Th10/omake.txt/en

--- ○東方風神録 (Touhou Fuujinroku: Eastern Wind God Chronicles)　～ Mountain of Faith.

Omake afterword

Team Shanghai Alice Leader ZUN 2007/08/17 ---

I've played too much Lunatic, so my hands are tired. I'm ZUN.

Finally, I've released the 10th Touhou work. I'm always doing pretty much the same stuff, but since Embodiment of Scarlet Devil was released, I get the gut feeling that the the game industry itself has changed an awful lot. The evolution of hardware has slowed down a bit, but at the same time software has reached something of an impasse. The users don't want just more of the same, and as a result, games have no choice but to evolve. Even the fact that the industry needs to attract users outside of the usual group that's considered gamers is in part due to this impasse. This need to bring games to a new audience has helped reinitialize games whose evolution has ceased. Nintendo has had some success by introducing new controls such as touch screens and remotes, and redefining the terms of victory at a game into things such as improving your English skills.

Yet, at the same time, there are things that the game industry has had no choice but to sacrifice. Shooting games that have become too difficult, fighting and action games that have become too complex ... games like this, intended for hardcore gamers, are used as bad examples for the modern game industry, and their representative old-time titles are practically treated as "the 'evil' of the new age of games". I wonder if the day will come when those old-time games are revived as something totally different before our eyes. It'd have to be in some way that today's new users could enjoy them...

In any case, I don't think that the games of yesterday have become boring. It's okay if they're difficult, and it's okay if they're complicated. It would be a lonely future if gamers who reveled in the old principles could only play the same games over and over. So, I want to see that sort of game continue to evolve, even if it's the "evil" of the new age of gaming.

Fortunately, shmups are definitely alive and well. Developing one is a fairly small scale venture, so you can do it alone. They're relatively short to play, and the basic rules are fairly simple, which has probably contributed to their success. Doujin games are also becoming a fairly major genre. Games following the old school that would be too hard to release to the consumer market are still around in the doujin scene. And now that hardware (PCs) have caught up with what's released for the consumer electronics market and the software has taken advantage of its strength, doujin games are more or less where they should be. Isn't that practically ideal?

To tell you the truth, about the time Embodiment of Scarlet Devil was released, I thought "shmups are a dying breed." When they finally disappeared, bullet hell would be retired to Gensokyo as well, so bullet hell battles would be the main thing in Gensokyo. But, I thought, if shooting games would be left in the past when we entered the new age of gaming, then I'd like to leave behind a few titles myself.. "A model 20th century shooting game to extend the craze into the 21st century" was something of a catch phrase for Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. And in the end, it's kept extending, and we've made it this far... Now that it's 2007, my brain is still stuck on the 20th century (somehow).

Some of my plans have fallen by the way side, but shooting games still continue to bemade, and even better, the doujin community has released games that have evolved in ways that aren't seen anywhere else. This is the extreme of happiness, to me. People like me who love the "'evil' of the new age of gaming" should pay attention to the doujin scene. How strange and wonderful to continue to enjoy this unchanging newness.

Well, now, I've made shrines the theme for the first time in this tenth game. Maybe I should have done that from the beginning, since this is a series of shrine maiden games. Thanks to this theme, it has a very Japanese feel to it. The songs are particularly nostalgic, and it was very enjoyable and nostalgic to make this. What do you think of it?

There might be parts that are hard to follow. If so, it's probably because it's full of references to the local gods around my home ... Since I wanted it to have a Japanese, nostalgic feel to it, I filled it with material that makes me feel nostalgic. In short, the story for this game is, "A pair of local gods who've fallen on hard times in the outside world discover a rich and wonderful second life in Gensokyo". How simple!

I did a lot of research to find out as much as I could about the gods that make their appearance in this game. It was by no means an excuse to do things like relax in a hot spring, drink some sake, then get back in the hot spring. The research was a lot of fun. Especially the hot springs and the sake.

Ah, hot springs. Ah, yes, once I've got the master copy, I should go to a hot spring. (Some sort of flag gets triggered then.)

ZUN (Twentieth Century Kannushi)