History for Videogame/Touhou

~~[[redirect:Franchise/{{Touhou}}]]~~[[quoteright:330:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/touhoupageimage_1849.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:330:A few of the more important characters[[note]]Clockwise from top right: Reimu, Miko, Sanae, Youmu, Remilia, Byakuren. Center: Marisa. Not pictured: [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters At least a hundred characters]][[/note]]]]

->''Girls do their best now and are preparing. Please watch warmly until it is ready.''
--> --LoadingScreen

''Touhou Project'' ("Touhou", 東方, meaning ''Eastern'' or ''Oriental'', [[NoPronunciationGuide pronounced]] "Toh Hoh") is a series of {{doujin}} scrolling shooter games in the BulletHell and CuteEmUp genres, developed by Team Shanghai Alice. It is most famous for its [[NintendoHard high difficulty level]] involving [[BeamSpam intricate bullet patterns]], and that instead of having spaceships and warfare vehicles, it has girls in frilly dresses: nearly every character is a LittleMissBadass, CuteMonsterGirl, or CuteWitch, and wears some degree of {{UsefulNotes/Lolita|Fashion}} clothing. Much of its popularity comes from its huge body of FanWorks, with tremendous numbers of not only amateur comics, but also fangames and arrangements/remixes of the games' music - in fact for many years, it has had the single largest fan-{{Doujin}} output of ''any'' franchise by a large margin. Indeed, while the series includes a large number of official [[TheVerse manga, sidestories]], and {{Universe Compendi|um}}a, its odd writing style means that many aspects of the setting are left vague - most characters [[AlternativeCharacterInterpretation can be interpreted in multiple ways]] or are [[OCStandIn given only a framework personality]] to begin with, [[UnreliableExpositor exposition generally comes from sources that have reason to be biased or distort the truth]], and even the artstyle of the games makes it hard to tell the body type of the character being depicted. All of this serves to make the series a goldmine of {{Fanon}} and FanficFuel.

Like ''VideoGame/CaveStory'', it's also outstanding in that the entirety of the games, including the sprite graphics, 3D graphics, character portraits, dialogue, story, music composition, programming, bullet-patterns, and concept is all done by one guy, known as [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/ZUN "ZUN."]][[note]]His real name is Jun'ya Ota. Some fans call him ''Kannushi'' (Head Priest)[[/note]]

The basic plot of each of the games is that the isolated land of Gensokyo, a FantasticNatureReserve hidden in the mountains of Japan and separated from reality by a magical barrier, faces some sort of "incident", which local {{Miko}} Reimu and her best friend CuteWitch Marisa feel compelled to resolve for their own reasons,[[note]]reluctant duty and greed, respectively[[/note]] sometimes joined by bosses from previous games. What qualifies as an "incident" can range from globally life threatening like the endless winter of ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' to harmless curiosities like the flying boat of ''Undefined Fantastic Object''. After beating up some random bystanders in the early stages, they eventually discover the person behind the disturbance and beat them up, along with some of their friends and/or {{Battle Butler}}s. Afterward, they make peace with the villains (often figuratively and literally "drinking tea" with them), and get sent on a tangentially related quest to beat up someone else related to the villain, but not to the incident, in a BonusDungeon.

Gameplay-wise, the main series games are vertical scrolling shooters divided into 6 stages with a bonus Extra stage accessible from the menu, [[BonusDungeon unlocked after beating the main game without continues]]. The games [[BossGame focus more on the bosses than the stages]], with each stage boss of each game being a colorful character given their own {{Leitmotif}} and trademark bullet patterns, known as "spell cards". The spell cards and the boss themes are also given fanciful names that hint at the character's backstory and personality. This steady accumulation of bosses is the source of the series' infamous LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters, while the spell cards and {{Leitmotif}}s keep them distinct enough to be memorable to the fans.

Besides this there are a number of {{Gaiden Game}}s[[note]]indicated with decimal numbering, e.g Touhou 10.5[[/note]] including both shooters which don't fit the pattern above, and {{Mascot Fighter}}s developed in collaboration with the doujin circle Creator/TwilightFrontier. Aside from generally being more dialogue-heavy than the main games, the fighting games are also known for their [[GenreBusting unconventional gameplay]] which adds in elements of BulletHell, as well as strange mechanics which vary from game-to-game including [[FightLikeACardPlayer Spell Card decks]], unlimited {{Flight}}, weather effects and popularity meters.

Non-game installments of TheVerse tend to follow a SliceOfLife or MysteryOfTheWeek format, either showing another side to the "incidents" of the games, or focusing on strange events too minor to count as an incident by themselves. While they remain light in tone, these media make it more obvious that Gensokyo's long years of isolation, as well as being a place where the fantastic is commonplace and TheFairFolk outnumber humans, have given it an unusual culture that's prone to DeliberateValuesDissonance. The accompanying stories of ''Music/ZUNsMusicCollection'' are notable for not being set in Gensokyo at all, but Kyoto in the near future.

See also the [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Touhou_Wiki extensive wiki]] about the game series.

The official games in chronological order: [[note]]Almost always, the games are referred to by the Japanese-speaking fans only by the Japanese part of the title, and by the English-speaking fans only by the English part of the title. Some fans also do this for [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters the songs that have both Japanese and English titles]], but we'll save that for [[{{AwesomeMusic/Touhou}} the Awesome Music pages]].[[/note]]

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:The Games]]
'''UsefulNotes/PC98 era:'''\\
[-Most characters and stories from this era have been retconned or otherwise ignored by the series' canon. Four characters from these games were re-introduced in the Windows era[[note]]Protagonists Reimu and Marisa, along with Yuuka from ''Lotus Land Story'' and Alice from ''Mystic Square''[[/note]], but with significant changes from their past appearances.-]
[[index]]
* TH 01 ''VideoGame/TouhouReiidenHighlyResponsiveToPrayers'' (1997) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Strange Spirit Legend ~ Highly Responsive to Prayers''[[/labelnote]] [[note]] Was made 95 but wasn't released to the public until 97.[[/note]]
* TH 02 ''VideoGame/TouhouFuumarokuTheStoryOfEasternWonderland'' (1997) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Sealed Demon Chronicle ~ the Story of Eastern Wonderland''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 03 ''VideoGame/TouhouYumejikuuPhantasmagoriaOfDimDream'' (1997) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Dream Dimension ~ Phantasmagoria of Dim. Dream''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 04 ''VideoGame/TouhouGensokyoLotusLandStory'' (1998) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Fantasy Land ~ Lotus Land Story''[[/labelnote]] [[note]] "Gensokyo" here is merely a descriptive term; it did not become the actual name of the setting until the Windows era.[[/note]]
* TH 05 ''VideoGame/TouhouKaikidanMysticSquare'' (1998) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Wondrous Romance ~ Mystic Square''[[/labelnote]]

'''Windows era:'''\\
[-Even though the numbering system continues from the PC-98 era, [[ContinuityReboot the sixth game is considered the beginning of the series' main canon]].-]
* TH 06 ''VideoGame/TouhouKoumakyouTheEmbodimentOfScarletDevil'' (2002) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Scarlet Devil Land ~ the Embodiment of Scarlet Devil''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 07 ''VideoGame/TouhouYouyoumuPerfectCherryBlossom'' (2003) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Bewitching Dream ~ Perfect Cherry Blossom''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 07.5 ''VideoGame/TouhouSuimusouImmaterialAndMissingPower'' (2004) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Gathering Reverie ~ Immaterial and Missing Power''[[/labelnote]][[note]]Actually released after ''Imperishable Night'', but listed as "07.5" since this game's plot happens before ''IN''.[[/note]]
* TH 08 ''VideoGame/TouhouEiyashouImperishableNight'' (2004) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Eternal Night Vignette ~ Imperishable Night''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 09 ''VideoGame/TouhouKaeidzukaPhantasmagoriaOfFlowerView'' (2005) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Flower Viewing Mound ~ Phantasmagoria of Flower View''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 09.5 ''VideoGame/TouhouBunkachouShootTheBullet'' (2005) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Cultural Album ~ Shoot the Bullet''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 10 ''VideoGame/TouhouFuujinrokuMountainOfFaith'' (2007) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Wind God Chronicle ~ Mountain of Faith''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 10.5 ''VideoGame/TouhouHisoutenScarletWeatherRhapsody'' (2008) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Skies of Scarlet Perceptions ~ Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 11 ''VideoGame/TouhouChireidenSubterraneanAnimism'' (2008) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Palace of Earth Spirits ~ Subterranean Animism''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 12 ''VideoGame/TouhouSeirensenUndefinedFantasticObject'' (2009) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Star-Lotus Ship ~ Undefined Fantastic Object''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 12.3 ''VideoGame/TouhouHisoutensokuChoudokyuuGinyoruNoNazoOOe'' (2009) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Unperceiving of Natural Law ~ Chase the Enigma of the Gargantuan Guignol''[[/labelnote]] [[note]] Originally referred to as ''Unthinkable Natural Law'' by English-speaking fans, it was soon superseded by simply ''Hisoutensoku'' (or ''Soku'' for short). There are still people who refer to it as ''Unthinkable Natural Law''.[[/note]]
* TH 12.5 ''VideoGame/DoubleSpoilerTouhouBunkachou'' (2010) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Double Spoiler ~ Touhou Cultural Album''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 12.8 ''VideoGame/YouseiDaisensouTouhouSangetsusei'' (2010) [[labelnote:Translation]]''[[Film/TheGreatYokaiWar The Great Fairy War]] ~ Touhou Three Fairies''[[/labelnote]] [[note]]Referred to by English-speaking fans as ''Great Fairy Wars'' or simply ''Fairy Wars''.[[/note]]
* TH 13 ''VideoGame/TouhouShinreibyouTenDesires'' (2011) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Divine Spirit Mausoleum ~ Ten Desires''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 13.5 ''VideoGame/TouhouShinkirouHopelessMasquerade'' (2013) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Tower of Beautiful Mind ~ Hopeless Masquerade''[[/labelnote]] [[note]] While written with different kanji, the Japanese title [[PunBasedTitle is pronounced the same way]] as the Japanese word for 'mirage'.[[/note]]
* TH 14 ''VideoGame/TouhouKishinjouDoubleDealingCharacter'' (2013) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Bright Needle Fortress ~ Double Dealing Character''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 14.3 ''VideoGame/DanmakuAmanojakuImpossibleSpellCard'' (2014) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Danmaku Amanojaku ~ Impossible Spell Card''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 14.5 ''VideoGame/TouhouShinpirokuUrbanLegendInLimbo'' (2015) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Record of Deep Mysteries ~ Urban Legend in Limbo''[[/labelnote]] [[note]]A [=PS4=] UpdatedRerelease was released in 2016, co-developed by Edelweiss (of ''VideoGame/EtherVapor'' and ''VideoGame/{{Astebreed}}'' fame). It includes some additional features, new music, and a new character in the form of Reisen Udongein Inaba (whose route gives an early glimpse of the "Perfect Possession Incident" that would feature in ''[=AoCF=]'').[[/note]]
* TH 15 ''VideoGame/TouhouKanjudenLegacyOfLunaticKingdom'' (2015) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Tale of the Ultramarine Orb ~ Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom''[[/labelnote]]
* TH 15.5 ''VideoGame/TouhouHyouibanaAntinomyOfCommonFlowers'' (2017) [[labelnote:Translation]] ''Touhou Flower Possession ~ Antinomy of Common Flowers'' [[/labelnote]] [[note]]Actually released after ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'', but listed as "15.5" since this game's plot happens before ''[=HSiFS=]''.[[/note]]
* TH 16 ''VideoGame/TouhouTenkuushouHiddenStarInFourSeasons'' (2017) [[labelnote:Translation]] ''Touhou Jade Scepter of the Skies ~ Hidden Star in Four Seasons'' [[/labelnote]]
* TH 16.5 ''VideoGame/HifuuNightmareDiaryVioletDetector'' (2018) [[labelnote:Translation]] ''Secret Sealing Nightmare Diary ~ Violet Detector'' [[/labelnote]]
* TH 17 ''VideoGame/TouhouKikeijuuWilyBeastAndWeakestCreature'' (2019) [[labelnote:Translation]] ''Touhou Oni Form Beasts ~ Wily Beast and Weakest Creature'' [[/labelnote]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Side Materials]]
'''Stories:'''
* ''Music/TouhouZUNsMusicCollection'' (2002 - Ongoing) -- A set of albums containing Touhou remixes and new music by ZUN, with accompanying stories. The first one is quite odd and likely not canon anymore. The rest follow the Sealing Club, a pair of female college students in future Kyoto.
* ''Literature/TouhouKourindouCuriositiesOfLotusAsia'' (2004 - 2007, 2015 - Ongoing) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Hall of Perfumed Rain ~ Curiosities of Lotus Asia''[[/labelnote]] -- A series of SliceOfLife short stories written by ZUN from the perspective of Rinnosuke, a NonActionGuy shopkeeper.
* ''Manga/TouhouSangetsusei'' (2005 - 2012, 2016 - Ongoing) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Three Fairies'', but homophonous with ''[[EpunymousTitle Touhou Sun Moon Star]]''[[/labelnote]] -- A SliceOfLife manga focusing on the various misadventures of the three fairies of light as well as, usually, Reimu and Marisa. Has been published under four different subtitles over the course of its run:
** ''Eastern and Little Nature Deity''
** ''Strange and Bright Nature Deity''
** ''Oriental Sacred Place''
** ''Visionary Fairies in Shrine''
* ''A Flower Blooming Fragrant Violet Every Sixty Years'' (2005) is a short story contained in the otherwise non-canon fanbook ''Seasonal Dream Vision''. From Yukari's perspective, it explains a bit more of just what the hell was going on in ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View''.
* ''Manga/TouhouBougetsushou'' (2007 - 2012) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Ephemeral Moon Vignette''[[/labelnote]] -- A group of stories concerning Remilia invading the moon. Can be considered a sequel of sorts to ''Imperishable Night''. Consists of:
** ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' -- The main story.
** ''Cage in Lunatic Runagate'' -- Mostly character-focused side stories. Also contains most of the backstory and '''the ending'''.
** ''Inaba of the Moon and Inaba of the Earth'' -- A gag comedy set around the same time, starring the Eientei crew. Unlike the other manga, where ZUN is credited with the scenario, here he's credited with characters and setting, putting it on a lower tier of canon than everything else.
* ''Manga/TouhouIbarakasenWildAndHornedHermit'' (2010 - 2019) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Thorned Poet Hermit ~ Wild and Horned Hermit''[[/labelnote]] -- A manga focusing on the hermit Kasen Ibaraki, and her interactions with Reimu and Marisa.
* ''Manga/TouhouSuzunaanForbiddenScrollery'' (2012 - 2017) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Suzuna's Hut ~ Forbidden Scrollery''[[/labelnote]] -- A manga focusing on Kosuzu Motoori, a girl who works at her family's book rental shop in the human village.
[[/index]]

'''Artbooks:'''
* ''Touhou Bunkachou ~ Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red'' (2005) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Cultural Album ~ Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red''[[/labelnote]] -- A book presenting articles from Aya's newspaper. Most are focused on individual characters from ''[=EoSD=]'' through ''IN'' with accompanying interviews, but there are also editorials on major locations and Aya's perspective of what happened in the games. The book also included some music commentary from ZUN, an interview, a one-shot official manga, and several fan-made doujinshi.
* ''Touhou Gumon Shiki ~ Perfect Memento in Strict Sense'' (2006) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Histories by Hieda ~ Perfect Memento in Strict Sense''[[/labelnote]] -- Part of the [[UniverseCompendium Gensokyo Chronicles]], as written by the ninth child of Miare, Hieda no Akyuu. Like ''[=BAiJR=]'', many of the articles are focused on characters up through ''[=PoFV=]'', but there's also some general setting background information and expands on powers and relationships. It too has an associated one-shot manga, but less other goodies.
* ''The Grimoire of Marisa'' (2009) -- Marisa's [[DeadpanSnarker comments]] on characters' spell cards, covering the games from ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' through ''Subterranean Animism''. ZUN compares it to an in-universe LetsPlay.
* ''Touhou Gumon Kujo ~ Symposium of Post-Mysticism'' (2012) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Oral Talks by Hieda ~ Symposium of Post-Mysticism''[[/labelnote]] -- A sequel of sorts to ''Perfect Memento in Strict Sense'', covering most of the characters introduced since. In lieu of the non-character encyclopedia entries it has a number of newspaper articles and a transcript of the titular symposium between Byakuren, Kanako, Miko [[MyFriendsAndZoidberg and Marisa]].
* ''Touhou Bunka Shinpo ~ Alternative Facts in Eastern Utopia'' (2017) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Essentials ~ Alternative Facts in Eastern Utopia''[[/labelnote]] -- A sequel to ''Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red'' and ''Symposium of Post-Mysticism'', with Aya trying her hand at a gossip magazine focusing on the daily lives of characters who [[LowerDeckEpisode don't show up as often]].
* ''The Grimoire of Usami ~ Hifuu Kurabu Ikai Satsuei Kiroku'' (2019) [[labelnote:Translation]]''The Grimoire of Usami ~ The Secret Sealing Club's Otherworld Photography Record''[[/labelnote]] -- A sequel of sorts to ''The Grimoire of Marisa'', covering the danmaku games from ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' through ''Violet Detector''. Has a manga FramingStory where Reimu decides to hold a fireworks festival, with danmaku in place of fireworks, and various characters turn up to offer their opinions on the spell cards.

