Touhou 14.5: 東方深秘録 ~ Urban Legend in Limbo. is HM sequel, demo at Comiket 87

[SacredWind]

I mean sorry you were expecting your opinion to go unchallenged, but that's not a very realistic expectation to have in the first place.

Calling people who disagree with you "elitist" isn't helping, either.

Seriously, there's a major difference between "challenging an opinion" and "angrily picking apart their post and chasing them away for not feeling the same way".

There does not seem to be much room for opinions in this thread judging by that earlier exchange. Last I checked, that's what elitism is. Clearly english wasn't the poor guy's first language and he got railed for asking "Oh hey, I didn't like HM, is Tasofro working on anything else?" I don't know how that's "being allowed to express oneself".

All I'm saying is, there's no need to pounce on people who aren't totally swept away by this announcement. Nor to defend that kind of behavior. Someone not liking HM isn't going to make Tasofro pull this game -- there's no reason to chase them away angrily like everyone needs to glorify this game or it won't get made.

Meh. I don't care. I'm just curious which characters will be in this. But seeing this kind of open hostility and seeing it defended leaves a sour taste in my mouth... -_-

[Tengukami]

Seriously, there's a major difference between "challenging an opinion" and "angrily picking apart their post and chasing them away for not feeling the same way".

There does not seem to be much room for opinions in this thread judging by that earlier exchange. Last I checked, that's what elitism is.

Wrong. Let me say it again: if you drop into a thread - like you did, for example, yelling "fuck you" and essentially accusing ZUN of ruining your Christmas - you're expressing a very strong opinion there. Expect a strong reaction from others, and either be ready to back it up or shrug and move on. Unless you don't want your opinions to ever be challenged, in which case I'm sorry to disappoint you but people disagree with each other around here.

All I'm saying is, there's no need to pounce on people who aren't totally swept away by this announcement. Nor to defend that kind of behavior. Someone not liking HM isn't going to make Tasofro pull this game -- there's no reason to chase them away angrily like everyone needs to glorify this game or it won't get made.

You're creating a false dilemma where none exists. Once again, literally no one is telling you that you can only have one opinion of this game. You're again ignoring the people who picked apart HM for all its terribleness, point by point, who were not at all "pounced on" as you put it. Why? Because they didn't come roaring into this throwing a temper tantrum but rather, they made great, cogent points.

Looking over this thread, I see people both hyped and underwhelmed about this game. The only people who seem to be upset about "elitism" are the people who were hoping to apparently just be able to make their howl of rage without any disagreement. And that's a shame, because it disrupts what could otherwise be a great discussion.

[Espadas]

SacredWind, just to show you what Tengukami is pointing out:

Don't get me wrong, Im not saying it will. Im saying if it does, then this will be disappointing. =) It's way too soon to speculate right now -- it just seems like the likeliest of scenarios, that's all.

I wish theyd just go back to the earlier system (SWR/Soku), iron out the problems people had with it, and add more recent characters to the lineup, personally..... If the game turns out like that, Im totally stoked! But if it turns out like HM? Meh...... it would be disappointing to see another craptastic fighter from tasofro....

Well just have to wait and see. =)


Different is fine. When the changes work. To me, HM was just.... bad. =( Aerial combat, the short timer, the one-button-special-moves, the popularity system, etc. I just didn't find myself enjoying any of it. The only thing I felt it had going for it was being able to customize your moveset (soku could have used that instead of its oh-so-reliable card system/replacement moves....)

I saw "Touhou 14.5" and expected a nice christmas present. Instead I learn it's a sequel to the crapfest that was HM.... So disappointed... sooooo disappointed.... Sigh... -_- Thanks for nothing, Tasofro. Way to get my hopes up. Merry fucking christmas to you too...

Fuck this. It's christmas. I don't need this kind of disappointment. I have a family to be with. -_- Merry christmas to everyone, try not to let this kick in the balls by Tasofro bring you all down.

The only people who say this are fanboys who can't handle someone criticizing their favorite thing.

Sorry I hurt your fee-fees

Do you see the differences? All 3 are negative posts about the new game, but the TONE is completely different.

