Some general 13.5 impressions. I already Normal 1cc'd the game while untranslated, and I've done a "story run" in English now. All that's left is 1cc'ing the game on Lunatic (when I get them all done, I can finally say I've technically fully Lunatic 1cc'd a Touhou game
). So far I've got Reimu, Marisa, Miko, Futo, Kokoro, Koishi, Byakuren and Mamizou all down.
I'll have a "Story Impressions" post done alongside the HM-related chapter impressions in FS.
Characters:
-I'm not familiar with Buddhism, but the impression that I'm getting from this game is a terrible, terrible Buddhist.
-Conversely, Futo is way, way more affable than I ever expected. I also did not expect her to try and offer several of the youkai characters Taoism
-I loved that Miko was rather important to the plot in this game. Also her remixed theme is just godly in this game.
-Kokoro is surprisingly pretty powerful with her emotions ability. I also completely forgot about her skirt changing color. At the same time, I can't say I find her to be terribly interesting, especially compared to the other fighting game bosses (since compared to an Oni or a Celestial, she's *just* a youkai)
-I really don't see where the "Byakuren and Miko as Kokoro's parents" angle comes from in fanworks. Neither of those two feel particularly close to Kokoro at all. I guess in 14.5, Kokoro is shown visiting Miko for mask repairs, but I still don't understand how that became a thing.
-The addition of Nitori and the absence of any playable Moriyas are all questionable choices. Like, even to someone like me, whose first new Touhou release after joining was Double Dealing Character, I can see that the roster feels a little incomplete.
Gameplay
-Futo is probably still my favorite character to play as (in 13.5 at least). I just love how much fun she is to use. I don't quite like the changes they made to her in 14.5
-I've tried 14.5 and, while I thought the tighter jumping there was a good change, I'm starting to prefer 13.5's system. I also like being able to customize your special moves and spellcards in 13.5.
-Lunatic difficulty feels ridiculously unbalanced. Some characters are just a complete cakewalk while other characters (mostly any character that has to fight Reimu in their Story route) just have a ridiculously hard time.
-Also I just want to mention that the Lunatic version of that Reimu spellcard (where the two projectiles will go past the screen) is ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. I can't believe that you can't graze those projectiles and that you're still expected to deal with a Lunatic level AI that's blasting projectiles everywhere.
Music
-I still like the soundtrack for this game. As mentioned before, Miko's theme is a massive improvement over the original. But Reimu, Marisa, Nitori and Mamizou all have excellent arrangements too
-The original music is pretty great too. There's a very different feel to the original music compared to the past fighting games that I really enjoy.
-I still dislike Kokoro's theme, but I'm starting to think it's mostly due to the weird instrumentation used in her 13.5 theme.
EDITED: Decided not to double post