'''Magazines'''
* ''Touhou Gairai Ihen ~ Strange Creators of Outer World'' (2015 - Ongoing) [[labelnote:Translation]]''Touhou Tomes of External Origins ~ Strange Creators of Outer World''[[/labelnote]] -- Contains newcomer-friendly guides to the Touhou cast and setting, as well as a continuation of ''Curiosities of Lotus Asia'' (see above). Also has features dedicated to Touhou doujins, including interviews with famous circles and samples of their works.
[[/folder]]

[[hardline]]

See FanWorks.{{Touhou}} for derivative VideoGames, {{Fanime}}, and {{Web Comics}}. See ''VideoGame/{{Seihou}}'' for the sister series, and ''VideoGame/LenEn'' for the non-fan work game series heavily inspired by both ''Touhou'' and ''Seihou''.

Not to be confused with Creator/{{Toho}}, a movie production company mainly responsible for the {{toku}}satsu genre.[[note]]It's pronounced the same, but written with different kanji. Touhou: 東方, Toho: 東宝[[/note]] Also not to be confused with [[Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure the Higashikata families]], for those fluent enough in Kanji.
----
!!''Touhou'' provides examples of:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Tropes in the games' gameplay]]
* AirJousting: Marisa's broom charge attacks in ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''.
* AllMonksKnowKungFu: Not only do the Buddhist monk characters in ''Hopeless Masquerade'' specialize in martial arts, ''Buddhism itself'' is associated with melee attacks as a game mechanic.
* AmazingTechnicolorBattlefield: From ''Lotus Land Story'' onward, bosses will change the background.
* AmbidextrousSprite: In the fighting games, characters' sprites are mirrored for movement, resulting in oddities such as Utsuho's arm cannon and asymmetrical legs switching places if she moves left.
* AntiFrustrationFeatures: Using a continue drops several pickups that instantly fill the power meter, so players won't be starting from zero power in the middle of a boss.
* ArbitraryMinimumRange: Some spellcards have bullets generated around the boss, but the bullets don't have the hitspot immediately. Because of this, a player can get very close to the boss before the bullets are fired, and hence without taking any damage. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZXM5L75h38 This video provides examples, like 1:02, 8:46 and 9:52]].
* ArtificialStupidity: The fighting games. Highlights include not particularly understanding if the character is melee or range oriented, using moves that can't possibly hit, virtually never using cards,[[note]]Arcade mode only. Story mode AI doesn't have cards to use.[[/note]] and difficulty selection in arcade mode doing nothing. This was bad enough for people to start work on [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcBtCUEV-K0 an AI hack]] but the project seems to have died since.
* AwesomeButImpractical: Pretty much all of the experimental shot types (ie, not spread, homing, forward concentration, or piercing) fall under one or DifficultButAwesome, depending on who you ask.
** Marisa's Master Spark bomb in ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' on definitely falls under Awesome But Impractical, at least during stages. The massive speed penalty it saddles her with makes it nearly impossible to collect anything.
** Death bombing introduced in the fifth game on. When your character gets hit, you have a fraction of a second to press the bomb button to save yourself. The timing varies with each game, but is rarely enough for the average player to do so as a reaction. You basically need to predict your own death in order to use it.
** Last Words in ''Hopeless Masquerade''; super-powerful spellcards that can only be used at max popularity, but drop your popularity to zero when used. The problem is that timeout victories are decided by popularity, making this a major risk, and gaining that much popularity likely requires you to be fairly decisively winning in the first place, making it an unnecessary risk.
* AWinnerIsYou:
-->''([[NintendoHard after completing everything in Double Spoiler]])'' You are Super Player!
* BalancePowerSkillGimmick: The four playable teams in ''Imperishable Night'' somewhat counts:
** The Boundary Team has the best coverage with homing attacks, but (theoretically) the worst damage.
** The hard-hitting Magic Team has [[CuteWitch Marisa]], who has stronger, but less spread-out shots, as the human, while [[MarionetteMaster Alice]], the Youkai, shoots a strong laser that can hit multiple enemies. They also have the GoodBadBugs, nicknamed by fans as [[PortmanteauCoupleName MAlice Cannon]], which allows them to basically attack together at the same time for heavy damage.
** The Scarlet Team is fairly balanced with a weak spread unfocused and decent concentrated damage focused (and a bit of a gimmick with locked options while focused).
** Then there's the gimmicky Ghost Team, which reverses the usual setup, but making the attacks stronger than other teams. It's the [[HalfHumanHybrid half-human Youmu]] who has the focused shots, while the Youkai side [[CuteGhostGirl Yuyuko]] is the one with spread-out shots. They're also the only team whose Youkai meter maxes at 50% Human.
** ''Ten Desires'' works similarly: Reimu is nominally balanced with weak homing shots unfocused and strong needles focused, Marisa hits everything in front of her hard, Sanae is a pure spread type, and Youmu is ''even weirder'' here. Youmu's unfocused options are ghosts that trail behind her, while her focused "shot" is a ''charge attack'' that will release a series of huge sword slashes.
** Back again in ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'': Reimu is balanced with more or less the same shot type as above, Marisa is pure power, Sanae has the best coverage in the game, and Reisen is weird with low damage but a bomb that lets her spend most of the game invincible.
* TheBattleDidntCount: Justified in that all the fights are technically exhibition matches, but... in ''Fairy Wars'', the BonusBoss fight against Marisa. ''Cirno'' is the one that starts looking beaten up and begging for a break as she whittles down Marisa's health, although Marisa does express surprise at how much effort she needs to go to against a "mere fairy."
* BattleIntro: ''Hopeless Masquerade'' is the first of the fighting games to feature this.
* BeamSpam: Every single character, with Shou being the worst offender.
* BeyondTheImpossible: In ''Impossible Spell Card'', Seija is being hunted by humans and youkai who are "cheating" by using spell cards that are considered impossible to dodge. In normal gameplay, you counter this with magic items that also let you "cheat", however, to get the highest rating, you have to forsake the artifacts and dodge the "un-dodgeable" spells on your own.
* BonusBoss: Every game except ''Highly Responsive to Prayers'', the versus shooters and the fighters has at least one extra boss. ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' also has the phantasm boss, a BonusBoss ''to'' the BonusBoss. In the phantasm stage, the extra boss reappears as a ''MidBoss''.
* BonusDungeon: Where the extra boss hangs out.
* BossBanter: Usually restricted to before and after fights, but the final boss in ''Ten Desires'' is eventually accompanied by her flunkies, who start taunting the player while the fight is still going on.
* BossRush: The entirety of ''Shoot the Bullet'', ''Double Spoiler'', ''Impossible Spell Card'', and ''Violet Detector'' is this.
* BossSubtitles: Everybody gets these, even most characters from the side materials, and they're known to change as well. Head over to [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Character_Titles the Touhou Wiki]] for the full list. The notable exception is Junko, who despite being a FinalBoss has no official title; her in-game profile simply says "(Nameless Being)" where her title would be, likely because she's purified herself of all identifying information.
* BossWarningSiren: In ''Subterranean Animism'', Utsuho Reiuji, the [[ILoveNuclearPower nuclear-powered]] [[CreepyCrows Hell raven girl]] (and final boss) of the game, has the distinction of prefixing each of her spell cards with klaxons while the text "'''CAUTION!!'''" flares on-screen.
* BreakingOut: ''Highly Responsive To Prayers'' has many elements of this.
* BrutalBonusLevel: Extra Stages. And the (so far) only Phantasm stage in ''Perfect Cherry Blossom''.
* BulletHell: The ''Touhou'' games are a well known example of the genre, quite possibly even more so than Creator/{{Cave}}'s shooters, at least outside of Japan. Mind you, Cave shooters are commercial, while ''Touhou'' is {{doujin}}.
* CallingYourAttacks: Any spell card declaration results in the name of the card showing up at the top/bottom of the screen. Also, in the fighting game ''Immaterial and Missing Power'', you choose one specific spell card out of three for each of your life bars, and you cannot actually use them until you input a command to declare them.
* CentralTheme: Boundaries, both physical and metaphysical, as well as [[SchrodingersButterfly paradoxical dreams]].
* CherryTapping: ''Hopeless Masquerade'' includes special animations if someone lost due to this.
* ChromosomeCasting: Most entries in the franchise feature exclusively female characters.
* CleverCrows: Aya Shameimaru is a Crow Tengu {{Paparazzi}} who publishes a rumor mill tabloid; if not an outright trickster, she's at least clever and annoying. There's also Utsuho Reiuji, a [[ILoveNuclearPower nuclear-powered]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-legged_bird hell raven]] who's a bit more... [[TheDitz straightforward]]. Fan interpretation is split on whether Utsuho is just an idiot, or if [[GeniusDitz all of her brainpower is focused on nuclear physics]].
* ClothingDamage: If there is a dialogue after a boss fight, the loser often has her clothing damaged. Downplayed, since the damage includes dusty hair, torn sleeves and ribbons, and everything else perfectly fine.
** One interesting case is the dialogue after you beat [[BonusBoss Marisa]] in ''Fairy Wars'', where it's ''Cirno'' who has her clothing damaged instead of Marisa.
** Similarly, [[OurVampiresAreDifferent Remilia]] will also look beaten up after defeating [[ThePowerOfTheSun Utsuho]] in ''Hisoutensoku''.
* CodeOfHonour: The Spell Card Rules, which are based around allowing humans and youkai to fight without destroying Gensokyo.
* ContractualBossImmunity: [[BonusBoss Ex-Bosses]] will not receive any damage from bombs during their own spellcards and any given FinalBoss will probably also have the same immunity during their last spellcard.
* ColourCodedForYourConvenience:
** Red items give power, while blue items give points. After ''Mountain of Faith'', green items (small green circles in ''DDC'') increase the value of Point Items.
** In ''Ten Desires'', Blue Spirits increase the Point Item value, Purple Spirits are Life Pieces, and Green Spirits are Bomb Pieces.
** Similarly, Red [=UFOs=] in ''UFO'' give Life Shards, Green [=UFOs=] give bombs, and Blue [=UFOs=] give points, although Flashing [=UFOs=] invert the item type.
* ComputersAreFast: Not present in the normal Shoot Em Up games, but have fun beating [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2x8cs2V2-Bg Lunatic AI]] in the two-player games.
* CosmeticAward: Clearing a scene with a high enough score in ''Shoot the Bullet'' or ''Double Spoiler'' unlocks commentary from Aya or Hatate. Score has no other purpose.
* ContrivedCoincidence: "[[ALittleSomethingWeCallRockAndRoll Punk Rock]] [[MemeticMutation in my Touhou]]" sounds [[MindScrew completely strange]] out of context, but it actually predicted the ''next two games''. The name of the band, "Chojuu Gigaku", comes from "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigaku gigaku]]", one of the oldest forms of masked plays in Japan, also known for its heavy use of taiko drums, and "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choujuu_giga choujuu giga]]", a set of scrolling images primarily known as being ''farces'' of their time period. Come Kokoro (whose Noh plays were influenced by gigaku) being influenced by Mamizou (who has a Spell Card in said game of the ''exact same'' images from choujuu giga) and Raiko (who is a Tsukumogami of a taiko drum set) and you have early Japanese dance history in a few games.
* CostumeExaggeration: Reimu originally wore a realistic {{Miko}} outfit; however, after the ContinuityReboot she switched to a more stylised and less practical version, complete with detached sleeves. Sanae also wears a similar outfit.
* CrissCrossAttack:
** In ''Hopeless Masquerade'', [[KungFuWizard Byakuren Hijiri]]'s ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d36LriyVz0M&t=3m28s Heaven Sign "Master of the Great Trichiliocosm"]]'' has her throw a vajra-blade at an opponent to immobilize them, then unleash a blindingly-fast series of attacks before finishing them off with a DivingKick.
** Aya Shameimaru's signature move "Illusionary Dominance" (and its [[HarderThanHard Lunatic]] version "Peerless Wind God") takes this appearance in both the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URobRcKms_M shooting games]] and the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvcqjKm42oA fighters]]. It's noted as something of an IAmNotLeftHanded technique for Aya, who [[AWolfInSheepsClothing usually prefers to project a friendly journalist image]] rather than throwing around her full power as a millennia-old {{Tengu}}. An unusual example in that it does not trap the opponent - Aya keeps zooming around the screen for quite some time, during which she can be dodged.
* DamnYouMuscleMemory: ''Impossible Spell Card'' features a camera that works similarly to Aya's camera in ''Shoot the Bullet'' and ''Double Spoiler'', but in [=ISC=], you take pictures with X as opposed to Z in [=StB/DS=]. Cue [=StB/DS=] players dying a lot when they try to take pictures with Z.
** If you're used to the modern Windows games, when you play the older games, you will often move to the POC area and wonder why you can't collect all the items on screen. Older Windows games needs full power before you can collect all items on screen when in POC while the modern ones doesn't need full power to do so. Also if you're so used to the Windows games, PC-98 games doesn't have that kind of feature.
* DarkWorld: Downplayed. The final stage of ''Hopeless Masquerade'' is the Human Village, but at nighttime. While daytime Human Village is one of the more colorful stages, with a lot of villagers watching and cheering. The night version, on the other hand, is dark and bleak, with the spectators standing still and wearing creepy white masks due to [[FinalBoss Kokoro]] absorbing their emotions.
* DefeatEqualsExplosion: For bosses in the shooting games. Characters can also explode in the fighting game ''Hopeless Masquerade'', depending on how they are defeated. Note that danmaku fights are non-lethal — the player character often has a chat with the boss ''after'' defeating her — so the explosion is presumably just a showy special effect.
* DesolationShot: In ''Mystic Square'', the AmazingTechnicolorBattlefield disappears when you dispel Shinki's penultimate spell and blast her wings off. The background of the battle's final phase is a slow pan down over Makai, which is now on fire as a result of the fight.
* DifficultySpike:
** Most games seem to have one, usually around stage 4.
** Most final bosses' and extra bosses' final spell cards start out fairly simple, even elementary... then it gets faster, or stacks more components simultaneously over time/damage. By the end, the spell is an all-out nightmarish mess that fills the screen or moves very quickly, or both.
* DivineBirds: Played with when a Yataragasu is eaten by an ordinary hell raven youkai, who gains the power of nuclear fusion from it. This was orchestrated by the goddess Kanako, as part of her plan from shifting her worship from lakes and mountains to technology.
* DrumsOfWar: Raiko Horikawa is a drum tsukumogami with a [[ThunderDrum thunder-god motif]], meaning her attacks and theme heavily feature drums.
* DualBoss:
** Yuki and Mai in ''Mystic Square''.
** The Prismriver sisters in ''Perfect Cherry Blossom''.
** Sunny Milk, Luna Child and Star Sapphire in ''Fairy Wars''.
** Seiga and Yoshika in ''Ten Desires''.
** Miko, Tojiko, and Futo for one of the former's spellcards in the same game — although Miko does not do a single thing during it.
** Reimu, Miko, and Byakuren in Kokoro's ''Hopeless Masquerade'' story mode. Reimu fights by herself, but during spellcards, in the first spell, Miko joins in the attack. In the second spell, Byakuren does tag with Reimu. Third and fourth spells? The religious trinity itself, Reimu assisted by Miko and Byakuren.
** The Tsukumo sisters, usually fought one at a time during regular gameplay in ''Double Dealing Character'', unite as the ex-stage midbosses.
** During the BonusBoss fight against [[spoiler:Hecatia Lapizlazuli]] in ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', normally she takes turns attacking you with [[spoiler:Junko]], the game's FinalBoss. However, for the finale, they attack together.
** Mai Teireida and Satono Nishida first appear as the midbosses for Stages 4 and 5, respectively, of ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'', before coming together to serve as the Stage 5 bosses. Yes, the gimmick of the Stage 5 boss this time is being a DualBoss. They later reappear as the midbosses of the Extra Stage.
* DynamicDifficulty: ''4''-''6'' have a system where the bullets become faster and denser over time. In the case of ''4'' and ''5'', it's somewhat tied to how well you're doing, but in ''6'', it just keeps going up until you die, which resets it.
* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness:
** ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieDudS_yi24 Highly Responsive to Prayers]]'' isn't [[OddBallInTheSeries even a danmaku game]]. It's more of a weird ''VideoGame/{{Breakout}}'' clone, with some ShootEmUp elements in boss fights.
** On a lesser note, ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' and ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' only let you gather all items at once by moving to the top of the screen when your power is maxed out.
* EleventhHourSuperpower: In ''Antinomy of Common Flowers'', during [[spoiler:Shion Yorigami's]] final spellcard, Reimu's spellcard meter recharges very quickly, allowing her to spam it.
* EveryTenThousandPoints: In many games you get [[OneUp extends]] at certain score thresholds, usually starting at some number like [[PinballScoring ten million points]] and at increasing intervals thereafter.
* ExpansionPack:
** ''Touhou Hisoutensoku'', an add-on to ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'' that introduces a new storyline and playable characters, including [[EnsembleDarkhorse Meiling and Cirno.]]
** ''Double Spoiler'' can be considered this for ''Shoot the Bullet'', which was originally meant to be updated as new characters appeared.
** ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' was ported to the UsefulNotes/PlayStation4 gaming console, and will include new playable characters (such as Reisen sporting her ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'' gun) and an all-new story mode that will take place after the original's story.
* FakeDifficulty:
** It's arguable that all of the ''Touhou'' games suffer from this, due to the ambiguity of the hitboxes on the bullets requiring more a ton of TrialAndErrorGameplay, although that really comes with the Bullet Hell territory. ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'' was the worst about it though, as your hitbox was rather large, and if you died it would offset slightly -- enough to make some previous safe spots no longer safe.
** ''Undefined Fantastic Object'''s fifth stage clouds the screen with literally ''hundreds'' of Point and Power Items. Normally, this would be a great thing for scoring and power alike, but the items can often cover the bullets onscreen, usually resulting in a "[=WTF=] just hit me?" reaction from the player. Also, [=MarisaA=] uses very shiny lasers to attack, which shoot from four options around Marisa. Almost all of stage 5 uses very shiny bullets, approximately the same size as said options. It's not uncommon for a player to run into a bullet because they look almost exactly alike. The fact that the red bullets can also blend into the red ''background'' makes it even worse. This problem is present in ''Mountain of Faith'' and ''Subterranean Animism'' as well, though to a lesser extent.
* FieldPowerEffect:
** ''SWR'' and ''Hisoutensoku'' have the weather system that can cause all kinds of effects from powered up spellcards to super armor and all hits counting as counters. Some spellcards and characters can manipulate this to their advantage.
** ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' uses the Occult Ball system that, when active, creates one occult ball that the player can attempt to grab as well as one random field effect. These can range from the occult ball healing oneself or damaging the opponent, to causing the play area to shrink or creating outright tears in reality that drain health for as long as the effect lasts.
* FightingGame: Five and a half fighting game spinoffs: ''Immaterial and Missing Power'', ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'' and its ExpansionPack ''Touhou Hisoutensoku'', ''Hopeless Masquerade'', ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' and ''Antinomy of Common Flowers''.
* FightingYourFriend:
** Stage 4 of ''Lotus Land Story'' has you fighting whichever character you ''didn't'' choose. Only Reimu and Marisa were playable at this point.
** It was repeated in stage 4 of ''Imperishable Night'', which has you fighting either Reimu or Marisa, depending on the team you choose.
** Much of the story of ''Immaterial and Missing Power'', ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', and ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''.
** ''Hopeless Masquerade'' plays it straight and averts it at times. Reimu and Marisa fight each other in their own routes (they're probably used to it by now), but the buddhists and taoists never fight amongst themselves (except for stage 5 in Ichirin's and Futo's routes, but that's Mamizou in disguise both times). And then there's Koishi, who, while not being a part of the Myouren crew, still is a freshly converted buddhist, so her fighting against either Ichirin or Byakuren may or may not count.
* FirstPersonSnapshooter:
** The {{Gaiden Game}}s ''Shoot the Bullet'' and ''Double Spoiler'', in which you play a reporter whose sole method of dealing with enemies and bosses is [[MartialArtsAndCrafts taking pictures of them]]. Similarly, ''Violet Detector'' has you playing as Sumireko who does the same with her smartphone.
** In ''Impossible Spell Card'' Seija can equip the Tengu's Toy Camera to both slots to imitate Aya.
* FlawlessVictory:
** Capturing spell cards, which requires wiping the spell card's corresponding LifeMeter segment or, in the case of a survival card, surviving it without losing any lives or bombs.
** ''Fairy Wars'' gives golden medals for capturing cards without dying, bombing or freezing any bullets. That was probably [[NintendoHard ZUN's idea of a joke]].
** ''Impossible Spell Cards'' will recognize if you can beat an attack without cheating (although some passive effects can still be used), and the AchievementSystem has a secret achievement for players who beat every attack that way, with the description basically being ZUN asking people who got it to tell him in-person about it.
* FlyingSaucer: One of Mononobe no Futo's spellcards will sometimes cause one to smash into her enemy.
* FourIsDeath: The enemies of the fourth day of ''Impossible Spell Card'' are Yuyuko (a ghost), Yoshika (a jiang shi who's closer to being a zombie), and Seiga (a necromancer).
* GagDub: Thanks to the [[FunWithAcronyms Community Reliant Automatic Patcher]], anybody can create, edit, and maintain their own translation for the windows games, ranging from English, over less common languages (like Polish), over fictional languages (such as [[Franchise/StarTrek Klingon]]) to outright silly ones (such as {{Pirate}} or {{Troll}}).
* GenreShift:
** The first game on the PC-98 was basically ''Videogame/{{Breakout}}'' or ''Videogame/{{Arkanoid}}'' with Reimu hitting a ball. The second game was a shooter, but the closest one can get to the modern gameplay is with ''Mystic Square'', the last PC-98 game.
** The two ''Phantasmagorias''; the other games are single-player scrolling shooters whilst ''Dim. Dream'' and ''Flower View'' are versus shooters.
** ''Immaterial and Missing Power'', ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'', ''Hisoutensoku'', ''Hopeless Masquerade'', and ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' are 2-D fighters.
** Nobody is entirely sure what to call ''Shoot the Bullet'', ''Double Spoiler'', and ''Violet Detector''. ZUN calls ''Shoot the Bullet'' a "Danmaku photography game" in his notes for the game.
** As seen from the overall theme of the series, while ''Touhou'' is always about a shrine maiden and a witch fighting against supernatural menace of the game, around ''Symposium of Post-Mysticism'' there's a notable nuance of political drama between the keep increasing number of factions within Gensokyo over their influence in the human village.
* GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere: In ''Hisoutensoku'', there was a [[spoiler:giant catfish from nowhere]] as the final boss for [[spoiler:Meiling's route]].
* GuideDangIt: Woe the players who die several times over trying to deal with Shion's "The Most Despicable and Disastrous God of Destitution and Misery" spell card in ''Antinomy of Common Flowers''. So, what are you supposed to do? Well, the kanji won't hurt you... ''if you dash into them''. They even refill your spell meter. No one tells you this.
* HarderThanHard:
** Lunatic mode. It's aptly named.
** In the 1.10 update of ''Antinomy of Common Flowers'', Overdrive mode is added as a new difficulty.
* HitboxDissonance: [[NecessaryWeasel Intentional]], as the games are [[BulletHell quite impossible]] until you learn to exploit it to the fullest. The radius of the hitboxes of large bullets are smaller than the radius of the sprites, so it is typically possible to move the player's hitbox into the very edge of the bullet's sprite and not die. In addition, the boss' hitboxes are usually purposefully larger than their sprites in order to make it easy to shoot the boss.
* HitodamaLight:
** As the princess of a ghost palace (and a ghost herself), Yuyuko Saigyouji seems to be continuously surrounded by hitodama. Yuyuko can use them as an AttackDrone in combat.
** Her [[BattleButler servant]], Youmu Konpaku, also has one of these next to her at all times, which happens to be half of her own soul — because she's only ''half'' ghost (don't ask us how that works). She can use the hitodama as an AttackDrone in combat.
** Rin Kaenbyou is surrounded by what appears to be small balls of flaming ''skulls'' — appropriate, since her job is to carry off corpses into the underworld. In some spell cards, she is accompanied by ''zombie fairies'', which look pretty similar (though a later [[AllThereInTheManual guidebook]] claims that they're just normal fairies who like to dress up).
* HitStop: Some high-power spellcards in ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'' and ''Hisoutensoku'', like Komachi's "Unpitiable Pitiable Life", Suwako's "Mishaguji-sama" and Meiling's "Light Lotus Palm" use this effect.
* HoldTheLine: Some of the bosses have spell cards that make them invulnerable, and you can't do anything other than dodge and wait for time to run out. Those are commonly known as "Survival" or "Time-Out" Spellcards.
* JackOfAllStats: Reimu tends to have the most balances shot types in terms of power and range.
* KaizoTrap:
** After beating bosses, it takes a second before the projectiles turn into tokens. So if you aren't careful, you can win, but still die. This can cause a glitch in games that use the second version of the engine (''Mountain of Faith'' to ''Undefined Fantastic Object''; ''Shoot the Bullet'' uses that engine as well, but this glitch doesn't occur because of different stage mechanic). Basically if this happens at the end of third stage, and you'll respawn after the "Stage Complete" message, you'll be stuck in that stage. You'll still have full control of the character, but some people reported being unable of alt-tabbing out of the game in fullscreen mode.
** Last Spells are often this. When you think you have defeated the enemy, you rush to the top of the screen to trigger the auto-collect and the enemy respawns right on you, giving no reaction time.
** In ''Highly Responsive to Prayers'', there is a slight delay between clearing the stage and the score screen. A careless or unlucky could lose a life over getting hit by the Yin-yang orb or enemy shots. Thankfully, boss battles avert this.
* LagCancel: ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' has the "Fast-talk Declaration" mechanic where any action can be interrupted with a spell card declare by pressing Spell button rapidly twice.
* MadeOfExplodium:
** There's a shot-type and four separate spellcards based on frogs blowing up.
** Artful Sacrifice. Yes, Alice uses gunpowder as filling for her dolls. And it results in a hilarious dialogue between Alice and Marisa in ''Subterranean Animism''.
* MagicMissileStorm: With the series being a fantasy-themed BulletHell series, this trope is basically the premise.
* MarathonBoss: By shmup standards, anyway. Each game has a BonusBoss which typically takes 8-10 minutes to defeat.
* MechanicallyUnusualFighter:
** The ReallySevenHundredYearsOld [[PhysicalGod goddess]] Suwako Moriya from '' Hisoutensoku''. Her standing is actually crouching, and her crouching is conjuring a lily pad underneath her, making her ''taller''. Her regular walking is slowly hopping like a [[AnimalMotif frog]] (and while hopping she counts as being in the air), and her ground dash is swimming underground, making her invincible to all attacks. Her air movement is her flapping her arms around, and is limited to several directions. Her attacks are relatively normal, though.
** [[EmptyShell Koishi Komeiji]] is the whacky fighter of ''Hopeless Masquerade''. To start, like Suwako, her dash is her ''prancing around'' while invisible, making her immune to all attacks. Unlike Suwako, her main whackiness is in her attacks. For most of her attacks, she ''doesn't instantly perform them when you input the commands''. Instead, she "stocks" them and use it ''automatically'' when certain conditions are met. For example, her 8B is performed only when she's under the opponent, and Catch and Rose is activated only after you hit the opponent with another attack. Also, she needs about 1-2 seconds before the moves are ready to activate, so you really need to predict the situations beforehand.
** To a lesser extent, Byakuren, who needs to charge her specials first before being able to actually use it.
* MickeyMousing:
** Some levels try to perfectly synchronize themselves with their music, to the extent where you get bonus enemies to destroy if you kill the midboss quickly, and perhaps even skip a pattern if you kill the first few too slowly. Part of this have to do with the fact that ZUN composes the music first, then creates and sync the levels and characters to it.
** In ''Double Dealing Character'', Raiko's last two spell cards are in sync with the music.
* MidairBobbing: In the fighting games, characters who hover will usually bob up and down, such as Patchouli and Cirno in their standing idle pose, as well as almost all characters in ''Hopeless Masquerade'' and ''Urban Legend in Limbo'', where combat happens in midair.
* MoreDakka:
** [[StalkedByTheBell Taking your time]] in some of ''Imperishable Night''[='=]s last words will eventually result in the bosses reaching the bullet limit, causing some of the patterns to glitch up. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jI-u7zCjquM This]] is just about the closest you can get to having enough dakka.
** If you don't have enough, try '''Touhou Ultra'''. It has so much more it can screw up patterns completely.
* MultipleEndings: At the very least, each shot type gets its own ending. Beyond that, specifics vary:
** Most games give you a character-specific bad ending for beating the game after using a continue. The ''Phantasmagoria'' games don't care, and ''Fairy Wars'' just doesn't give you an ending if you continue. ''Mountain of Faith'' gives you one regardless of continues if [[EasyModeMockery you played on easy]], and in ''Lotus Land Story'' and ''the Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'', after beating the fifth stage in easy mode, you proceed to the bad ending directly.
** The games that have route selections give you an ending based on which route you take.
** ''Imperishable Night'' combines the two above into something odd. You get a Bad Ending for ''running out'' of continues. You get a normal ending for facing Eirin as the final boss, who you'll be locked into fighting if it's your first time playing with that character or if you continued.
** ''Ten Desires'' gives you a 'Parallel Ending' if you beat the game on normal or higher with at least three bombs in stock (bombs from unused lives don't count).
* MultipleLifeBars: Each life bar represents an attack pattern. Stage bosses have at least four patterns.
* NintendoHard:
** It's fairly easy to get to the end by arcade shmup standards, as it wasn't designed to take your money. Doesn't stop it from being frustrating when you're going for that elusive one-credit clear, though. Especially on higher difficulties, getting a good ending is quite a feat. With that said, although the games are ''hard'', they are also ''fair''; most patterns are generally good with being about learning how to avoid them rather than just tossing cheap shots at you, so every death is your own fault.
** Games 10 through 12 made things worse by having continues send you back to the beginning of the stage (thankfully reverted back in ''Fairy Wars'') and removing the option to increase your base lives above three (this one still stands).
** ''Shoot the Bullet'' is 11 levels of the most sadistic, multi-layered spell cards in the whole series. Unlike any of the other games, you have no extra lives, no bombs, you lose when you time out, your only weapon is a camera that needs to be charged and manually aimed for long distance attacks, and some bosses are only vulnerable for a fraction of a second. Lastly, the difficulty ''is not adjustable at all''. You do take on each spell card individually and have infinite retries, but the incredible difficulty makes clearing it impossible for most people.
** The sequel, ''Double Spoiler'', is somewhat better thanks to improved camera controls and a new unlockable character that makes most cards easier to beat. It's still harder than the normal ''Touhou'' games, though. ZUN even had this on his blog.
-->''[[Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned Warning]]: Compared to the other works in the series, the difficulty level of this game in terms of full completion is [[NintendoHard rather high]], so be prepared.''
** Even ''fan-made crossover games'' fall into this, probably a direct result of putting danmaku in genres where you're actually affected by gravity and don't have a tiny hitbox.
** ''Touhou'' arranges are a somewhat common source for licensed songs in modern arcade {{Rhythm Game}}s such as the VideoGame/{{BEMANI}} series and ''VideoGame/{{maimai}}''. Most of the time in these games, licensed songs never have endgame-level charts. ''Touhou'' arranges, however, are an exception to that rule; expect many ''Touhou'' arranges to have a rating of 10 out of 10 on their hardest charts in ''VideoGame/{{jubeat}}'', at least 16 out of 20 on ''VideoGame/SoundVoltex'', 10 out of 10 on the arcade versions of ''VideoGame/GrooveCoaster'', and so on.
** For the really masochistic people, there's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Je-mu6z532E Ultra mode hacks,]] or cranking up the framerate to play at [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDUdRryiE78 150% speed...]]
** ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'' takes this trope UpToEleven. It uses a new game mode called [=PointDevice=] mode where you get infinite retries and can start from the beginning of checkpoints called Chapters if you die. However, the game is overall much, much harder than the standard ''Touhou'' game. How hard you ask? ZUN modeled it after ''VideoGame/IWannaBeTheGuy''-style gameplay! And that's not even going into playing on Legacy mode, which removes the infinite retries and plays like a standard ''Touhou'' game.
** While the games may be easier than many other BulletHell games in terms of patterns, ''Touhou'' lacks an AntiFrustrationFeature that many of these other games have: the game does not slow down for you when there are a large number of bullets on the screen; you have to dodge them in real time. Any slowdown is the result of your PC not being able to handle the game, and in fact, abusing slowdown (often reflected by a high slowdown percentage in ranking tables and reply lists) is grounds for disqualification in many score attack circles.
* NormallyIWouldBeDeadNow: An in-game feature later games gives you a very tiny window after you are hit to bomb, thereby preventing a loss of a life. The eighth game actually makes an entire gameplay mechanic based around this, although that instance is more of a BigDamnHeroes moment as the teammate of the one that was hit comes in and uses the bomb.
* NoSell:
** The final card of the final boss is immune to bombs, though they still clear the bullets away (though usually with some diminished effect, like a smaller radius or only getting half of them or somesuch). You'll have to grind down their health the normal way.
*** The only exception to the rule is Utsuho Reiuji, the final boss in ''Subterranean Animism'', which gains armor instead. In other words, you can continue doing reduced damage to her with a bomb, but this comes with the cost that the bombs don't clean the bullets in the screen.
** All [[BonusBoss extra and phantasm stage bosses]] have this effect for all spellcards, except in ''Fairy Wars''. In the versus shooters they are completely invincible for a certain period of time.
* ObviousBeta: ''Hopeless Masquerade'' was likely rushed for the convention it was released in. It was playable, but there were random crashes (particularly around Koishi) and the final boss was only playable in Story Mode...probably because ''she had no special moves or Spellcards implemented''. This was all eventually fixed with patches.
* OffModel: ZUN's artistic capabilities are... inconsistent. Alphes was generally much better about this, but the ''Hopeless Masquerade'' drawing style is ''rife'' with anatomy issues.