The first one explain why he doesn't like it, the second one is basically a rant, the third is literally just for flame.
While the first one might get a civil response, the other 2 will NEVER get anything good as answer, because they are not good to begin with.

 

[cuc]

>Drake drops Tasofro's game list

You forgot Higurashi Daybreak (w/ expack), and another Ryukishi07 collaboration, Natsu no Kagerou, which is apparently the secret shame of Tasofro, since they only released a demo and never finished it.

>fighting game characters tend to be Stage 4+

That's mostly down to that ZUN sees Stage 1-3 (i.e. the demo) as a game's first half, Stage 4-6 as the second half. The second half tends to have actually important characters. But this is not an absolute rule, and "unimportant" characters like Ichirin and Nitori do get the spotlight possibly due to the variety they bring.

For IaMP, the one that actually stands out is Patchouli, the only one not playable in IN. Since according to the IN demo document (my favorite "key to understanding early Touhou" doc), ZUN laid the plan for IN's 8 playables when conceiving PCB, and Alice was introduced in PCB specifically so she can be Marisa's partner. This importance is the deciding factor that ensures her place in IaMP.

>The Tasofro site IP block

People have inquired Unabara about it, and he seemed surprised. Perhaps the IP block was pure ISP policy; in that case, there's hope they may ask the ISP to remove it.

[SacredWind]

I fail to see what this has to do with the latest attack on what I'm assuming is now an ex-member.

Whatever. This is clearly one-sided so I'm not going to bother. It's sad to see what the fanbase has turned into, is all I'm saying. Enjoy your game and your "great discussion".

[Tengukami]

I'm amazed you consider any of that an attack (for real - calling any part of that brief exchange an attack or bullying is hyperbole at best and hugely unfair to those who responded), and a real shame you're dismissing and ignoring points explained to you in good faith, but rest assured the state of the fandom will survive this thread.

[Omegahugger]

Whatever. This is clearly one-sided so I'm not going to bother. It's sad to see what the fanbase has turned into, is all I'm saying. Enjoy your game and your "great discussion".

Can I offer advice? Just ignore this stuff. At this point all that mostly remains in this thread are supporters of the game and there's little room left for well-received opposing views. When the opinions of the majority center around the same thing, bullies emerge and stop seeing themselves as doing anything wrong anymore, sad to say. It's just human nature. Anyway, I'm just saying don't make one person's mistreatment into something personal or let it reflect on the state of the forums at large. Do like the rest of us: watch and see what the character roster and story will comprise of, then once your curiosity is satisfied just go on with your life like this game never happened. =) You're not going to fix the world's problems by getting yourself riled up over this issue..... you'll just make enemies.

[Quwanti]

That's mostly down to that ZUN sees Stage 1-3 (i.e. the demo) as a game's first half, Stage 4-6 as the second half. The second half tends to have actually important characters. But this is not an absolute rule, and "unimportant" characters like Ichirin and Nitori do get the spotlight possibly due to the variety they bring.

I think the stage 1-3 characters all have changes to show up. It just depends on how they'll get involved in the story. Like how Wriggle was considered for Touhou Hisoutensoku.

I?m exited for this game. Definitely can?t wait for the new music! Even though HM feels young, the demo version already came out two years ago.

[FearNagae]

Ahhh yep music I wish they could redo the miracle of SWR themes. I feel that SWR main theme and Tenshi's themes are really good, compared to HM and Kokoro's.

Kokoro's might sound nice at first but then IMO it's only because ZUN used nice instruments, her theme isn't really good for remixes.

[Tiamat]

Is it wrong that I'm more hyped for the story and new character(s) than the game itself?

I've never ever had any complaints with the games, but somehow getting new instalments and world building simply tickles me pink~

I'm this way for every new Touhou game.

Course, I'm more into RPGs than fighting or shooting games.

I think the stage 1-3 characters all have changes to show up. It just depends on how they'll get involved in the story. Like how Wriggle was considered for Touhou Hisoutensoku.

