Bullets and Lasers Hitboxes

[Lino Lyrac]

stupid question.
but the hitboxes of each bullet always maze me! (well.. the pellets one not..)
because sometimes they hit and another not (Bubble bullets and Butterfly Bullets)
even lasers work like that... (Keine's Last Word)
so... anyone has a clue?

[Serela]

The hitboxes are smaller than the image of the bullet generally is. This is also true for your hitbox. For very fancy looking bullets (butterflies, knives), the only part with a hitbox is the glowing ball in the middle. Well, technically, this is true for most bullets- but it's especially true for those.

Bubble bullets after EoSD (So, starting in PCB) have a hitbox -much- smaller than the graphic. It doesn't start until around the colored area towards the middle. In EoSD though, whilst it's still smaller than the image, it's much larger than in later games, so be careful. I think these bullets were mostly phased out in favor of generic big-ball bullets after UFO, though... (so, starting with Ten Desires, and maybe Double Spoiler as well) Kind of a downgrade but oh well.

In IN, lasers are... weird. Sometimes you can literally move through them unscathed, the hitbox doesn't seem to always be active (You will usually be hit though, so uh, don't do it on purpose). Also, keep in mind when the laser is just a thin tracer line, it's not "active" and you can safely go through; it's just a warning there's about to be a laser there.

By the way, here's a collection showing exactly how close you can get to bullets without dying. AFAIK it's pretty much frame-perfect though, one more pixel being death; in real play you should not get -this- close, but it's a good reference. http://thwiki.cc/%E6%B8%B8%E6%88%8F%E6%94%BB%E7%95%A5/STG%E5%88%A4%E5%AE%9A%E6%95%B0%E6%8D%AE The second set of images is from Th13/14/15, where the algorithm changed and some hitboxes got slightly larger.

[Tashi]

It's hard to guess the EXACT hitbox of the bullets when you are actually playing to dodge them (or graze). Of course, practice makes the master, and in a future these kind of things will not be a problem

Me, for example. The bullets with a smaller hitbox than they apparent to have were my demise when I started playing Touhou. Currently I doesn't bother me at all, and I am pleased to them to appear, because I find it easier to avoid them)

[Yatsuzume]

What I tend to do to get used to for example bubble bullets is to try and push myself into the hitbox as much as I think I can, and keep trying to get deeper until I die. Then I kind of know what part of the bullet is a definite "safe zone" (in most games, the white edges of bubble bullets are never bad to hit)

[Shizzo]

There's also a few specific spellcards where the bullets' hitboxes are pretty different from the standard ones.  Kanako's divining crop and Patchouli's earth spells come to mind, but I'm sure there's a handful of others. 

[Serela]

There's also a few specific spellcards where the bullets' hitboxes are pretty different from the standard ones.  Kanako's divining crop and Patchouli's earth spells come to mind, but I'm sure there's a handful of others.

I don't think this is actually true; the main reason with Patchouli's, for example, is that in EoSD the big bubble bullets (aka Emerald Megalith?) that bullet just has a much bigger hitbox period compared to the rest of the series. Gotta be careful on Remi's opener...

edit:Actually, that's a glitch in MoF, just looked it up; in MoF ZUN made a new game engine (because he had a hard drive crash or whatnot and had no backup; this is why the art totally changed style and kinda tanked, dear god Reimu what happened) and when the bullets change graphic in MoF, the hitbox does not change. This only happens in two of Kanako's cards, and only in MoF; and it's not very apparent in Source of Rains so it's almost exclusively Divining Crop or whatnot, yeah.

[Tashi]

I don't think this is actually true; the main reason with Patchouli's, for example, is that in EoSD the big bubble bullets (aka Emerald Megalith?) that bullet just has a much bigger hitbox period compared to the rest of the series. Gotta be careful on Remi's opener...

edit:Actually, that's a glitch in MoF, just looked it up; in MoF ZUN made a new game engine (because he had a hard drive crash or whatnot and had no backup; this is why the art totally changed style and kinda tanked, dear god Reimu what happened) and when the bullets change graphic in MoF, the hitbox does not change. This only happens in two of Kanako's cards, and only in MoF; and it's not very apparent in Source of Rains so it's almost exclusively Divining Crop or whatnot, yeah.