* OneHitPointWonder: Standard for BulletHell game protagonists. Curiously enough, when you meet playable characters as bosses they gain SuperToughness instead.
* PacifistRun:
** The bosses' attacks are all on timers, and it's possible to beat them just by outlasting them. They'll even blow up at the end regardless of whether you fired any shots at them. Since this requires inhuman dodging skills on some of the harder attacks, it has become a favorite SelfImposedChallenge for ''Touhou'' gamers.
** Most of the extra bosses actually have a secret difficulty on their last (or second-to-last, in Yukari's case) spell card, triggered by attempting to go pacifist. Normally, those spell cards start off easy, but get harder as the boss loses HP. [[NoFairCheating To prevent cheesing the game]] and trivializing what should be a climactic end by just waiting, the spell card will have an extremely hard pattern, even harder than the normal final pattern, starting at 30 seconds left if the boss has not lost enough HP.
** Ironically and counterintuitively, this is the easiest way to defeat the Phantasmagoria AI. [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard The computer opponents basically only get hit when they want to]], easily demonstrated by watching two Lunatic AIs fight each other (it can be hours before someone gets hit, as they seem to be capable of getting hit without taking damage). The number of bullets on screen only gets more dense over time if both players are killing enemies, using spell cards, and reflecting more bullets back each time. Level 3 spellcards are also safe, as they cannot have any of their bullets be reflected. If one player never shoots anything, the feedback loop never happens, as the AI's only means of sending bullets at you will be killing fairies, and bullets stay at a manageable level. Bullet density means nothing to the AI, so playing normally only makes it worse for you. [[ArtificialStupidity The AI will get hit on purpose]] after a certain time limit is reached, even if there is only one bullet for them to get hit by.
* ParabolicPowerCurve: It's generally accepted that the stage 5 boss will be harder than the final boss, or at least as hard. The reason for this is that stage 5 bosses tend to have more experimental or random patterns, with fewer bullets but much trickier dodging. Final bosses are all about large quantities of bullets at all times, but because they're fired in easily predicted patterns, they're not nearly as challenging for experienced players, even if it's their first time fighting that particular boss.
* PinballScoring: Typical scores after beating the game are in the millions. Highscores are in the billions. You can score more points on the final level than the rest of the game combined.
* RecurringBoss: Despite having LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters, there have been many instances of characters appearing outside their debut games as bosses, as well as bosses in one game being faced multiple times. Discounting spin-offs like ''Shoot The Bullet'', ''Double Spoiler'', ''Impossible Spellcard'', and ''Violet Detector'', which are essentially {{Boss Game}}s dedicated entirely to having previous bosses showing off, as well as the {{Fighting Game}}s, we can mention:
** Cirno has midboss appearances in ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' and ''Double Dealing Character'', both in Stage 1. In the earlier case, it's winter, Cirno's home season, while in the latter, the stage is the Misty Lake, the very same stage in which Cirno debuted in ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil''.
** Counting the PC-98 era games, ''Imperishable Night'' marks the return of Reimu and Marisa to the boss scene. Marisa latter gets a spotlight opportunity as [[spoiler:the BonusBoss of ''Fairy Wars''.]]
** Daiyousei and Lily White have appeared a few times as well, with both appearing as midbosses in ''Fairy Wars'' and the latter also making a return in ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'' in Stage 3 ([[FridgeBrilliance which is the "spring stage", the very season for which Lily White heralds its arrival]]).
** Sanae returns from ''Mountain of Faith'' as the Extra Stage midboss of ''Subterranean Animism''. Makes sense, since the stage is the Moriya Shrine rather than the underground like the other stages.
** Of all people, Yuyuko, the FinalBoss of ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'', reappears as the '''first boss''' of ''Ten Desires''. In the same game, Kogasa from ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' is the Stage 3 midboss, and Nue, the BonusBoss of ''UFO'', is ''TD'''s Extra Stage midboss.
** While it's normal for a previously defeated boss to reappear later as the midboss of a later stage in the same game, we have to make a special mention to the FinalBoss of ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'', because she's pulling double duty as the BonusBoss ([[IAmNotLeftHanded where the Stage 6 confrontation is where she's actually holding back, unlike in the Extra Stage]]). The only boss in the series that does something similar is Yuka, who was the boss for Stages 5 and 6 of her debut game.
* RecursiveAmmo: Some spell card bullets create their own bullets.
* RedemptionDemotion: Playable characters are never anywhere near as strong as when they were enemies. Played straightest in the fighting games, where the main threat in single-player are the various unlimited-duration, amped-up spell cards that you of course don't have access to.
* SceneryPorn: Next time you watch a replay of any game from ''Mountain of Faith'' onward, ignore the pretty bullets and look at the backgrounds. They're absolutely stunning.
* SchizophrenicDifficulty: Significantly more the case in the photography games, which have things like ''Double Spoiler'''s 11th level being easier than its 8th level, and the bizarrely difficult 3rd level of ''Shoot The Bullet''. ''Great Fairy Wars'' is also infamous for its difficulty spike, even for a ''Touhou'' game.
* SchmuckBait: About the upper quarter of the screen is an area called Point of Collection, or POC. If you're in this area with maximum power ([=TH05-TH07=]) or in general ([=TH09=] and on), all items that enemies drop will float towards your character. This is essential to racking up points. Except... it's highly recommended you stay away from the POC area unless you know you can sweep around. Sometimes it's too tempting to grab up all the items and then enemies suddenly come out to take a life.
* ScoreScreen
* ScoringPoints: The mainline games have scoring systems. The PC-98 games' scoring tend to be pretty simple, but the Windows games [[GuideDangIt make figuring scoring out a chore]].
* SequelDifficultySpike: Every now and then, between this and SequelDifficultyDrop. The most notorious examples usually cited are ''Subterranean Animism'' for every normal entry before it, and ''Shoot the Bullet'' , ''Double Spoiler'', and ''Violet Detector'' to the entire series. ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', however, is quickly gaining notoriety for being even harder than ''Subterranean Animism'', to the point that SaveScumming and TrialAndErrorGameplay are the main gameplay gimmicks.
* SerialEscalation: The whole series could be characterized as "And here, ZUN thought if you can win after 20 tries, the game is too easy".
* SincerestFormOfFlattery: Wondering why some game mechanics look a lot like ''VideoGame/DonPachi'''s and ''VideoGame/{{Darius}}''? ZUN is a {{Fanboy}} of Creator/{{Cave}}'s and Creator/{{Taito}}'s shooters, [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Bohemian_Archive_in_Japanese_Red/Interview praising their stories and characters]].
* SmartBomb:
** "Spell cards" are {{Vancian|Magic}} style [[FunctionalMagic magic]] attacks. Whenever someone uses a spell card, the screen goes to an abnormal background, a portrait of the character appears on the screen, [[CallingYourAttacks the name of the spell card is shown in the corner]], and a [[InstantRunes circle]] surrounds the user, getting smaller and smaller until the effect runs out. When a boss uses a spell card, a bullet pattern appears on the screen. When a player uses a spell card, they use a Smart Bomb.
** In the 2-player ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', the game uses a SplitScreen approach in which using a spell card Smart Bombs your side of the screen ''and'' puts bullets on your opponent's side of the screen.
** It's a notable source of GameplayAndStorySegregation, since in ''Imperishable Night'' the playable characters become bosses and use their Smart Bomb attacks on you as bullet patterns which look nothing like each other. This is lampshaded in the in-game commentary, where the author says, "This is another spell card that doesn't look much like when the player uses it."
* SpinningPaper: Appears in ''Hopeless Masquerade'' at the end of a match, with the headlines indicating who won.
* SpritePolygonMix: All of the Windows era main series games uses this. ''Hopeless Masquerade'' is the first of the fighters to incorporate this.
* StalkedByTheBell:
** Rarely occurs, since [[PacifistRun Timing Out is a victory condition]], but some spell cards have an extra phase that usually begins when 30 seconds remain on said card. [[RealityWarper Yukari's]] second-to-last card, "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bTnLf1ju70 Boundary of Life and Death",]] [[FantasticNuke Utsuho's]] final card, "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdtRhBxsPz8 Subterranean Sun",]] and [[NintendoHard Gengetsu's]] [[FanNickname aptly nicknamed]] "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FS-o5nYe9pw Gengetsu Rape Time"]] all do this.
** ''Highly Responsive to Prayers'' does similarly, with random bullets shooting at you if the clock runs out on any stage.
** ''Shoot the Bullet'', ''Double Spoiler'', and ''Violet Detector'' technically play it straight, but the setup all but ensures you will either defeat the boss or perish long before you time out.
* StepIntoTheBlindingFight: The Night Sparrow {{Youkai}}, Mystia Lorelei, who can [[BrownNote cause night-blindness with her songs]]. In the boss fight against her, this is implemented as [[InterfaceScrew you being unable to see anything except a small area around your character]].
* SuperMovePortraitAttack: The player's and the boss's spell cards. Utsuho's nuclear-based spell cards come with warning sirens and big yellow "CAUTION!!" tape on top of that.
* TrialAndErrorGameplay:
** When Mima flashes in ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'' it means she's about to ram you. Moving to the side is recommended.
** Yuuka has an attack more or less guaranteed to kill you the first time you see them in both fights in ''Lotus Land Story''. In her first fight, there's her so-called "[[WaveMotionGun Master Spark]]"; it's very obvious that she's about to do something, but there's no indication that you need to be on the side of the screen to survive. In the second fight, she has an attack that places a shrinking circle under the player: Gamer instinct is to get as far away as possible... [[DeathByGenreSavviness and the attack hits everywhere ''except'' in the circle]].
** The fourth stage of ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' has certain enemies that will cancel all bullets on screen when they die. The stage is much more passable if you know about them, but a first-time player won't.
*** In the same game, the normal bullet pattern Remilia uses after her second spell card is essentially a cheap shot against anyone not expecting it/not being careful enough, because it comes out '''WICKED''' fast.
** Mokou's Forgiveness "Honest Man's Death" has a gimmick that's completely unique in the entire series: The laser won't kill you if you move towards it when it's firing. Most people have to get help with this one online — it is actually the case that the laser's hitbox only activates when it passes through your position at the point in time when it was originally fired: moving towards the laser's point of origin at any point after this will save you. Of course, this still requires some trial and error to figure out alone.
** Yuugi's Four Devas Arcanum "Knock Out In Three Steps" is basically impossible to capture unless you already know what to expect. It relies on you being in the right place ''before'' the bullets start moving.
** There's several instances in the ENTIRE series where memorizing where enemies come from at which point in each stage and destroying them as soon as possible greatly reduces the number of bullets you have to dodge. It's safe to say that it is virtually impossible to not be subject to this when playing these games.
** ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'' takes this trope UpToEleven by making it the main gameplay mode. By dividing every stage into several "chapters", making checkpoints after each one is cleared, disabling lives, and granting infinite retries, the point of the mode is to clear the whole game on what is essentially a game-induced NoDeathRun. This is necessary to grant the average player even a snowball's chance in hell of clearing the game, because "NintendoHard" [[UpToEleven does not do it justice]]. For the record, "Legacy Mode", the other gameplay mode which is standard ''Touhou''-style, is ''[[SelfImposedChallenge for the hardcore]]''.
* TrueFinalBoss:
** In ''Imperishable Night'', there are two versions of Stage 6. Though both Eirin and Kaguya are considered {{Final Boss}}es, the actual FinalBoss of the story is Kaguya, but the player must first clear the Eirin version of Stage 6 before being able to choose to fight Kaguya in a new playthrough.
** In ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'', [[spoiler:the heroines fail to defeat Okina due to her final attack being too lopsided in her favor (she strips you of your options, release ability, and Power, and uses it to create a difficult multi-stage attack) and end up running away. Thus, [[HeroicSecondWind they regroup]] and [[EleventhHourSuperpower learn to harness a new power]] before [[ItsPersonal invading Ushirodo-no-Kuni again and challenging Okina to a rematch]]]], which is the Extra Stage of this game. This makes it a first for the series, where the Extra Stage is actually truly "Stage 7" and a continuation of the story, and the only game where the BonusBoss is also the TrueFinalBoss.[[note]]Yukari in ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' does not count because, while she ''is'' the one who actually opened the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead, she only did so at Yuyuko's request, which makes the latter the real FinalBoss of the story.[[/note]]
* TurnsRed:
** Almost all the the spell cards in ''Shoot the Bullet'', ''Double Spoiler'', and ''Violet Detector'' as you take successful shots.
*** This appears to be what those spell cards would look like from Easy mode to [[NintendoHard Lunatic difficulty]].
** Inverted in the main series, where some spell cards will speed up if the player isn't damaging the boss fast enough.
* UnexpectedShmupLevel: In the 1.10 update of ''Antinomy of Common Flowers'', Tenshi's [[ThatOneAttack final spell]] uses mechanics similar to a regular Touhou game, but the moving is slow and float-like, and it's horizontally-oriented. Melee shots can be used, Jo'on's basic special move is used like a shot type, and her spell card is used like a bomb.
* UnitsNotToScale: With the exception of ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'', bosses are markedly larger than the player, regardless of how large they're supposed to actually be. This is also {{lampshaded}} by ZUN. Occasionally, fan art makes jokes based on how large the hitbox of a boss is.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Non-gameplay trope, A-M]]
* OneHundredAndEight: There are 108 scenes in ''Double Spoiler''.
* AdaptationExpansion: Some of the mythologies ''Touhou'' draws inspiration from are expanded. For example, in the ''Tale of the Bamboo Cutter'', a pair of old bamboo cutters found a baby princess Kaguya inside a bamboo stalk and adopted her. When she came of age, she revealed that she [[{{Lunarians}} came from the moon]] and has to go back, leaving an elixir of immortality. In ''Touhou'', Kaguya is an immortal herself. She was a {{Lunarian|s}} noble who got exiled to Earth for drinking the elixir of immortality, bringing "impurity" to the "pure" moon. Also, she didn't actually return to the moon, but wandered around Earth for several centuries before ending up in Gensokyo.
* AdventureFriendlyWorld: Much of the {{Universe Compendium}}s are devoted towards explaining how Gensokyo is the perfect setting for a series of ShootEmUp games while still remaining largely pleasant.
* TheAlcoholic:
** At least every other picture of ZUN shows him drinking alcohol, with several bottles of it at his side, or both.
** In the series canon, oni are the heaviest drinkers out of everyone, followed closely by the tengu, and the cast ''really'' loves their alcohol in any shape or form in the ExpandedUniverse.
** Reimu is such an alcoholic, she bullies Sanae for choosing not to drink, and even calls drinking her chosen method of ''worshiping the gods.''
* AllThereInTheManual: See that list of side materials up above? That's where the vast majority of the world-building is. On a smaller scale, a considerable amount of any given game's story is in its prologue and character profiles.
* AppleOfDiscord: Mokou implies that during Iwakasa's mission at the top of Mount Fuji to dispose of the Hourai Elixir, many of the soldiers they traveled with tried to take the Elixir for themselves and were presumably killed by Konohana-Sakuyahime. And eventually, even Mokou got trapped by the Elixir's lure leading her to kill Iwakasa.
* ArtEvolution: Inevitable in a long-running series like this. There's a noticeable bump in quality from ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' onwards.
* ArtifactOfDoom: The Occult Balls' true purpose [[spoiler:is to take advantage of rumors to create a new Lunar Capital in Gensokyou. It would also have the unfortunate side-effect of killing everyone present]].
* ArcWelding: [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Ten_Desires_special_and_two-part_interview_with_ZUN According to an interview]] with ZUN for ''Ten Desires'', this was said game's intention: to connect the new trilogy, [[FanNickname also known as the]] "[[MemeticMutation Moriya Shrine conspiracy]]", (''Mountain of Faith'', ''Subterranean Animism'', and ''Undefined Fantastic Object'') to the older trilogy (''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'', ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'', and ''Imperishable Night''). Due to a [[ContrivedCoincidence certain fan theory]], ''Ten Desires'' may have been able to connect to every Windows game in one go.
* AsianRuneChant: Referenced in some of Sanae's spellcards.
* AuthorTract: Flat out defied. ZUN tends to have a lot of subjects on his mind but also goes out of his way to try and be subtle and sensitive about various issues, thinking that doing otherwise would not be fun for those watching and would make him come across as preachy.
* AutobotsRockOut:
** Two songs, "A Tiny, Tiny Clever Commander" and "Nuclear Fusion", are uniquely in the rock genre by default, the former practically a synthtar and the first boss theme of ''UFO'', the latter is simply epic and the final boss theme of ''SA''.
** The remix of one of Reimu's themes used in ''Hopeless Masquerade'' named "[[http://youtu.be/2DUjUPzIfBk?t=46s Colorful Path]]".
** The last word theme from ''Hopeless Masquerade''.
* AwesomeButImpractical: The Spellcard Rules fall into this, since it prefers beauty rather than lethality. ZUN himself [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] that:
-->Beauty of danmaku is total nonsense for the bosses. If they really have the intent to kill someone, they won't even need 1/10 of those bullets.
* BackstoryHorror: Many characters have nasty things in their past, and Gensokyo itself was originally far more dangerous, but none of it ever comes up in the current storylines.
* BatmanGambit: The entirety of ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' is Yukari using one to troll Eirin while wrapped in a XanatosGambit.
* BattleButler: Many penultimate bosses are a servant of the final boss and have very unlikely job descriptions for someone of their combat abilities:
** In ''Phantasmagoria of Dim. Dream'' Chiyuri is Yumemi's research assistant in "comparative physics".
** ''Mystic Square'' and ''The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' both have {{Ninja Maid}}s in the form of Yumeko and Sakuya.
** ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' introduces [[MundaneMadeAwesome samurai gardener]] Youmu.
** Komachi from ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', whose official job is to be TheFerryMan of the Sanzu River.
** Eirin and Reisen from ''Imperishable Night'' both fit the part, being Kaguya's pharmacist and pet respectively. However, ZUN states that Eirin is actually stronger than Kaguya and [[WillfullyWeak limits her power]] out of respect for the princess.
** In ''Mountain of Faith'' Sanae is the priestess of both the final and extra boss, who are both gods.
** ''Subterranean Animism'' reverses this trend by having the BigBad and the stage 5 boss be the pets of the stage 4 boss. Similarly, the stage 5 boss of ''Double Dealing Character'' is the actual BigBad, with the stage 6 boss being someone she tricked.
** ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' introduces some typical ''Touhou'' weirdness with Shou and Byakuren, the stage 5 and 6 bosses respectively. Technically Shou is Byakuren's servant, but she's an avatar of Bishamonten, who Byakuren worships, so she worships her own servant.
** In ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', stage 5 boss Clownpiece is the subordinate of Hecatia, the extra boss, and has been enhanced by stage 6 boss Junko.
** In ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'', stage 5 bosses Satono Nishida and Mai Teireida are the dancing servants of stage 6 boss Okina Matara.
* BadassBoast: Every final boss, and many of the other bosses. Makes sense, as spell card duels are all about being as flashy and bombastic as possible.
* BareYourMidriff: Fanart often shows the blouses worn by characters such as Reimu, Marisa, Flandre or Sanae riding up when they raise their arms.
* BarredFromTheAfterlife: We have [[CuteGhostGirl Yuyuko Saigyouji]], the princess of the Netherworld, the place where souls wait for their {{Reincarnation}}. However, because [[spoiler: her body is being used to seal the [[EldritchAbomination Saigyou Ayakashi]]]] she cannot enter the cycle of reincarnation and is stuck forever as a ghost. She seems to be enjoying it, though.
* BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy: The semi-legendary Prince Shoutoku of Japanese history is credited for spreading Buddhism in Japan. In ''Touhou'', Toyosatomimi no Miko is him, resurrected through Taoist magic. Miko was actually a Taoist who is looking for immortality, all while spreading Buddhism as a front to control the masses. When they almost died, they set up a ritual to let them revive when the time is right. And like most ''Touhou'' characters, he is now a [[GenderFlip she]], although whether she's a girl all along, or just her resurrected form is left unclear. Unlike Prince Shoutoku's gentle image, Miko's personality is best described as "I'm better than you".
* BerserkButton: May the Lord have mercy on you if you tell Reimu she has awful night vision.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Most characters are rather friendly when there isn't an incident, and even those with a low "human friendship level" like Yuuka are nice as long as you don't hit their BerserkButton. They're still powerful combatants with huge reserves of magic who won't hesitate to beat you to a pulp in a duel.
* BewareTheSillyOnes: Nearly everyone. Most pre-battle conversations are rather [[SeinfeldianConversation bizarre]] before the danmaku starts.
* BlackEyesOfCrazy: Inverted with the hobgoblins in ''Wild and Horned Hermit'' that despite them having black sclera, in this setting they come of as the OnlySaneMan.
* BloodKnight: As ZUN explains, the only characters we meet are the sorts of people who get into fights at a drop of the hat, because that's what the game revolves around. All the peaceful, boring people sit around at home [[NominalImportance without names]].
* BlondeBrunetteRedhead: In ''Forbidden Scrollery'', the three main characters are Marisa (blonde), Reimu (brunette), and Kosuzu (redhead). There's also the Three Mischievous Fairies, Luna Child (blonde), Star Sapphire (brunette) and Sunny Milk (redhead).
* BlueAndOrangeMorality: Youkai as a whole act "odd" by human standards, and Yukari is weird even by ''their'' standards. In the fandom, this ranges from justifying youkai being murderers, to being ditzy weirdoes.
* BiggerOnTheInside:
** Yuuka's mansion, Mugenkan, in ''Lotus Land Story''.
** The Scarlet Devil Mansion. {{Hand Wave}}d — Sakuya uses her time and space manipulation to cause the effect.
** Eientei. {{Hand Wave}}s involving timehax are also involved, courtesy of Kaguya.
** The Palanquin ship of ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' appears a lot larger on the inside as well — [[UpToEleven despite it being a massive wooden ship already]].
* BootstrappedLeitmotif: A character's {{Leitmotif}} usually ends up being the music from their boss fight, but this trope happens a few times. Meiling, Alice and Youmu all get their stage themes as {{Leitmotif}}s (along with their boss themes); Suika gets her pre-battle theme (again, along with her boss theme).
* BossInMookClothing: Every game has at least one "[[FanNickname death fairy]]"/"[[DoomyDoomsOfDoom doom fairy]]" — a seemingly normal [[{{Mook}} fairy]] that has attacks and health comparable to most bosses. They always come from the top-center of the screen, and, like bosses, have abnormally elaborate bullet patterns.
* BreakingTheFourthWall:
** Kogasa appears on the disc for ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' in an attempt to surprise you.
** Kogasa states in ''Ten Desires'' that she keeps losing to Yoshika [[GameplayAndStorySegregation because she always times out]].
** Flandre tells Marisa in ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' that she can't use a continue.
** The trial versions of ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'', ''Lotus Land Story'', ''Mystic Square'', and ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' all end on someone saying that you can't go any farther because it's a trial.
** Reimu and Rika talk about the latter being the stage 1 boss in ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'' during the extra stage.
** The bad ending of ''Mystic Square'' has Yuuka telling you that you need to train harder.
** One of Sumireko's win quotes against Reimu in ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' is that The Girl in the Gap is unfitting for a protagonist.
** In Sanae's scenario in ''Undefined Fantastic Object'', she mistakes the Power items for secret treasures.
** Seija in ''Double Dealing Character'' has the ability to flip anything over. What does she use this on? [[spoiler:[[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou Your]] [[InterfaceScrew screen.]]]]
** If you try to beat ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' on easy, Sakuya [[NoFinalBossForYou won't let you go any further]] simply because [[EasyModeMockery you're playing on easy]]. Cue bad ending.
** In ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', Junko knows if you've been playing on Pointdevice or Legacy Mode.
* BreakoutCharacter:
** Mima and Marisa all the way back in ''Story of Eastern Wonderland''.
** Yukka, a boss in ''Lotus Land Story'', and playable in ''Mystic Square'' and ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View''.
** Cirno received her own game in ''Great Fairy Wars'', then she became a playable character in ''Hidden Star in Four Seasons'', the 16th numbered game.
** Seija has her own game, ''Impossible Spell Card''.
** Many stage 5 bosses such as Sakuya, Youmu, Sanae, and Reisen eventually became playable characters in the main numbered games.
* BrickJoke: From ''Inaba of the Moon and Inaba of the Earth'', the [[UnconventionalSmoothie Banana Yogurt]] ''[[StockYuck Natto]]'' Drink.
* BrokeTheRatingScale: ''The Grimoire Of Marisa'' includes a star rating for each spell card, but several are passed over for being too weak or too strong for the rating to matter, and others get silly ones, such as "Mega-Disgusting Score" for Wriggle's bug attacks.
* ButterflyOfDoom: Just about every game from ''Mountain of Faith'' to ''Hopeless Masquerade'' (barring the {{Gaiden Game}}s), which some fans call the "[[MemeticMutation Moriya Shrine conspiracy]]". It starts out with an incident caused by a group of newcomers (the Moriya Shrine) arriving in Gensokyo. They then try to give Genokyo nuclear power, which causes another incident. That incident then sets free the followers of a sealed youkai priestess, starting yet another incident. ''And then'' the sealed youkai and her followers come into conflict with the subject of the next incident, a resurrected ruler from ancient Japan and her own followers. ''Hopeless Masquerade'' then has a religious conflict breaking out between the two groups. All because the Moriya Shrine was trying to modernize the place. [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom Thanks, Kanako.]]
* TheCameo:
** ''Wild and Horned Hermit'' is absolutely covered in these. The story hasn't used many characters, but Azuma Aya seems to want to draw as many as possible.
** ''Hopeless Masquerade'' features almost every character from the Windows games ([[AllThereInThemanual and the supplementary material]]), if not as a player character, then as a spectator in the background. Notable exceptions are Akyuu, the Watatsuki sisters, Kasen, Meiling, and [[MadwomanInTheAttic Flandre]].
* CannotCrossRunningWater: Remilia and Flandre Scarlet (and supposedly other ''Touhou'' vampires) have this among their weaknesses.
* CarnivoreConfusion:
** Gensokyo has a food chain. [[ToServeMan You're not at the top of it]], since most non-human characters ''will'' attempt to eat helpless humans away from the protection of a village.
** Most humans eat meat even though all animals in Gensokyo can become youkai if they live long enough/become closer to enlightenment. One of the articles in ''[=BAiJR=]'' is about the rabbits protesting the Hakurei shrine serving rabbit stew.
* CastHerd: Given the [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters enormous number of characters]], it isn't surprising they tend to be split into distinct groups. Sometimes this is done per game, but other times, it's done based on location (Eientei/Moriya), based on intellect ("[[TheDitz Team 9-ball]]"), and so forth. Tends to be subverted over time as each group stars in print works that elaborate on their members' characterizations.
* CelestialBureaucracy: Used repeatedly, given how many of the settings have to do with the afterlife. One recurring gag is that the Ministry of Right and Wrong (ie: Hell) is constantly running into budget problems and has to either downsize, come up with alternate sources of income like publishing guidebooks, or whatever else the story requires.
* ChekhovsGun:
** ''Perfect Memento in Strict Sense'' was released in 2006 before the game ''Mountain of Faith''. With that in mind, look through some of the articles and realize just how much of ''Perfect Memento'' became used in future games.
** Both the games and the side materials have been foreshadowing some kind of big social upheaval that's about to occur. What form this will take exactly however is currently unknown.
* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Most of the characters that appeared in the PC-98 games (read: every character except Reimu, Marisa, Alice, and Yuuka) have not made any more appearances outside of the game they originally appeared in. Compare that to the cast members of the games since ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'', who make appearances in multiple games and source material.
* CityWithNoName: The Human Village (somewhat justified in that there seems to be only the one), and the Former District of Hell (also called the Ancient City or the Subterranean City). There's also a Tengu City somewhere up Youkai Mountain (ugh...) and a Lunar Capital on the Moon, but they may just be a product of people only talking about it indirectly.
* ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve:
** If [[TheOneGuy Rinnosuke's]] theories are correct, the entire realm of Gensokyo ''inverts'' this. According to him, things such as magic, youkai, gods, etc. are able to exist in Gensokyo because people in the outside world ''actively disbelieve'' in them. For instance, in the tie-in manga ''Silent Sinner in Blue'', he manages to find information on the Moon landings because, as he claims, enough people have become convinced that they never happened. There is also evidence to the contrary (what with him being a KnowNothingKnowItAll), so this is hardly conclusive proof.
** In general, this is how youkai and gods come into being. The belief in them makes them stronger, while forgetting them causes them to either disappear (youkai) or return to being nameless Divine Spirits (gods). Gods, however, are shaped by their myths, which allows them to change their titles and powers due to their followers believing in them. Kanako was originally a Storm god before she became a Mountain god, for example. The real reason for Gensokyo's existence is to separate the Youkai from human imagination, allowing them to shape themselves. This trope is played straight, subverted, and inverted all at the same time.
* {{Cliffhanger}}: The trial of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' ends with the appearance of an unknown character and Reimu deciding to strike first. It cuts out in the middle of her strike, followed by a "to be continued".
** Reisen's scenario mode in the [=PS4=] version of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' also ends with a {{Cliffhanger}} tying into ''Touhou 15.5''.
* CoinsForTheDead: In keeping with her job as TheFerryman, Komachi Onozuka wears a Chinese-style coin tied around her waist, and often throws them as projectiles.
* ConservationOfCompetence: Most "servant" characters in the series are portrayed by the narrative as fairly useless or lazy compared to their hyper-competent bosses. However, they're still strong enough to make stage 5 a challenge.
* ContinuityCreep: The plots of the games were originally largely standalone. Each game was generally self-contained. However, starting with ''Mountain of Faith'', the series has gained continuity, the events happening in each game becoming connected in various ways. ZUN has both stated that "''Touhou'' is not a series" and included the phrase "''Touhou'' series" in manuals.
* ContinuityReboot: The first 5 games were released between 1996 and 1998 on the Japan-only PC-98 computer. In 2002, the series continued on the Windows platform starting with ''Touhou 6'', ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil''. Although the numbering scheme still includes the PC-98 games, most of the characters and events in these games have never been mentioned again in any canon materials, including ''Perfect Memento in Strict Sense''. The only exceptions are PC-98 characters who made reappearances in the Windows games: Reimu Hakurei, Marisa Kirisame, Alice Margatroid (looking much older than her appearance as a child in ''Mystic Square'' and with a different backstory), and Yuuka Kazami. Fans still argue if the rest of the PC-98s are canon and if Alice's new backstory can compliment hers in ''Mystic Square''.
* ConvectionSchmonvection: There are many examples, but some notable ones involve flying through the Burning Hells and fighting a boss who throws miniature suns at you routinely. Some of this can be justified by GameplayAndStorySegregation, but the player characters should have really died well before reaching Utsuho. Reimu does comment on how incredibly hot it is and that she's feeling like she's about to get roasted. She (and probably Marisa too) is most likely only saved by her very powerful magic shielding her. Still, that doesn't explain how Cirno managed not to be ''disintegrated'' when she went inside that very same place to fight Utsuho in ''Hisoutensoku''.
* CoolGate:
** The Hakurei Shrine serves as a gateway between our world and Gensokyo, and has a traditional Japanese arch.
** The gate at Hakugyokurou is placed at the entrance to the Netherworld, but it doesn't open. People just fly over it instead.
* CrapsaccharineWorld: ''Neo-traditionalism of Japan'' gives us a viewpoint of the future world Maribel and Renko live in; in summary, the world is what would happen if ''VideoGame/{{Seihou}}'' was given a dose of ''VideoGame/TalesSeries'' formula. This is jarring because this storyline is [[CerebusSyndrome surprisingly dark]].
* CreepyCemetery:
** Muenzuka, the location of the final stage of ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', and resting place of humans who died without any living family, as well as humans who came from the Outside World and met their ends at the hands of youkai. It's also covered in poisonous spider lily flowers and watched over by youkai cherry trees, the latter inducing sadness in whoever watches them. Save for Rinnosuke and Nazrin, who search the place for treasures due to the fact that it's one of the weakest spots of the Hakurei Barrier because of its intersections with the Outside World and Netherworld, it remains mostly deserted because of its dangers to both humans and youkai. The Road of Reconsideration that leads to it, on the other hand, is infested with human-eating youkai waiting to prey on the hapless Outsiders that get brought there.
** In ''Ten Desires'', it's revealed that Myouren Temple has a very vast cemetery in its backyard. Our heroes fight the Jiangshi Yoshika and her very oppressive poisonous kunai danmaku over it. Then it's revealed that the Buddhist monks deliberately built the cemetery over a different mausoleum to prevent their rival Taoist liches from resurrecting themselves. The entire travel to the mausoleum is characterized by its BGM echoing on the cave walls and vulgar spirits floating about as the heroes fly through the tunnel at max speed.
* CropCircles: Instead of aliens or the like, crop circles in Touhou are meeting spots for fairies during emergency situations.
* CrossCulturalReference: ZUN loves slipping in references to Western literature, though it's mostly present in the earlier Windows games, with later games relying far more on references to Japanese and nearby cultures.