I?m exited for this game. Definitely can?t wait for the new music! Even though HM feels young, the demo version already came out two years ago.

Hisoutensoku in general was supposed to consider lots of early stage characters (kinda a shame that it only ended up with Cirno and Meilling out of that).

Hisoutensoku's story was also low-key to go along with that.  It was kinda a lower-deck episode in general compared to the stories of other games that are grander in scale (IE, most other games have stuff that influence or threatened to influence all of Gensokyo.  Or in UFO's case, delved behind the philosophy of it.  Hisoutensoku's storyline only influenced all of Gensokyo in the inflated imaginations of the protagonists ).

[cuc]

According to the IN demo doc, Wriggle is notable for being fairly strong (for such a low-tier character).

And re: ZUN's big "introduce teams for the third game" plan, the question I'm most curious about is if he had the plan when creating Rin Satsuki. If he did, who would be the partner? Could that partner be someone in EoSD?

It may take a few more years for us to know the answer.

[Monkeypro257]

I don't usually post anymore, but I couldn't help but see Urban Legend in Limbo be a sequel to HM. I'm fairly disappointed in that, but I'm seeing high expectations in this new upcoming game! (I just hope some new returning chars. will appear or just new.)

[Drake]

>Drake drops Tasofro's game list

You forgot Higurashi Daybreak (w/ expack), and another Ryukishi07 collaboration, Natsu no Kagerou, which is apparently the secret shame of Tasofro, since they only released a demo and never finished it.

No I did that on purpose lol

Seriously, there's a major difference between "challenging an opinion" and "angrily picking apart their post and chasing them away for not feeling the same way".

There does not seem to be much room for opinions in this thread judging by that earlier exchange. Last I checked, that's what elitism is. Clearly english wasn't the poor guy's first language and he got railed for asking "Oh hey, I didn't like HM, is Tasofro working on anything else?" I don't know how that's "being allowed to express oneself".

excuse me did you even read my posts

[ILikeBulletZ]

...


Another fighter?...


Well, I hope its at least NOT anything like HM. I honestly think that is the worst Touhou in existence, fighter or not.

But, seeing as it is indeed a sequel of sorts to HM...


Hope they at least make a fair amount (as in a LOT) of improvements to it. At least go back to the previous fighter?s style- I also don't really enjoy them all that much, but at least they show some potential and its OK for messing around from time to time!

[Polaris]

I really liked Hopeless Masquerade so I'm pretty excited for this game to come out. The graphics in HM are really pretty and it's really a step up from the earlier fighters. I liked the customization in it more than in SWR or 12.3 because of the Shinto/Buddhism/Taoism thing, since that added variety to the normal moves on top of the special moves, and I had a lot of fun changing the religion on each character to see what was different and how that would affect combos. I'm doubting that something like that will make a return due to the theme of ULiL being different, but the "using different urban legends" thing might prove to be interesting for customization.

I guess one of my biggest complaints with HM would be that it's easy to get bored with it after a while: the character roster felt limited, the AI was poor, and the netplay was iffy, so it was hard to play with others and it would get boring simply playing on your own. Of course, those are all obvious improvements to look for in ULiL: more characters are going to be added, and the AI and netplay will (hopefully) be better. The one thing I really want in ULiL is an arcade mode, since HM didn't have that. There's a surprising world of difference between beating everyone up one after another without interruptions and having to select a character in VS CPU mode between each battle.

I'm wondering if, as a sequel to HM, ULiL is just a sequel in spirit (same engine, similar gameplay) or if it's going to be a legit sequel in story, too, with HM somehow being the cause of the events in ULiL. Either way, I'm hoping that the entire HM character roster returns, and if it follows the same pattern as SWR, it'll have 3 existing characters and 2 new characters. The only one I'd really like to see again is Sanae, since in WaHH it was mentioned that she was getting restless after not taking part in HM/DDC, so it wouldn't be unnatural if she showed up now. No clue on the others.

[Leon゠Helsing]

Considering how Shinkiroll was kind of a bust I hope we get a Shinhiroll out of this.