I think the hitbox of the bullets, sometimes, can go crazy. I was fighting Sanae and, when two bullets normal size were so close together that it seemed impossible to avoid them, incredibly managed to pass between them without problems (I must say that my hitbox was literally eaten by those two bullets when they are having a larger hitbox (I think, atleast that's what my personal experience says) and I should have died). Maybe just lucky to make an "impossible dodge"? Maybe, i'm just glad that i did not died.

About the "fake sprite bullets" (Omg so original). Yeah, "God's Rice Porridge" (Normal version of Divining Crop) drives me crazy when such small bullets killed me several times. I just bomb that spellcard because it is likely to have a stupid death... most of the time... Argh. Dammit, Kanako.

[ILikeBulletZ]

Bubble bullets after EoSD (So, starting in PCB) have a hitbox -much- smaller than the graphic. It doesn't start until around the colored area towards the middle. In EoSD though, whilst it's still smaller than the image, it's much larger than in later games, so be careful. I think these bullets were mostly phased out in favor of generic big-ball bullets after UFO, though... (so, starting with Ten Desires, and maybe Double Spoiler as well) Kind of a downgrade but oh well.

You know, I always thought something was missing from the newer games, and I always sort of suspected it was these bullets that were missing and were not nearly as commonly used as it was in the earlier games, in the back in my mind I always suspected this, and your post just confirmed it.

Are the bubble bullets even present on LoLK? I will have to double check... but I think they are nowhere to be seen... damn, I always liked to dodge those.

[TresserT]

There weren't any bubbles in LoLK OR DDC. The last person to use them in a main game was Kyouko, and she was the only one in her game.

They did show up in Impossible Spell Card, though, so they haven't been phased out completely.

It's sad because patterns with those bullets tend to be some of ny favorites.

[Shizzo]

There weren't any bubbles in LoLK OR DDC. The last person to use them in a main game was Kyouko, and she was the only one in her game.

They did show up in Impossible Spell Card, though, so they haven't been phased out completely.

It's sad because patterns with those bullets tend to be some of ny favorites.

Man that's true, they're nowhere to be seen in the last 2 games.  What a shame, just like iLikeBulletZ (what a fitting name!) I also really like dodging bubble bullets. 

[ILikeBulletZ]

There weren't any bubbles in LoLK OR DDC. The last person to use them in a main game was Kyouko, and she was the only one in her game.

They did show up in Impossible Spell Card, though, so they haven't been phased out completely.

It's sad because patterns with those bullets tend to be some of ny favorites.

This might also explain why always found LoLK to be a bit lacking in variety of bullets/danmaku patterns then (In fact, other than Bubbles I cant really recall another classic bullet: Knifes).

When I think about it... Stage 4, 5 and 6 all completely stick to mostly 1 or 2 bullets for their respective bosses... yeah...I cant believe I just noticed the lack of variety despise playing it so much :/

[TresserT]

Yeah, LoLK was extremely monotonous in terms of bullets. It almost entirely stuck to balls, stars, Miko orbs, and rice bullets. You'll notice it uses tons of red blue and purple too, almost exclusively until stage 5.

This, along with the stages being almost entirely aimed, makes it feel a lot like a PC98 game to me.

[Phasm]

Yeah, LoLK was extremely monotonous in terms of bullets. It almost entirely stuck to balls, stars, Miko orbs, and rice bullets. You'll notice it uses tons of red blue and purple too, almost exclusively until stage 5.

This, along with the stages being almost entirely aimed, makes it feel a lot like a PC98 game to me.

It kinda makes sense for the danmaku in LoLK to be a mixture of pc98 and windows danmaku, after all it is the 20th aniversary game. And it also makes sense because of the setting, the Lunarians do not fight like the Gensokyans do they prefer a more pure and simple approach to Danmaku especially Junko.