* {{Crossover}}: "If it exists, there's a crossover with ''Touhou''" is almost an internet rule. Seriously, it even has its [[FanficRecs/TouhouCrossover own page]].
* CurtainsMatchTheWindow: All of the PC-98 characters have a same eye color as their hair (given that they're in their regular outfit). There is a fair share of Windows characters with this as well.
* CuteEmUp: Thankfully, Gensokyo's not a SugarBowl that TastesLikeDiabetes, but it's still a major dietary source of {{Moe}}.
* CuteMonsterGirl: Almost every {{youkai}} depicted in the series is one of these.
* DeadlyEuphemism: Inverted. Shrine maidens like Reimu have the task of "[[InsistentTerminology exterminating]]" youkai, which sounds very lethal, but in the context of ''Touhou'' it usually just means that they beat the youkai in question in [[NonLethalWarfare danmaku duels]] and tell them to stop doing whatever naughty thing they're doing. ''Forbidden Scrollery'' shows that [[spoiler:[[KilledOffForReal there have been exceptions to this rule]].]]
* DefeatMeansFriendship: At least one ending to every game involves the main character having a tea party with the BigBad, and [[TheDragon dragons]] Sakuya Izayoi, Youmu Konpaku, Sanae Kochiya, Reisen Udongein Inaba, and even Marisa Kirisame have become playable characters after getting defeated.
* DeliberateValuesDissonance: To match with the BlueAndOrangeMorality, standards in Gensokyo are often nothing like ours. The most obvious example is how any human not in a designated safe area during the night is [[ToServeMan fair game]] for any youkai, as humans are expected to be at least proficient in youkai hunting. This is the whole point of ''Symposium of Post-mysticism'', with Kanako, Byakuren and Miko arguing about the role of humans and youkai in Gensokyo.
* DidWeJustHaveTeaWithCthulhu: Pretty much every game has an ending like this.
* DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu: In the PC-98 games, you defeat the Angel of Death, [[GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere two goddesses who created their own dream world (just because your player character was bored)]], and The Goddess of Hell. In the Windows series, the protagonist stops the mistress of the Netherworld with the power to invoke death in mortals, the local Charon equivalent, one of the Judges of the dead (who is implied to be more powerful than anything in Gensokyo), a hell raven channeling the power of a sun god to control nuclear fusion, not to mention the [[RealityWarper reality-warping]] youkai who may have created Gensokyo itself. This is one of the purposes behind the spell card system - it allows even weak humans and youkai a chance at fighting stronger opponents to settle accounts, without needless, one-sided bloodshed.
* DoNotSpoilThisEnding: ZUN has requested that the fanbase keep the endings of the games secret and, for the most part, the fanbase complies (although you can find all of them if you know where to look). Given that request, and the fact that, to get a good ending, one has to 1 credit clear the game, seeing the good ending of a game is [[EarnYourFun a great accomplishment, indeed.]]
* DragonsAreDivine: The most powerful god in Gensokyo is the unnamed dragon god, who is worshiped by both humans and youkai alike as a creator god found in the ocean, sky, and rain. It also serves as a protector deity. Akyuu describes it as so large that it's thicker than a thousand-year-old tree, and so long that it could blot out the sky. In terms of power, she mentions that its cry is said to part the sky and create thunderstorms, and that just by moving it can create earthquakes. It can also easily move between Gensokyo, hell, heaven, and the Netherworld without being stopped by the Great Hakurei Barrier. Its last appearance was when the Barrier was first erected in 1885, where the youkai sages managed to placate the dragon god by staking their very existences swearing eternal peace towards it.
* DragonsUpTheYinYang:
** Dragons are rarely seen, but they are said to be in the ''highest'' class of beings in Gensokyo. One dragon spoken of in canon is worshiped as a god by human and youkai alike for his power to create or destroy anything. It's said that he appeared in the sky on the day the Great Hakurei Border was erected.
** Kasen has a baby pet dragon and its status as a [[GooGooGodlike godlike being makes itself known right away by causing a (very local) rainstorm]]. She alludes to the fact that simply hatching was enough to cause a calamitous thunderstorm.
** At one point in ''Wild and Horned Hermit'', Nitori mentions a water dragon "Lord Suiryuu" as being the only thing she can think of powerful enough to create the waterspout that was the focus of the chapter. Although [[spoiler:it turns out it was a Kishin.]]
** In ''Forbidden Scrollery'', Marisa accidentally helps an Evil Dragon (that's its name) unseal itself from one of Kosuzu's scrolls. Despite being Evil, it politely thanks them for the help and gives them gifts being flying away to rest for a few hundred years.
* DreamLand: The later stages of ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'' and the extra stage of ''Lotus Land Story''.
** Also where the Lunarians are hiding in ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom''.
* DropInCharacter: Half the cast, to one degree or other, and into various locations, the most common being the Hakurei Shrine.
* DrunkenMaster: The creator of the games, ZUN, is a drinker, and MemeticMutation has progressed it to the point where, much like all the oni characters, he is ''never sober''. This isn't too far from the truth. Practically every image of him seems to show a beer within arm's reach, and ZUN himself admitted being drunk during some of ''Imperishable Night'''s development. In-Universe, the Oni are this. Suika Ibuki's even stated to never be sober.
* EasilyForgiven: No matter what schemes or grievous bodily harm has been committed, after the incident is over, everything goes back to normal and everyone is invited to the Hakurei shrine for partying and booze. For a while, Tenshi Hinanawi was notable for being the ''only'' character who didn't receive this, a unique status she retained until ''Impossible Spell Card'', wherein Seija Kijin is hunted by the majority of Gensokyo as a fugitive for her actions in the previous game.
* EldritchLocation:
** The Great Hakurei Barrier is actually not really a barrier in the traditional sense and by its very nature defies common sense. Marisa once attempted to cross it, but no matter how far she flew, [[AlienGeometries the scenery just stretched on forever, and the moment she turned around, she was back where she started, giving the appearance that she had gotten nowhere.]] It is even described as non-Euclidean.
** Gensokyo's secondary barrier, described as the Boundary of Fantasy and Reality, was erected by Yukari Yakumo alone about 500 years ago, and covers the entire world, beckoning youkai from even outside Japan and the rest of Asia to head to Gensokyo.
** Ushirodo-no-Kuni, the Land of the Rear Door and personal realm of Okina Matara, is a seemingly infinite black abyss with floating doors leading to places in Gensokyo.
* ElegantGothicLolita: A large chunk of the cast wears clothing in this style, though later characters' designs have moved away from it.
* EliteFour: Among the oni, there was a famous group called the "Four Devas of the Mountains". When the oni decided to leave the human world, each of the Four Devas went their separate ways. The confirmed members are Suika Ibuki and Yuugi Hoshiguma. Kasen Ibaraki is heavily implied to be the third Deva, although it has not been said outright.
* ElixirOfLife: Shows up twice:
** Eirin Yagokoro came up with the Hourai Elixir, which induces complete Resurrective Immortality in the drinker after three sips (the first prevents aging, the second prevents disease), and was banished to Earth from the Moon along with Kaguya. When Kaguya left the Earth, she left the elixir behind and he Emperor ordered it destroyed, but Mokou (whose father had been humiliated by Kaguya's Impossible Task) stole it and drank it herself.
** Junko launched an invasion of the Moon to get revenge on Chang'e (her son was killed by one of the suns shot down by her husband Houyi), unaware that the Lunarians had imprisoned her for drinking the Hourai Elixir as well.
* EmptyQuiver: Kanako gave Utsuho power over nuclear fusion via Yatagarasu because she believes becoming known as a god who grants miraculous technology would serve as good advertising for the shrine. This ends up ''backfiring'' when Utsuho decides to use it for herself, and to [[ToCreateAPlaygroundForEvil turn Gensokyo into a living hell]]. Her status in later games have diluted to what can be classified as "Bent Spear" (we know the bomb is there, but it's not a priority) and "[[HurricaneOfPuns Faded]] [[FridgeBrilliance Giant]]" (an event that involves a nuclear reactor that's currently in use by the military, e.g. Moriya Shrine).
* EveryoneHasASpecialMove: The spellcards each character have in stock help themselves become distinct, like [[NiceHat their hats]]. They tell stories, they reference user's power, and even the shapes of the bullets used in the spellcards can become a special trait for a character.
* EveryoneIsASuper: From common fairies to even average Gensokyo humans, who have some magic powers, it is flat-out assumed ''everyone'' has some kind of special powers or danmaku powers here. So, when Sanae first came to Gensokyou, she was unhappy at this fact, as she's not special anymore. Likewise, Rika is one of the few characters to ''not'' have a special ability, and offsets the fact by using technology that is normally off-limits to a non-outsider, and by not fighting by the rules.
* EvilDoppelganger:
** In ''Antinomy of Common Flowers'', as a side effect of the ongoing incident, Dream World versions of the characters start appearing in the real world. These copies have BrutalHonesty and are often violent. [[spoiler:In the Yorigami Sisters' scenario, they are tasked with capturing these copies that are running rampant in the real world.]]
** In Sumireko's scenario, [[spoiler:there are ''two'' copies of herself, her Dream World self and the Dream World self's doppelgänger]].
* EvilIsNotAToy: In the story of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'', both Reimu and company treat the power of the strange rumors as playthings and manipulate them to be either harmless or even in a way to fit their own agenda. However, [[spoiler:one night, a crack is formed in the barrier, and it also becomes clear that everyone had been under the rumors' influence without realizing it, causing them to collect the occult balls and leading to said crack forming in the first place]].
* ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin:
** If we were to tell you that ''kedama'' essentially means "fuzzball" in Japanese, could you guess what enemy it refers to?
** ''Hopeless Masquerade'' is a love letter to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noh Noh theatre]].
* ExcusePlot: Progressively less as the series progresses, but the PC-98 games in particular had very flimsy plots.
** Danmaku Amanojaku Gold Rush is an unreleased game made in two days meant to be played at the Digital Game Expo 2014 where Seija takes the Miracle Mallet and uses it to rob the Hakurei Shrine. When asked how Seija can use said Mallet (since only inchlings are able to use it), ZUN just said that she can't, that since he made the game so quickly he didn't think about the plot at all.
* TheFairFolk: {{Youkai}} tend to act like this. They have been relatively behaving this generation due to a lazy yet powerful {{miko}} and trigger-happy CuteWitch who have been [[DefeatMeansFriendship befriending them]] constantly.
* FairyTale: Fairy tales are sometimes referenced in spell cards.
* {{Fanime}}:
** ''[[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Touhou_Project_Side_Story Touhou Project Side Story]]'' by SOUND HOLIC, released at Comiket 73. Features a now non-canon depiction of the Lunarians. It introduced a SpotlightStealingSquad of {{Original Character}}s, leaving the canon characters standing on the sidelines without doing much to instigate or resolve the plot. It also follows the LeaveTheCameraRunning school of cinematography.
** ''Anime/MusouKakyouASummerDaysDream'' by Maikaze, the first episode of which was released at Comiket 75. Managed to bring in such big names as Creator/RieTanaka to do voice work. Unfortunately, it had poor sales and it wasn't until 2011 that another episode was announced, and ''another'' year until it was released.
** Manpuku Jinja's ''Gensou Mangekyou'' (or ''WebAnimation/FantasyKaleidoscope''), which retells the story of ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' in the first episode, ''the Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' in the second to fourth episode, and ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'' in the fifth and sixth episode.
** ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8bbNnLnPiw Patchouli to Explode]]'', released at Reitaisai [=SP2=]. Unlike the other examples here, it's based on a doujinshi and follows a small cast.
** A Chinese fanime titled ''Hifuu Club Activity Record ~ The Sealed Esoteric History'' by Kyoto Fantasy Troupe. This one focusing more on Gensokyo and its characters' pasts alongside adapting the CD stories with Maribel and Renko as well.
* FantasticCasteSystem: The Tengu has a set up caste system based around their type at birth.
* FantasticGhetto: The underground is basically a place where despised youkai eventually settle down.
* FantasticNatureReserve:
** The purpose of Gensokyo's existence, which was eventually made clear from ''Mountain of Faith'' onward. Since belief in such beings as youkai and gods is rapidly disappearing in the outside world, Gensokyo is a haven for them.
** On a more mundane level, Gensokyo due to its nature as a place where forgotten things end up is also a haven for mundane species that are either extremely rare, extirpated from, or completely extinct in Japan and elsewhere in the world, such as crested ibises and the Japanese wolf.
** The "nature reserve" part is also noted in Chapter 33 of ''Wild and Horned Hermit'', where Yukari mentions that she always makes sure to do sterilization procedures in order to prevent Gensokyo from being accidentally populated by things that aren't on the ropes in the Outside World. She figures out Kasen can go through the Barrier (And hasn't done similar procedures) because otherwise the western dandelions out-competing the Japanese dandelions in the Outside World would not have gotten inside. One reason Yukari lists for terminating them with extreme prejudice is the dandelions managing to form more belligerent fairies in Gensokyo, displacing the old ones.
* FantasticRacism:
** The residents of the underground are mostly youkai who are hated or feared, usually for their power. A notable example is the [[MindReading satori species]]. According to Hatate's comments from ''Double Spoiler'' on Satori's spells, there used to be many satoris on Youkai Mountain, but they were banished to [[FantasticGhetto the underground]] because of their [[AMindIsATerribleThingToRead ability to read other people's minds]].
** ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' brings up the question of whether it's youkai who are oppressing humans or the other way around. It should be noted that the cycle of youkai terrorizing humans and being "exterminated" in turn is actually [[InherentInTheSystem necessary for Gensokyo's survival]]. Not that that excuses some of the remarks our heroines make...
** Reimu is unique in that, despite one of the few dealing with youkai being jerks on a daily basis, she doesn't care about them one way or another.
** [[{{Tanuki}} Mamizou]] is noted for her dislike of [[{{Kitsune}} foxes]] and was responsible for driving them away from her native island of Sado. Whether Mamizou will attempt to do something similar in Gensokyo in the future is unclear.
** Youkai in general, harmless or not, are treated this way by humans. However, given how many times youkai who call themselves "harmless" have manipulated the main characters into doing their bidding, and how even Nitori stops just short of blurting out how Kappa still kill humans to eat their shirikodama, it might be [[JustifiedTrope justified]], even if depictions of that justification are off-screen and HandWaved, and even if the Youkai themselves don't exactly have a choice.
* {{Fan Vid}}s: [[FanficRecs/TouhouFanVids a whole page of them.]]
* FanworkOnlyFans: ''Touhou'' is typically introduced to will-be fans through a fan video or music before those people discover the games themselves. There are many people who are fans of fandom interpretations and doujin circles and have never played an actual ''Touhou'' game.
** This created the bizarre situation of people commenting on any given ''Touhou'' fanwork, especially a FanVid, asking "What anime is this?" despite there not being a ''Touhou'' anime (at least, no official one). This happened so often that "What anime is this" became a meme on its own.
* {{Flanderization}}: {{Fanon}} is fond of this, characters commonly reduced to a single character quirk which may or may not have been a major part of their character in the original games. Given that this happens to every single character, often in multiple ways, a full list of every change would far, ''far'' larger than this page.
* FleetingDemographicRule: Formerly-inanimate objects plot social upheaval. Are they a doll[[note]]Medicine's route in ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'', released 2005[[/note]], or musical instruments[[note]]The plot of ''Double-Dealing Character'', released 2013[[/note]]?
* FloatingClocks: Sakuya can temporarily freeze time, usually seen in animated works as clocks appearing and fading all over the screen.
* FlyingFirepower: ''Everyone'' in the series who fights is capable of flying and firing danmaku.
* FoulFlower: Yuuka Kazami is a flower youkai... and one of the oldest and most powerful in a setting that includes PhysicalGods. Fandom nicknamed her the "Ultimate Sadistic Creature" and likes to show her inflicting DisproportionateRetribution on people who disturb her sunflower field.
* FriendlyWar: The main purpose of the spell card system is to allow youkai to "attack" humans without killing them, and to be "exterminated" without actually being killed themselves; this system gives the youkai sustenance so they don't die by PuffOfLogic[[note]]a youkai that doesn't attack humans isn't a youkai[[/note]] and can live their lives freely.
** SecretWar: While a [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters massive array of characters]] avidly use the spell card system, it's implied that out of all of Gensokyo's population, only a handful of the major characters understand the system's real purpose. Reimu and Yukari are the best examples.
* FullContactMagic: At least in the fighting games, as well as in FanWorks, the intense nature of spell card duels is portrayed as having a fierce physical combat aspect, especially for the more physically abled girls.
* FunctionalMagic: Inherent Gift, Theurgy, Device Magic, Alchemical Magic, Rule Magic, and Force Magic are all present.
* GaidenGame: Anything with a decimal point in its number.
