I like to think I'm fairly good, at least. I'm certainly no top-level player, but I've cleared every Extra stage and can 1cc about half of the games on Lunatic.


As for tips...

- The best one I can give is simply to keep playing and enjoy the game. I started playing Touhou (and shmups in general) almost 8 years ago now; there isn't a person alive that doesn't completely suck when they first start playing.

- If you greatly suspect you're about to die, don't be afraid to use a bomb. Your bomb stock will be replenished to 2-4 when you die (depending on character/game), so excess stock is wasted if you don't use them up.

- Learn to 'stream' bullets early, as you'll be doing it a lot in virtually every Touhou game. You can do this by simply moving slowly in one direction when streams of bullets are aimed at you continuously (the beginning of PCB's extra/phantasm stage is a good example of where this is useful, and a good place to practice).

- New players tend to hold focus almost constantly; don't be afraid to unfocus to quickly avoid being trapped.

- Some players advocate intentionally playing on a higher difficulty level than is 'suited to you' in order to get better at the games faster, although I'm unsure how much merit there really is to this. That being said, I moved onto Extra stages after Normal myself, which was a great struggle at the time. I wouldn't jump so far ahead that you're getting completely stomped on Stage 1 or 2, though.

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>>2119
I've been playing Touhou as a whole for about a year. I dl'd Perfect Cherry Blossom on a whim, used to have huge trouble on stage 1 and 2. It was an accomplishment just to make it to stage 3. Now I realize that stage 4 in every Touhou game is invariably the point where difficulty begins to spike exponentially.

I had a period where I could reliably make it to Youmu without losing any lives on Normal. Was running into trouble with her though - I think I was on the way to figuring out getting past her nonspell without bombs/misses. That was months ago and I haven't been able to play because of computer troubles. Now even as far as stage 4 is beyond me, I lost all of my muscle memory.

I'll just keep playing though that seems to be the best bet. Pretty stupid thread, but I was fatigued and mildly frustrated with the lost progress. Thanks for the response, will look into the things I haven't done yet.

Made it to Ran on extra stage today. I got stomped but it felt good. I then deleted the score.dat because I want to reach Extra on my own. Also tried a bit of IN and SA.

I also like other stg, though not as much to be honest. Cave shooters (DoDonPachi Daioujou) are fun, they also have great music. Gradius is dope.

>>2120
I'm with you on CAVE shooters. I enjoy them too, but I find the 'format' of Touhou (especially the lengthy boss fights) to be more enjoyable overall.

>>2121
?? the final boss of guwange with its countless forms takes ages, for example. the inbachi fight also seems to last an aeon.

You couldn't be bothered to scroll down the front page a bit?

>>2006

>>1794
Thank you, I found it! It was 'Radical Dreamers'.

>>1795 here
I hate to ask again, but does anyone know what song plays in this video?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j3IwB3C5gAA

Be of Good Cheer and U. N. Owen Was Her?. ZUN has a bad habit of writing carnival music with unrelated parts (the catchy theme coupled with arpeggio "breaks"). My favourite tunes showcase his ability to include actual themes (as more than snippets of melody to be repeated with different sounds), their variations, and development.

>>1638
I like Remilia's theme a lot. It's based off of a Beethoven composition.

I have too many to choose a specific favorite. ZUN makes extremely unique music, it's so special and interesting. There's this really dark tone to a lot of his songs, it's weird, it's creepy.

Locked Girl is pretty high in my rankings. Patchouli is moe, the second neatest boss fight in EoSD. I like the hi-hats/beat in it as well. It's like the depressed child of a chamber music piece and a rejected techno song. The chorus-like part is really neat, too - It spells out "love" in morse code.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdzFCwTr0ps

Some more that I like:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fY5AkxHw8A
>Chen's theme
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9Lf30NWNos
>PCB stage 3 theme
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=195XntreoMc

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>>1919
Either Junko or Sagume.

Shinmyoumaru was my favorite from DDC.

>>1833
That's how I was, too. I wasn't very interested in shmups before getting into Touhou, but I thought I might enjoy them a lot. I do, what prevented me from being more into them in the past was their difficulty and how much practice is involved.

You don't need to be a pro at shoot 'em up games to beat a Touhou game. You just need tons of patience, time and practice. I think that people like us who sucked at shoot 'em ups but kept playing Touhou over and over for weeks or months trying to beat the games are more devoted fans than people who beat the games with little effort and mocked others for being bad at them. Let alone secondaries who claim to love Touhou but don't play the games because they're too hard. Saging because this thread is rather kuso, you shouldn't be unable to be someone who plays the games and someone who is obsessed with girls and "waifu bullshit", playing the games is what should be making you fall in love with them, considering all the effort you have to put into playing them if you're not experienced with such games.

The Satori boss fight in TH11 is really, really good. You know her spellcards change depending on what character you play? It makes sense cause she reads minds. Satori means "seeing into one's true nature." Thank you for reading namaste.

>>1882
>and mocked others for being bad at them

You left out that part. I've seen so many people say "LOL TOUHOU ISN'T HARD" but they've played shmup games all their lives and don't really like Touhou that much in the first place. But whatever, it doesn't really matter.

>>1833
>To them: You and I are worlds apart. You don't know the characters as I do.

Holy shit, this. I'd like to emphasize this a bit.
I also kind of forced myself to get into Touhou. After hearing about it over and over from a friend I played with on Runescape, and being frustrated by his increasing absence due to the games, I've decided to begrudgingly try it. My first game was Imperishable Night, I think. I was surprised with just how difficult the games were, and the entire genre was completely new to me. The game seemed to be making fun of me for losing and even taunted me for playing on easy mode (which I though was insanely hard at the time). And I was getting my ass kicked by little girls to boot. There was no way I was going to let myself walk away from the game without beating it first. Before I knew it, I finally cleared Normal difficulty and unlocked the extra stage. I decided to challenge myself. "This'll be the last one. I'll beat this on Lunatic difficulty and be done with this game," I told myself, but by then I had a lot more fun than I'd like to have admitted.
Getting to Mokou was insane, and trying to beat her even moreso. She'll always hold a special place in my heart, being my first EX boss, from only beating Normal difficulty just twice, I don't think I'll ever experience that kind of leap of a learning curve and the effort I had to put into pushing through that. She's literally freaking immortal, and super cool to boot. Her theme rocks too.
I know I'm just rambling on now like a nerd, but what I'm trying to say is that what this guy says is entirely true. Now I'm hooked to Touhou and couldn't be happier. I never got to thank my friend for getting me into it, though...

Probably this

>>1680
>I never really found the games to be frustrating, though- it's very difficult, to be certain, but it's exactly because it has such a simple premise (don't get hit) and manages to be both challenging and entertaining that I find it appealing.

Same here. If I did not like it, I would not have practiced it so much. I just think that those who are only playing it for the fandom would find it irredeemably frustrating.

>>1681
I generally pay attention to the entire screen/pattern, unless it's one that requires extremely precise micrododging. I never actually set out to pay more attention to the rest of the screen, I just found that as I played more I got used to where my character was and was able to pay attention to the danmaku on the whole screen better (instead of the just the bullets immediately around my character). It does help greatly in not getting trapped, though.

>>1673
I'm surprised at how many people here are bad at the Touhou games. Every other touhou community I've gone on is filled with scary people who have 1CC'd every game on Lunatic. I just barely managed to 1CC EoSD on Normal, but I realized I had it set to 5 lives for some reason, so I'm going to eventually redo it with the default number of lives.

>>1813
We take it wasy