[FearNagae]

Has anyone ever inquired Unabara about how derp HM netcode is ?
We really need Shinhiroll or whatever it is now, I hope someone who can cares enough to do this, because I haven't gotten anywhere with my lack of hacking skills...

[LunaWillow]

I hope, that ULiL will improve story mode a little bit. After some time it was just boring. For most character it looked like: "beat some characters, then Mamizou, then Kokoro". Same goes with IaMP, with the exception of beating Yukari and Suika. In SWR, not every character fought Tenshi. Story modes were also on diffrent timelines - before the incident, long after the incident. That's what I liked about SWR. I hope ULiL will have it too. 

I wonder how will new character portraits/sprites look like. Especially newcomers.

[Gpop]

Has anyone ever inquired Unabara about how derp HM netcode is ?
We really need Shinhiroll or whatever it is now, I hope someone who can cares enough to do this, because I haven't gotten anywhere with my lack of hacking skills...

Thing is, HM's netcode was made mostly for Japan only (and same with SWR and soku's original netcode). Considering how small Japan is compared to NA in general, and how their target audience is Japan only, it's understandable that it's pretty bad at far distances, however this netcode suffices more than enough within Japan itself.

[Colticide]

Thing is, HM's netcode was made mostly for Japan only (and same with SWR and soku's original netcode). Considering how small Japan is compared to NA in general, and how their target audience is Japan only, it's understandable that it's pretty bad at far distances, however this netcode suffices more than enough within Japan itself.

It's possible they might try and improve the netcode this time, I'm pretty sure Zun now knows how popular his game is around the world, that may get to Tasofro to make it better. I would assume so anyway. With the many changes Touhou offical and fanwork have seen in terms of digital releases to overseas attention, they might put more worth in the netcode. But I barely know what I'm talking about, just second hand info and observation.

[Aya Reiko]

I think the reactions to this announcement can be summarized as either "Yay! More Touhou!" or "Oh god, not another Tasofro fighting game".  I kinda skew towards the latter, though in my case, I'm tiring of tasofro's formula. 

What I'd like to see in ULiL:

* An bigger roster ESPECIALLY AT LAUNCH.
-- Even for an indy dev, a roster of only 10 characters, 8 of which were initially playable, in this day and age is kinda pathetic.
--- (Lab Zero is excused because they were cranking graphics to ridiculous levels for a 2D game)

* More new characters THAT AREN'T END GAME BOSSES.
-- PFoV gave us Aya and Medicine, and re-introduced Yuuka.  Why can't tasofro ever do the same?

* Do something different with story mode.
-- Ever since IaMP, the formula has essentially been the same in terms of storytelling AND gameplay.
--- Story mode has always been arcade-like.  It's out-of-date and boring.  They should consider branching paths like original Melty Blood and/or a singular narrative like Injustice (chronological) or DOA5 (anachronistic).
--- Every stage in every game has been the same damn thing.  Fight opponent, then fight them again as they use "boss"-type spellcard with a pre-set pattern. Give us something new.

* Make a competent AI.
-- I highly doubt I'll ever play multi-player.  Give me SOMETHING so that this game has some replayability.

[7TC7]

* More new characters THAT AREN'T END GAME BOSSES.
-- PFoV gave us Aya and Medicine, and re-introduced Yuuka.  Why can't tasofro ever do the same?

Pretty sure that's not for tasofro to decide. New characters and story are after all still by ZUN. Sure, that opens the question of why ZUN doesn't want to add more new characters in the fighters, but I assume the pattern of letting existing characters that wouldn't appear again in any other way get some screentime is his preferred way with these games instead of creating many new ones.

Then again, I would say having two completely new characters like in SWR would be pretty great already.

Also, it's much easier to create more new characters for a game like PoFV than for a fighting game.

[game2011]

- PFoV gave us Aya

Aya first appeared in Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red, so she's not really a new character in Touhou 9.

[Peachems]

As for ULiL, I'm mainly just excited for the characters and music. The biggest problems I had with HM were the popularity system and the central air gravity thing. I believe aerial fighters can be done better than that, so I hope ULiL will succeed in that, and it appears the popularity system has been changed as well.