* GambitPileup: So Sumireko's (reasonably complex) plan was actually part of Sagume's plans, which were themselves entirely within the scope of Junko's plans. Then Eirin figures out what's going on and fixes it with her own plan.
* GameBreakingBug:
** In ''UFO'', reaching 1 billion points would up and crash the game. A patch was released to fix this 12 days after release.
** In ''Fairy Wars'', hitting Retry from the pause menu on Stage [=C2-2=] or [=C2-3=] and then subsequently beating the game on route C2 without returning to the menu would crash the game. This one has not been patched.
** In ''Ten Desires'', the game would crash if you are not using a bomb, a valuable resource, when the Survival Card of the Extra Boss ends. This is the ''second-to-last'' attack in the entire game. Even worse, that makes it [[UnwinnableByMistake impossible to capture]] in Spellcard mode because you aren't ''given'' any bombs to start with. Be grateful the patch for that only took 4 days after release.
** In ''Hopeless Masquerade'', the game will crash if Mamizou's Last Word is blocked.
* GameplayAndStorySegregation: There tends to be a disconnect between what a character's powers are ''said'' to be, and what they can actually ''do.'' No matter what a character's stated powers are, they only manifest in the form of danmaku in-game. Justified, in that the spell card rules require danmaku to be used to solve disputes. It's what stops every stage 5, 6, and extra boss from curb-stomping you. See HoldingBackThePhlebotinum. The in-universe explanation for this is that the character's powers are listed in the UniverseCompendium as whatever the character ''says'' they are, even if it doesn't reflect reality in any way.
** Although divine beings are said to be poisonous to youkai, Remilia can safely suck Tenshi and Suwako's blood in ''Hisoutensoku'' in her alternate special move "Vampire Kiss".
* GhibliHills: What most of Gensokyo's landscape consists of, SceneryPorn included.
* GiantPoofySleeves: A good half of the cast.
* GoodAllAlong:
** As with WhiteAndGreyMorality, almost nobody is ''really'' evil in Gensokyo, which helps facilitate DefeatMeansFriendship. Actively noted by ZUN, who mentioned that the "darker" plots of ''Mountain of Faith'' and ''Subterranean Animism'' (see SortingAlgorithmOfEvil) would be shifted back to the lighter tone of the rest of the series in subsequent games, which was indeed the case with ''UFO'', save for the aforementioned philosophising about the nature of youkai and humans.
** The only aversions so far in canon are Seiga Kaku and Seija Kijin. Seiga is explicitly described as evil by everyone else (mostly the necromancy) and no one likes her, while Seija was not forgiven for what she did in ''Double Dealing Character'', and not even her defeat [[DefeatMeansFriendship guarantees friendship]] with the player characters; during ''Impossible Spell Card'', she's on the run because ''everyone'' is after her for what she did (not that she really minds, due to her contrarian nature).
* GratuitousEnglish: [[TranslationConvention The joke is usually lost in fan patches]], but it does indeed happen. Though, this isn't readily apparent anyway, as most of the time, they're spelled out in kanji.
** In ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', Clownpiece yells "It's lunatic tiiiime!".
** Hecatia's shirt has "Welcome ♥️ Hell" written on it, in plain English.
** Before ''Antinomy of Common Flowers'' made it canon, CallingYourAttacks was a fairly common thing in fanworks. And since spell cards usually have parts of English in thier names, you can imagine this was done a lot.
* GreatBigLibraryOfEverything: Voile, the Magical Library [[note]]Voile is simply from the name of the music track that plays there: the library is never given a name in the narrative[[/note]] in the Scarlet Devil Mansion's basement. It's large enough to allow for a stage roughly five-minute-long aerial battle over the bookshelves traveling in one direction without ever reaching the end. The library is maintained by [[BadassBookworm Patchouli Knowledge]], who spends her days locked up inside adding to the already-massive cache of knowledge — she's not just the librarian, but also the author of an unspecified proportion of the tomes in her library, and probably the overwhelming majority of the magic books in the library, given the esoteric rules for wizardry in the ''Touhou'' 'verse. While 100 straight years of this this have given her [[SquishyWizard anemia, asthma, and Vitamin A deficiency]], you are more than likely to find anything you could ever want in there ([[StickyFingers Marisa]] sure does).
* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold:
** By the end of ''Imperishable Night'', only all the team members, Kaguya and company, and Keine know that the real incident was the corrupted Moon. Everyone else thinks that the real incident was the unending night, which was actually caused by the protagonists you chose in order to buy time to fix the Moon.
** From Reimu's interview in ''Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red'', it would seem Gensokyo's residents are unaware of her resolving ''any'' of the incidents. Later on in ''Wild and Horned Hermit'', she decides to start throwing big "Incident Resolution Parties" to make sure everyone realizes that she was the hero. Although apparently this fails, since in ''Forbidden Scrollery'', Akyuu hadn't noticed that ''Double Dealing Character'' had occurred, despite that being the same Incident we saw Reimu host a party for.
* HairDecorations: If a character doesn't have a NiceHat or [[LittleBitBeastly animal ears]], they'll most likely have some kind of hair decoration instead. There are many, ''many'' kinds worn here.
* HardWorkHardlyWorks:
** Most youkai seem to get by with whatever talent they're born with and no training whatsoever.
** Reimu's laziness, yet apparent genius lets her get by without any training either. Averted with Marisa, who works her butt off just to keep up.
* HeartIsAnAwesomePower: Pretty much every character has some InformedAbility that is nearly useless if taken at face value, and the ones that don't are basically triple-7s on the SuperpowerLottery. Danmaku prowess is sometimes even completely exclusive to what power a character has, though more frequently the character's ability plays a role in their danmaku to varying degrees, such as Cirno's ice projectiles making up most but not all of her attacks.
* HeroicComedicSociopath: Many of the playable characters are acknowledged not to be the most virtuous people around, and fighting the villain of the day is often done for purely selfish reasons. Aside from their motives, the BossBanter also tends to reveal serious lapses in moral judgement on the protagonists' part.
* HiddenTrack: The soundtrack CD for ''Hopeless Masquerade'' contains an 8-bit cover of the game's "Candid Friend" arrangement. It didn't even have an official name until the [=iTunes=] and Google Play releases confirmed it (it's simply titled "Akutagawa Ryuunosuke's "Kappa" ~ Candid Friend (8bit)", in case you were wondering).
* HistoricalCharactersFictionalRelative:
** Remilia Scarlet claims to be descended from [[UsefulNotes/VladTheImpaler Vlad Tepes]] ([[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ1jgSkP0Oc and this is the title of her stage theme]]). It's complete BS, however: if anything, she's old enough to have been his ''daughter''.
** Yuyuko Saigyouji is implied to be the daughter of the famous Japanese poet [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saigy%C5%8D Saigyou]].
** Byakuren Hijiki is the sister of the actual Buddhist priest Myouren Hijiri.
** Fujiwara no Mokou was the daughter of a Fujiwara noble of high enough rank to be a princess' suitor. However, due to [[TheTaleOfTheBambooCutter the princess]] humiliating her father by refusing his proposal, Mokou swore revenge, drank the Hourai elixir she was supposed to destroy, and now fights Kaguya whenever she can (since both are immortal).
** The relation between Yukari Yakumo (one of the oldest and most powerful youkai in Gensokyo, able to do [[SemanticSuperpower whatever the hell she wants with boundaries]]) and Maribel Hearn (a young girl who can see boundaries) is uncertain, but fanon generally accepts that Yukari was Maribel very (very) long ago, despite existing in the same time period (which, admittedly, means very little in Gensokyo). When asked about this, ZUN only said "There once was a man named Lafcadio Hearn" (Lafcadio being a 19th-century Irishman who eventually settled in Japan, taking the name Koizumi ''Yakumo'').
* HitSoHardTheCalendarFeltIt: The creation of the great Hakurei Barrier also acted as the lead event for changing the Gensokyan calendar to its own system. This makes the year 2015 for us, for example, into the year 130 for them.
* HoldingBackThePhlebotinum: The spell card system was created because the youkai would have no other way to fight Reimu, who is canonically unbeatable by any method when she isn't messing around, and killing her would possibly result in the collapse of Gensokyo's barrier, which separates it from our world and would thus [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt eradicate Gensokyo and everyone in it]], and numerous other characters could crack the planet in half if they got serious. For Reimu it may just be an excuse to be lazy and not take things seriously. Some of the more forward thinking youkai recognize that the spell card system allows them to sit down and have tea with mortal enemies, and keeps the place at least ''safer'', if not totally safe.
* HonoraryPrincess: It features a lot of princesses, though very few have actual royal status.
** Toyohime, Yorirhime, and Kaguya are princesses in Lunarian society (Kaguya being the one from TheTaleOfTheBambooCutter).
** Fujiwara no Mokou was the daughter of a high-ranking nobleman (high enough to ask for Kaguya's hand in marriage), but her status as ex-nobility is rarely mentioned.
** Yuyuko Saiyouji is a ghost princess, who was the daughter of a Japanese court poet in life.
** Kotohime is from one of the early games, a CloudCuckoolander who thinks she's a police officer.
** Wakasagihime, despite the name, shows no sign of being royalty, being a mermaid named after a Japanese fish.
** Parsee Mizuhashi is a hashihime (bridge princess), a youkai based on a WomanScorned who waits under bridges to kill loving couples.
** While her general attitude is TheOjou (especially in fandom), the vampire Remilia Scarlet's only link to princessdom is her theme, "Septette for the Dead Princess" (she claims to be descended from [[{{Dracula}} Vlad Tepes]], but this is a [[BlatantLies bold-faced lie]]).
* HufflepuffHouse: Many species and groups are introduced to having a presence in Gensokyo with one character who has a few lines, and is then never mentioned again. Various ExpandedUniverse material, well, expands on these groups, with the tengu in particular being the most fleshed out society, but groups like Heaven and Makai are still just there with no other information.
* HyperactiveSprite:
** In the fighting games, Suika keeps goofily swaying back and forth when standing in place.
** In ''Mountain of Faith'', Hina spins while shooting bullets in all directions. ''A lot.''
* IAmNotAGun: Youkai, as beings born from human fears or as explanations for the unknown, tend to have a specific "purpose" that they were born to fulfill, most commonly to antagonize humans. Not all of them want to though, despite the risk of death or worse for being forgotten after abandoning their "purpose". Byakuren's Buddhist temple was created to help youkai either find a new purpose or simply come to terms with non-existence. Of course, most of the younger ones don't even ''know'' they have a purpose or why they should care.
* IBelieveICanFly: Pretty much everyone. By this point, the series has stopped trying to justify it. Originally, Reimu walked or used Genji, a flying turtle.
* IconicSequelCharacter: Many, MANY characters, especially since most of the characters from the first five games have disappeared without a trace, and the very first game barely has any story at all. Among the popular protagonists, Marisa debuts in the second game, and Sakuya in the sixth. Yukari, who has been part of Gensokyo's history since it was founded, doesn't even appear until the seventh game, and Sanae doesn't appear until the ''tenth''.
* IdiosyncraticEpisodeNaming: With the exception of ''Sangetsusei'' and some of the music [=CDs=], the Japanese title of every official Touhou work shares at least one kanji with the name of a character introduced in it (or involved, in the case of ''Seasonal Dream Vision'').
* ImageBoard:
** [[http://www.pooshlmer.com/wakaba/wakaba.html Pooshlmer]] is a major English imageboard for most of your ''Touhou'' needs.
** [[http://voile.gensokyo.org/ Voile,]] not to be confused with Patchouli's library, is where people translate the fancomics.
** Although [[ImageBooru Danbooru]] isn't specifically ''dedicated'' to ''Touhou'', over 25% (and growing) of its content (over 600k images, out of Danbooru's total of over three million) is ''Touhou''. Some individual ''characters'' (and not even just the main characters) have more images than entire popular ''series'' such as ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'' and ''Franchise/LyricalNanoha''. As an example, Fujiwara no Mokou, who wasn't playable until ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' (''eleven years'' after her introduction in 2004's ''Imperishable Night''), is represented in more posts than the entire ''Final Fantasy'' franchise.
* {{Immortality}}:
** ResurrectiveImmortality:
*** All who drink the Hourai Elixir gain the resurrective type, at least functionally. The very concept of death is removed from their being, but in practice this works by having them "respawn" whenever they take what would've been lethal damage.
*** The fairies work like this: As embodiments of nature, they are reborn immediately whenever they die. Gameplay-wise, this is the explanation for how you can blow them away by the hundreds without feeling guilty, and in the written stories, we see them fall asleep in the snow, die of hypothermia, and wake up the next morning. Akyuu says they don't really understand what death ''is''.
** TheAgeless:
*** [[WitchSpecies Magicians]] who become "complete" gain this — [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld they stop aging]], but disease may or may not still kill them, as they're still [[SquishyWizard as fragile as humans]].
*** Lunarians don't age, since it's apparently caused by "impurity", which they've isolated themselves from. They can die by non-natural means, though, and it's implied that despite their efforts, they still carry small traces of impurity from before they moved to the moon and will ''eventually'' die of old age, just much, much slower.
*** Toyosatomimi no Miko and company were seeking this, as was Byakuren.
* ImmortalImmaturity: Practically everyone. Notable exceptions are Kaguya and Yuyuko, when she's not busy harassing her guardian. It's also implied that Suwako's childishness is really just an act.
* ImprobablyFemaleCast: Near the entire cast ''just happens'' to be female, with a literal handful of exceptions; men ''do'' live in Gensokyo, but they're rarely ever relevant to the plot. However, statements by ZUN imply that this isn't so much a personal taste as it is something that's enforced, since so many people associate ''Touhou'' with "girls shooting bullets at each other" that changing it would ruin that dynamic. ZUN has mentioned that for ''Undefined Fantastic Object'', he originally planned to have Byakuren's brother Myouren be the final boss, but didn't go through with it since having an "old man" be the final boss of a ''Touhou'' game would be weird. Subsequently, the final boss of ''Ten Desires'' is a [[GenderFlip Gender Flipped]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Sh%C5%8Dtoku Prince Shoutoku]], and the final boss of ''Double-Dealing Character'' is closely tied to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Issun-b%C5%8Dshi Issun-boshi]] and has a very boyish name.
* InformedAbility: Due to how danmaku battles work,[[note]]they're essentially a formalized dueling system designed to level the playing field and reduce lethality[[/note]] most characters' stated abilities have very little relevance to their gameplay performance.
* InnBetweenTheWorlds: The Hakurei Shrine technically isn't part of Gensokyo proper, instead being located on the eastern portion of Great Hakurei Barrier that separates Gensokyo from the Outside World, and simultaneously existing within both. As a result of its dual existence, objects from the Outside World and occasionally even people can be spirited away to Gensokyo through the Shrine's Outside World counterpart, though the exact mechanism remains unknown.
* InternalDeconstruction: As the series progresses and accumulates continuity, several elements of the setting that were previously ignored or laughed off have come under increased scrutiny. The casual youkai-hunting done in the games has been revealed to be part of a far more sinister and intentional ForeverWar between humans and youkai, and there are differing opinions on how justifiable the youkai-hunting is in the first place. While ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' got the main characters chewed out by Byakuren for their casual racism, ''Forbidden Scrollery'' shows that interacting with youkai [[TheFairFolk rarely turns out well for the average person.]]
* ItAmusedMe: Bored characters do a lot of crazy things in this series and are occasionally responsible for the entire plot with no further motive than to shake things up. Many extra stage fights are along these lines on the part of both protagonist and boss. This is the entire reason why Tenshi comes down in ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''.
* ItRunsOnNonsensoleum: In ''Silent Sinner In Blue,'' the rocket to reach the moon is designed by taking some out-of-context tidbits from the Apollo moon missions, and hammering them back together with InsaneTrollLogic. The result is this adorable thing that basically looks like a vaguely rocket-shaped cottage with frilly curtained windows. When Eirin sneaks in to check up on it, she's shocked... at how perfectly made it is without her assistance. This is Gensokyo, so ''of course'' it's space-worthy.
* ItsPersonal:
** Mokou holds Kaguya responsible for the humiliation and eventual death of her father, and her grudge hasn't died even after an eternity of mutually despising and killing each other.
** Reimu and Yukari are not amused ''at all'' with the Hakurei Shrine's destruction in ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'', and so when they find out that [[ItAmusedMe Tenshi basically did it because she was bored]], well, they get very ''physical'' in expressing their displeasure.
** Chang'e has wronged Junko so terribly that the latter has become a nihilistic incarnation of hatred, and in the pursuit of her revenge, she has practically ousted the Lunarians from the Moon, uncaring of who or what got in her way. Hecatia Lapizlazuli also has beef with Chang'e for shooting down Apollo, so she was more than happy to lend Junko a hand.
* {{Jerkass}}: Most dialogue consists of the girls insulting each other, clashing egos, death threats, and in the case of defeating Mokou, casual murder and cannibalism.
