Prequel to the series?

[Lt Colonel Summers]

Some of you may have noticed me asking this question in the What If topic...

What if the next Touhou game turns out to be a prequel to the entire series, taking place before even the PC-98 games?

In this topic, I'm going to be asking the question for real:

If Zun does decide to make a prequel, how do you think it will be like?
If a prequel is made, I would like to see it explaining:
1. The origins of Gensokyo in full details.
2. Yukari origin story.
3. Where is Layla Prismriver and Youki Konpaku?
4. Why Mima's very first appearance depict her with a bloodied knife and baggy eyes? Did she perhaps murder someone or kill herself, and came back as a ghost regretting what she did back then?
5. Full detail of Kaguya's backstory.
6. Ditto with Sakuya.

[Kulgia]

So Touhou PC-98 (X.5)??

I always thought PC-98 games took place right after the Hakurei barrier was erected and the Reimu at that time is the present Reimu's grandmother or predecessor.

[PK]

If based on what we alredy know:
-Yukari in her quest to popularize the future Hakurei barrier. Or the opposite: i'd really love to see this seen from the other youkai POV, something with the youkai who didn't want the barrier, that manage to defeat the filthy humans but ultimately fail because of Yukari.
-Ran's story
-the invasion of the Moon
-Kaguya and Mokou 1200+ yers ago
-something about the Scarlet sisters 300-400 years ago.
-Sakuya's story.

Otherwise, either some huge-scale incident many levels of magnitude more dangerous than now, or small incidents of Rumia and the like eating humans here an there.

[Tengukami]

You know what? I don't want a prequel. Not just because prequels are usually awful, with a few exceptions, either. Nor also because a prequel might just snowball more and more questions until there's no mystery left. But also, I actually like the fact that we don't know everything; that we are left to imagine, speculate and dream. I find this really inspiring.

I might be alone in this, but I don't want all of Gensokyo spelled out for me. I like the presence of the unknown, in life as in Touhou.

[NuclearFalcon]

Depending on interpretations, I think Yukari's origin story might actually be in a SEQUEL and not a prequel.  Time travel, lol.  Mmm...  Relativistic Psychology, that is an interesting sounding major.

[haoreos2]

I actually like the fact that we don't know everything; that we are left to imagine, speculate and dream. I find this really inspiring.

I might be alone in this, but I don't want all of Gensokyo spelled out for me. I like the presence of the unknown, in life as in Touhou.

Pretty much this- and at the very least, it allows people to be pretty creative with fanworks without outright contradicting canon.

...Tbh I'd just like a lot more well written fan-made character backstories. Ran, Sakuya, Yukari; heck, the Hakurei line itself could make for an interesting story if you try to justify what makes their line so special (Youkai secretly matchmaking from the shadows to produce successively stronger offspring? Hakurei Mikos power the Yin-Yang orbs after death instead of reincarnating? Maybe they aren't actually that special, and it just takes a lot of effort to set up a new one if the old one dies heirless?). Without any concrete canon to go off of, you can make all kinds of fun stories or comics or animations.

[Aya Reiko]

Considering Reimu is the one who established the spell card rules, I'd have to figure any prequel to the series would resemble something like Mortal Kombat.

Now that I think of it, very few of the "modern canon" characters could appear in a prequel.  Particularly those from Stage 4 or higher.

[NuclearFalcon]

Well pre-PC-98 characters were shown still alive after battles, some even becoming playable in subsequent games, most notably Mima, Marisa, and Yuuka.