When I look back, IaMP was my very first touhou game. When I replayed it a long while after having experienced SWR and soku, it felt incredibly clunky to me. Therefore, I hope this will also be the case with ULiL compared to HM, in that the movement feels a lot better.

As for characters, I'm hoping for a lot of playable youkai, most notably Orin, since she's a stage 5 boss that's a youkai and has never appeared playable as of yet (andbecausefavoritecharacter) and otherwise Wriggle, Yamame, Medicine, that kind of characters (maybe even Raiko as she is a tsukumogami) though Nue would be most logical I suppose, as her DS spellcards revolved around Urban legends a lot. Shou would be nice too since she hasn't appeared yet either though I can't really imagine a good reason for her.

We'll see! I'll probably be surprised to see any new character really. Before HM, I didn't like Futo one bit, but her HM aestetics and behaviour made me like her more.

[Phasm]

If Koishi returns as a playable character, i hope Satori or Orin and Utsuho are in it. But, please read this quote from the story:

" Reimu and company have assumed the rumors that fit them, and treat the anomalies as their playthings. As long as one can control the rumors without being afraid, the manifested anomalies can be rendered harmless. More than that, they can be turned into powers of one's own"

From this we can assume characters like Sekibanki will appear. Satori might appear when you take into consideration she is a feared sealed youkai, same for Koishi, Orin and Utsuho, but + for Orin because she steals corpses from cemitaries. I honestly think either Suika or Yuugi will appear, or a member of the 4 devas of the mountain never before seen! On another note, i hope the popularity system isn't in this game, i never understood it.

[Colticide]

If Koishi returns as a playable character, i hope Satori or Orin and Utsuho are in it. But, please read this quote from the story:

" Reimu and company have assumed the rumors that fit them, and treat the anomalies as their playthings. As long as one can control the rumors without being afraid, the manifested anomalies can be rendered harmless. More than that, they can be turned into powers of one's own"

From this we can assume characters like Sekibanki will appear. Satori might appear when you take into consideration she is a feared sealed youkai, same for Koishi, Orin and Utsuho, but + for Orin because she steals corpses from cemitaries. I honestly think either Suika or Yuugi will appear, or a member of the 4 devas of the mountain never before seen! On another note, i hope the popularity system isn't in this game, i never understood it.

Those rumors don't deal with the girls themselves but if you read earlier it talks about the outside worlds urban legends and how the girls are aware of them since they are manifesting in gensokyo. Potential PC can use those legends as power, we could get sekibanki but not because of who she is but what she is doing with the rumors she has.

[Phasm]

Tomorow we will finally discover how the girls will use the urban legends!

[Clarste]

* Do something different with story mode.
-- Ever since IaMP, the formula has essentially been the same in terms of storytelling AND gameplay.
--- Story mode has always been arcade-like.  It's out-of-date and boring.  They should consider branching paths like original Melty Blood and/or a singular narrative like Injustice (chronological) or DOA5 (anachronistic).
--- Every stage in every game has been the same damn thing.  Fight opponent, then fight them again as they use "boss"-type spellcard with a pre-set pattern. Give us something new.

I don't mind the boss spellcard system because it's supposed to be imitating the shooting games. That's kinda the whole point of the spellcard duels and ties the series together. I'd also greatly object to any kind of branching story system because this isn't a visual novel: there's a chronological set of events happening that I want to be able to keep track of. For example HM's plot, which is probably the best plot told within a Touhou game (not the manual), wouldn't have been possible with a branching storyline. I don't see how that would add anything meaningful.

What I wouldn't mind though is cutting out the ability to choose characters at the start. The whole "Futo's storyline" thing ruins it, imo. That just sort of draws things out by forcing everyone to fight nearly everyone else for no reason at all. It ends up being... filler I guess. A fighting game where they were willing to switch the playable character based on the plot and have more of the fights be interesting or relevant might be interesting.

[Fumi]

Ahhh yep music I wish they could redo the miracle of SWR themes. I feel that SWR main theme and Tenshi's themes are really good, compared to HM and Kokoro's.

