure what it has to do with waking a sleeping terror. Aside from that, we have a few instances of 'illusions', which ties into Touhou's general tone, in a way. Not much to say here.

edit: Hmm, perhaps Lotus Land refers to Gensokyo? So LLS is talking about a story in the lotus lands, aka Gensokyo. Now we need some sort of reasoning. The land of rebirth? of purity? I suppose it could be the latter, as Gensokyo is relatively untainted by, well, stuff. In a way, there's not much traces of impurities like uncontrolled human greed or lust or anything of the sort. The residents seem to be at peace with each other (in a general sense). We gather this from our current stores of resources and information about Gensokyo, but perhaps ZUN was already imagining it to be a place like this?



東方怪綺談 (Tou-hou Kai-ki-dan, MS,  "Eastern Ghostly and Beautiful Tales")
I can't remember playing this one much. Probably because I only did it for Alice and Shinki. Speaking of Shiki, her name (神綺) is the only one with a kanji from the title in it. I'll also mention that there's a lot of western names in this game, Alice being one of them.
Music:

Title Theme　怪綺談　～ Mystic Square (Wondrous Tales of Romance ~ Mystic Square)

Only one. This is the last PC98 Touhou game. Excluding HRtP, this game also kept the tradition within the PC98 games of having the Title theme be a title drop. For some reason, the title of the game sparks a kind of strange bittersweet-ness. It kind of evokes this fairy-tale like romantic mood, and an imagery of this game being banished into the past in the form of a far off memory, and the rest of the PC98 games along with it. In that way, it feels like a rather satisfying end to the PC98 era, though I haven't played them much. Mystic Square doesn't make much sense, so perhaps it's just something that stands out and sounds cool. Personally, I feel that the "Eastern Ghostly and Beautiful Tales" part perfectly describes the entire Touhou series in general. It's kind of bookends in a way. HRtP started the series off with "Wondrous Legend", and we finish off with a "Beautiful Tale".
Although the windows-era Touhou game titles are rather self contained within their game, I find it interesting how the PC98 games seem to build the foundation for the series, if we stretch the meanings of a few of the titles.
HRtP introduces the main character, and the title suggests that she goes off to eliminate those threatening the peace of the people (ie. she's responsive to prayers). The first game starts off as a "wondrous legend".
SoEW kind of hints at the general way the heroines deal with the big bads.
PoDD describes the fantasy-like encounters of the cast of each game.
LLS describes the setting of Touhou, the gensoukyou, the eastern land of fantasies and illusions, Gensokyo.
MS gives us the general mood of the stories created in the Touhou-verse. Essentially, they're tales. Small, isolated, fantasy-like tales.

Maybe it's me stretching the meanings a bit much. Maybe it's me trying to dig deeper holes than the creator intend. Maybe and maybe. It's pretty fun and interesting regardless.

I hope you enjoyed this post. If you have any analyses of your own or would like to point out some errors, please feel free to share.

[cuc]

Thank you for your effort in translating the article. It has some shortcomings, but counting the appearance of kanji in song titles, that's inspired work.

For example: the author only found one 船 in UFO's song titles, yet ignored other references to "ship", including the Stage 1 song: "At the Harbor of Spring" (a literary metaphor for the end of spring).

[Colticide]

This is really cool and informative! While reading this I though about the theme of red in EoSD and realized that every character uses something with red wither it be in clothing, hair, or Danmaku. But with this seeming to be a common thing, it would be great for those who make fan games and trying to come up with a name of sorts, I feel inspired I must do something now!

[Dingo785]

Now I feel stupid as I never knew this! But seriously, I like this and found it very informative!

[Mеа]

I've updated the OP to contain every main shooter game in the series, so it's more or less complete. I suppose I could do a few of the spin-offs in my free time sometime later. In any case, check it out.