Kokoro's might sound nice at first but then IMO it's only because ZUN used nice instruments, her theme isn't really good for remixes.

That's enterely personal and related to ZUN as he makes the composing of such themes, but I think themes are more apreciated when you give them a meaning. At first I didn't liked Kokoro's theme but once you realize that such theme describes the entire despair she is irradiating to having lost her hope then it makes it a masterpiece. Just like Tenshi's theme became an avatar for all the tension every character had against her.

Speaking of the music, I was a bit disappointed HM didn't had more "ambient" music, like, if I remember correctly SWR OST had two discs, one of arranges for each character's theme and the other was the ambient music and special battles. I mean, if we can get something like Swift Battle or Demistify Feast that would be great, HM had only a few pieces and it made story mode so repetitive. Oh, and about story mode...

* Do something different with story mode.
-- Ever since IaMP, the formula has essentially been the same in terms of storytelling AND gameplay.
--- Story mode has always been arcade-like.  It's out-of-date and boring.  They should consider branching paths like original Melty Blood and/or a singular narrative like Injustice (chronological) or DOA5 (anachronistic).
--- Every stage in every game has been the same damn thing.  Fight opponent, then fight them again as they use "boss"-type spellcard with a pre-set pattern. Give us something new.

Yes, I agree. Tasofro has been re-using the same arcade mode formula, it's always the same, fight 4 opponents (Which could be Reimu/Marisa), fight a special opponent, fight a character that will appear on everyone's story mode then fight the new character.

What I loved from SWR is the story mode, for example in Aya's story mode the final fight is Reimu while on Remilia's it's Yukari, I'd love to see that not all characters meet up or end up fighting the same characters, differents lenghts are appreciated too because if I recall correctly Remilia and Tenshi had the most fights in their respective story modes. I think that would be nice, because most story modes for characters in HM that were not Koishi or the religious triad get boring and just become fillers.

[Razzi Zadhna]

* Do something different with story mode.
-- Ever since IaMP, the formula has essentially been the same in terms of storytelling AND gameplay.
--- Story mode has always been arcade-like.  It's out-of-date and boring.  They should consider branching paths like original Melty Blood and/or a singular narrative like Injustice (chronological) or DOA5 (anachronistic).
--- Every stage in every game has been the same damn thing.  Fight opponent, then fight them again as they use "boss"-type spellcard with a pre-set pattern. Give us something new.

Since Tasofro's games are kusoges already, and since they snuck by a bunch of random fanservice in to HM, they might as well go full-pandering and make a swimsuit/onsen bonus story after you beat all the main routes. I mean, they already gave Byakuren jiggle and Futo the shortest goddamn skirt in 2hu history

Okay but to get serious I'd like for the story to get more meat. I mean we're probably not gonna have Blazblue-level length here, but I'd like for each pre-battle fight to be more than just:

"Man what the hell be going on"
"Yo the fuck you doing here"
"I dunno lol"
"A'ight I guess we can beat the shit out of each other for no reason"
*FIGHT*
"Well that did absolutely nothing to help me"

For like three fights and THEN it becomes:

"I have accomplished literally nothing from this besides graitutiously assaulting random women"
"'Sup, oh and [INSERT_GRATUITOUS_INFODUMP_HERE]"
"Goddamn woman you expect me to read all that shit"
"Whatever let's just beat the hell out of each other"
*FIGHT*
*ENDING*

Like, I know that's how the shooting 2hu games go (first three stages have nothing to do with the plot, then all of a sudden the dialogue becomes thrice as long while the bosses talk the PC to death), but that doesn't mean they have to follow it...

They don't even need to hire VA's. Surely they can write more substantial dialogue scenes, it's not like they spend dev time actually testing and bugfixing the game as HM's glitch-ridden release shows :V

And since I'm on an ArcSysWorks kick here: I'd love to see some unique pre-battle animations for certain duels like Reimu vs Marisa or Miko vs Byakuren. And, even though this will NEVER happen, versus themes. Where's my kickass Byakuren vs Miko theme dammit  :V