* JustifiedTrope: ''So'' many. The Spell Card Rules, drafted by Reimu, justify NonLethalKO, LetsYouAndHimFight, SuperMovePortraitAttack, the ability to have crazy semiregular incidents while maintaining WhiteAndGreyMorality, and even the use of the BulletHell genre ''itself''... because the tropes are the law. And for very good reasons: it lets youkai do what they do best, lets Reimu easily resolve the incidents, and lets youkai fight back without fear of killing Reimu, which would be a very Bad Thing.
* KickingAssInAllHerFinery: Almost everyone wears pretty frilly dresses and fights in them as well.
* KingOfAllCosmos: The portrayal of some of the gods in the series are decidedly unusual. For example, Hecatia Lapislazuli is the ''Touhou'' version of the Greek goddess Hecate, making her one of the few non-Japanese characters. Here, she is one of the rulers of Hell, ranking much higher than the yamas. Hecate being a triple goddess is expressed as Hecatia having [[HiveMind three bodies at three different hells at once]], each for the Earth, the Moon, and the Otherworlds. She also seems to have taken a liking to modern teenager fashion, as she wears an "I HEART HELL" black T-shirt.
* {{Leitmotif}}:
** Each boss in the main series gets a unique song for her BossBattle, which naturally becomes her {{Leitmotif}} in fanworks.
** ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGwASZn0ZKA Shrine of the Wind ~ Theme of Eastern Story]]'' (an unused track from the first game) has become the {{Leitmotif}} for the series as a whole, with the intro music of all the main Windows games being remixes of it. Some FinalBoss themes also incorporate elements of it, and considering the remixes of it that are the themes of Stages 4 and 3 of ''IN'' and ''DDC'' respectively, it might qualify as the Leitmotif of the Bamboo Forest of the Lost.
** ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbjbNGgL8p8 The Gensokyo the Gods Loved]]'' from ''Mountain of Faith'' is often considered the unofficial Leitmotif for Gensokyo itself.
** This spreads over to Website/{{Pixiv}}, where the Leitmotif acts as a special tag for [[SceneryPorn exceptionally beautiful artwork]], even for unofficial Leitmotifs for special characters. For example, the original kanji for "Lunate Elf" along with its English reading is a tag for beautiful Daiyousei works.
* LetsFightLikeGentlemen: The [[JustifiedTrope justification]] for the danmaku combat system.
* LetsSeeYOUDoBetter:
** Interestingly enough, that's how the games were created. ZUN couldn't find any game he really liked, so he created his own. And ''boy'', did it work.
** In addition, a good chunk of the fandom's appeal is the opportunity to do this with ZUN's artwork/character designs.
* LikeAnOldMarriedCouple:
** Reimu and Marisa's conversations tend to default to mild bickering and teasing.
** Marisa and Alice more so, in both ''Imperishable Night'' and ''Subterranean Animism'', more than once ignoring the boss just to trade snipes.
* LittleMissBadass: Nearly everyone in the series.
* LivingForeverIsAwesome: The youkai are living it and loving it. Only Mokou has a problem with immortality.
* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Characters Surpassed one hundred]] years ago, even when only counting the ones who [[ContinuityReboot debuted in Windows games]].
* LoadsAndLoadsOfRaces: [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Category:Bestiary A large number]] of {{youkai}} and other groups, with every mainline game adding at least one more. Even "youkai" is just an umbrella term, and they can range from angry, ravenous monsters, to classical vampires, to beings that might as well be human.
* LongRunner: The first game came out all the way back in 1996, and yet the series continues to be very popular across the world.
* LowerDeckEpisode: ''Fairy Wars'', a much shorter game than usual, focuses on a quarrel between Cirno and the Three Faeries. Every single person in the game is a fairy, with Daiyousei, Lily and the Three Faeries themselves as bosses, rather than any of the usual "A-list" cast members. [[spoiler:Except at the end of the extra stage, where Cirno takes on Marisa]].
* LuckyRabbitsFoot: Tewi the rabbit, an unabashed prankster whose explicit power is giving people good luck.
* {{Lunacy}}:
** Youkai in general tend to be more powerful during a full moon.
** Byakuren notes in Reisen's scenario of ''Urban Legend In Limbo'' that urban legend phenomena tends to be strongest during the full moon.
* {{Lunarians}}: Kaguya and Eirin, with Reisen technically counting due to being a MoonRabbit. More are seen in official manga and ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom''.
* MacrossMissileMassacre: Often used in ''Touhou'' [[FanficRecs/TouhouFanVids Fan Vids]] to represent danmaku in three dimensions.
* TheMagicGoesAway: Gensokyo was created as a safe haven for magical creatures and gods who can no longer exist in the outside world. It's also implied that humans can't cast spells out there either. Although given the existence of immigrants it's not as though there's ''no'' magic outside. Yet.
-->'''Byakuren''': But then, because of the Westernization of Japan, folklore became superstition, shugendou gave way to secularism, and they were forgotten about along with humanity's fear of the dark. The tengu who were working together with humans starting appearing less and less. For this reason, the existence of these youkai was endangered. And not just tengu, but all youkai...
* MagicOrPsychic: The term "magic" is most commonly used to describe the SufficientlyAnalyzedMagic used by magicians and UsefulNotes/{{Onmyoudou}}, but it can also be used as an umbrella term to describe supernatural powers in general, such as Sumireko Usami's psychic powers.
* MagicalGirlWarrior: Most of the cast.
* MeaningfulName: Most characters have at least one name (the family name, most often) that's vaguely related to what they do.
* MirrorMatch:
** Miko's fifth match in ''Hopeless Masquerade'' is against herself. Of course, it's just [[VoluntaryShapeshifting Mamizou]], and the fight ends after one spell card, only for the real fight to begin.
** Eiki's last spellcard in ''Shoot the Bullet'' has her turn into Aya. It's probably some sort of test of character.
* MissionControl: In ''Subterranean Animism'', various youkai provide this to Reimu and Marisa, leading to different ammo/bombs, different special skills for Reimu, different dialogs and endings, and different ways of getting horribly mauled by Satori.
* MoeAnthropomorphism: A lot of the characters are humanoid representations of abstract concepts.
* MonoNoAware: One of the {{Central Theme}}s of the franchise, becoming particularly prominent when the cast interact with [[ImmortalsFearDeath immortal beings like the Lunarians]], as well as in the future setting of ''Music/TouhouZUNsMusicCollection''.
* MonsterClown: Featured heavily in the ''Dolls in Pseudo Paradise'' story.
* MonsterMash: It's fairly commonplace in Gensokyo for miko, witches, vampires, ghosts, aliens, faeries, oni, goddesses, and all sorts of other youkai to have tea or sake together.
* MookPromotion: Most of the normal enemies in every game are fairies. However, the [[AnIcePerson ice fairy]] Cirno is a self-proclaimed strongest fairy, and may well be one, appearing as a boss in few games and being the sole protagonist of ''Great Fairy Wars'' with an ability to freeze bullets.
* {{Mooks}}: Fairies, in addition to the lesser-used Fuzzballs and Doofy Ghosts. Fairies are [[SuicidalOverconfidence suicidally overconfident]], weak, and effectively immortal (regenerative), though the last [[GameplayAndStorySegregation doesn't manifest in the games]], probably because they "respawn" somewhere safe offscreen. These factors combine to make them pretty much perfect mooks
* MundaneMadeAwesome: '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9Qa9AIxJhs Touhou Soccer.]]'''
* MundaneUtility:
** ''[[MundaneMadeAwesome Touhou Soccer]]'', where the girls use their massively destructive spell cards to play ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kofnEdB8Blc Soccer]]''.
** Turns out that ghosts make excellent air conditioners.
** Similarly, there used to be an entire pool on Danbooru of Cirno being used for mundane ends, such as chilling drinks.
** Both Sakuya's and Kaguya's timehax abilities are used to maintain their homes in various ways.
** Yukari regularly uses her [[RealityWarper Phenomenal Cosmic Powers]] as a glorified transportation system.
** The official comics feature something of an aversion, in that the characters - particularly the human characters - don't seem to use their [[IBelieveICanFly powers of flight]] very much.
---> '''Marisa:''' Where's your ladder?
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Non-gameplay trope, N-Z]]
* TheNeedless: [[WitchSpecies Magicians who are turned into youkai]] don't need food or sleep, though they do both out of habit or leisure. They don't age, either.
* NewPowersAsThePlotDemands: Built into the descriptions. Almost all ability descriptions include 程度の能力 (Teido no nouryoku), which is (as of June 2012) translated as "capable of". Basically, everyone can do more than what's stated. This is confirmed in ''Forbidden Scrollery''; according to Reimu's discussion with Kosuzu, her powers had recently awakened, suggesting that {{Muggles}} who don't have powers ''now'' can have them ''later on''.
* NiceDayDeadlyNight: While Gensokyo is fairly dangerous to outsiders at any time of day, youkai tend to be most active at night, and leaving the Human Village at that time is more or less taking your life into your own hands if you don't happen to be a protagonist, as it's automatically assumed that you know how to defend yourself.
* NiceHat:
** Touhou Wiki, [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Category:Characters which lists]] [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters 176 characters]], has a special category called "Characters without hats"... with 20 names.[[note]]Though they count hair accessories and animal ears as hats.[[/note]]
** ZUN also has a NiceHat.
* NightAndDayDuo:
** Two of the [[TerribleTrio Three Fairies of Light]] are the bright and energetic Sunny Milk, who has the power to [[LightEmUp refract light]] and is powered up by [[ThePowerOfTheSun sunlight]], and the clumsy and pessimistic Luna Child, who has the power to silence sounds, and is powered up by [[{{Lunacy}} moonlight]].
** Two of the Prismriver Sisters are eldest sister Lunasa, who wears a hat with a moon decoration, and has the power to produce [[BrownNote depressing sound with her violin]], and second child Merlin, who wears a hat with a sun decoration, and has the power to produce [[BrownNote uplifting sound with her trumpet]].
** This also applies to Kaguya Houraisan and Fujiwara no Mokou, though more thematically than anything else. Kaguya is a [[WorldsMostBeautifulWoman fair]] {{Lunarian|s}} [[EverythingsBetterWithPrincesses princess]] who was exiled after she drank the [[ElixirOfLife Hourai Elixir]] to obtain CompleteImmortality, and Mokou is the [[TomboyAndGirlyGirl tomboyish]] daughter of one of the noblemen that Kaguya humiliated in ''The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter'' who drank the Hourai Elixir in order to even the playingfield with her sworn nemesis, after which she took up [[PlayingWithFire fire magic]] with motifs based upon ThePhoenix. Now, the two of them are locked in an unending CycleOfRevenge, likened to the cycle of the Sun and the Moon that fall and rise as the days come and go.
* TheNightThatNeverEnds: The plot of ''Imperishable Night'' plays with this. It's ''your characters'' causing it, so they can find the source of the real incident.
* NobodyCanDie: A function of the spell card rules. Aside from the few [[OurGhostsAreDifferent ghost]] characters, the only confirmed deaths outside of the manga are briefly-mentioned background characters.
* NocturnalMooks: While they can be seen during the day, youkai in Gensokyo are most active at night because they tend to be nocturnal.
* NoHuggingNoKissing: Despite what the majority of [[{{Shipping}} fan]] [[{{Rule34}} work]] will tell you, all the official content has virtually no romance (and always kept to backstories or non-sequitur jokes) and absolutely no sexual themes. Amusingly a couple of the characters are even ''married'' (the Watatsuki sisters) but this seems to serve the single purpose of making them the nieces-in-law of another character and their husbands are never seen or mentioned at any point.
* NonLethalKO:
** The spell card rules mean the games follow this trope. There is very strong lampshading of this, and very good reasoning for characters ''not'' wanting to kill the human characters. Also, since most of the characters are youkai, odds are many of them can't be killed by physical damage anyway, while the fairies which provide most mook enemies are said to have very short lifespans but constantly revive, giving them little concept of mortality.
** A good number of characters are implied to have killed people, but no one that's introduced ever dies. The only exception to this is Mokou apparently dying during her battle... and it doesn't count, since she's immortal.
* NonindicativeName:
** Team Shanghai Alice, the name ZUN operates under, is (1) a single person, not a team; (2) based in [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebina Ebina]], Japan, not Shanghai; and (3) he isn't named Alice. From Touhou 13's staff roll: "[[LampshadeHanging Lately I've been wondering if there's a real point to the staff roll]]."
** Many of the cast's powers fall under this, since [[UnreliableNarrator they provided the official names themselves]] and may be trying to either hide or exaggerate their true strength. Examples include Reisen (who can "manipulate madness") actually having wave-based abilities that can be used for illusions and hypnosis among other things, Kogasa (who can "surprise humans") never actually managing to do so, and Futo referring to her style of magic as "feng shui" seemingly just to keep up her image.
** Most of the humans in Gensokyo live in a settlement called the Human "Village", but a panoramic shot in ''Visionary Fairies in Shrine'' shows it's actually roughly the size of a large town or small city.
* NonNaziSwastika: Both Ran and Yukari Yakumo use manji-themed spellcards. Ran's version is ''Shikigami's Shot "Ultimate Buddhist"'' and Yukari's is ''Evil Spirits "Butterfly in the Zen Temple"''.
* NonSpecificallyForeign: With the sole exceptions of Hong Meiling and Seiga Kaku (both being Chinese), the Scarlet sisters (who are from Europe, but they're never stated from which country are from) and, in less degree, Parsee Mizuhashi (possibly from Iran), all the characters with non-Japanese names are never stated from which country are from, or even if they were born outside Japan in first place. This is weirder regarding their names along with the nationality of their species; Letty Whiterock is an English-sounding name, but she's a ''yuki-onna'', a Japanese type of youkai. ''Double Dealing Character'' takes it to the next level by having the first three youkai described as Japanese youkai in their profiles but also referred to as Western youkai in the song titles (ningyo/mermaid, rokurokubi/dullahan, etc).
* NotAllowedToGrowUp: Though a number of years have passed both in and out of universe since they were introduced, the few human characters don't seem to age at all, and they always look like they're somewhere in their teens (though since the official manga are able to get away with having Reimu and Marisa regularly drinking alcohol, they're likely 20[[note]]the legal drinking age in Japan[[/note]] at least). The lone aversion is Hieda no Akyuu, who's the only human character who's visibly aged over time; she was only 10 years old in her debut in ''Perfect Memento'' (and an article in the same book states that she was born in 1994), but by ''Forbidden Scrollery'' she's clearly older than she was when first introduced.
* NotDrawnToScale: In particular, boss characters tend to look taller in cut-ins than they would logically seem to be based on their sprites or other aspects of their character. Most fans depict Remilia as fairly short, but her cut-in makes her as tall as Reimu.
-->If their sizes appear to be different on the game screen than given above, it's because of some mystic force like perspective, so [[BellisariosMaxim pay it no mind]]. :-)
---> ZUN, after discussing some characters' heights in [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/ZUN%27s_E-mails an e-mail]]
* TheNothingAfterDeath: The Hell of Avici is an endless black void where nothing, not even time exists, and where wicked souls are trapped for eternity. Specifically, they are effectively locked within themselves, robbed of all senses. [[spoiler:It's also here that a piece of Kasen's spirit is located, the spirit of her true right arm]].
* NotSoExtinct: It was widely believed that there were no oni in Gensokyo despite otherwise being a FantasyKitchenSink. And then of course they immediately meet one. In fact, it's not even mentioned ''until'' they meet her and it comes up in their conversation with her as ArbitrarySkepticism.
* OffOnATechnicality: [[{{Troll}} Someone]] tried to trademark "東方プロジェクト". He succeeded, [[EpicFail but it didn't affect anything except ZUN's mood]], since the series actually uses the GratuitousEnglish title "東方Project". Said person also attempted to trademark that and "上海アリス幻樂団" (Shanghai Alice Gengakudan) and failed.
* OlderThanTheyLook: Applies to pretty much every character that isn't stated to be completely human, which is Reimu, Marisa, Sakuya, and Sanae. And even then, questions have been raised about Sakuya, even in-universe.
* OnlySixFaces: Not only is ZUN susceptible to this with his famously crappy character art, but so are some of the official manga artists, such as Aki Eda (''Silent Sinner in Blue'') and Makoto Hirasaka (''Touhou Sangetsusei''). One step up in the fighting games, since as far as Alphes' character portraits go literally everyone has the same face.
* {{Oni}}:
** Suika Ibuki and Yuugi Hoshiguma are powerful oni based on the legendary [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuten-dōji Shuten-douji]] and Hoshiguma-douji respectively, who once worked together as part of a group called the Big Four of the Mountain. The two are heavy drinkers, with Suika having never been seen sober in 700 years, and Yuugi being unable to be intoxicated. [[Manga/WildAndHornedHermit Kasen Ibaraki]] is heavily implied to be another member of their group, based on Ibaraki-douji, who has chosen to disguise herself as a human for unclear reasons. A notable trait of oni in ''Touhou'' is their honesty; they WillNotTellALie and they hate liars.
** Remilia and Flandre Scarlet are vampires implied to be of European origin, but reference the "blood-sucking oni" translation by possessing the traditional weaknesses of oni in addition to their vampiric ones.
* OrWasItADream: After [[spoiler: returning from the outside world at the end of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'', many characters felt like they had had a really strange dream and start to question if what they saw really happened]].
* OurElvesAreBetter: While in ''Touhou'' "elves" means fairies (who are none too bright), the Lunarians fit this trope to a T, specifically being SpaceElves.
* OurMonstersAreDifferent: Including [[OurFairiesAreDifferent fairies]], [[OurAngelsAreDifferent angels]], [[OurDemonsAreDifferent demons]], [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampires]], [[OurGhostsAreDifferent ghosts]], [[OurGodsAreDifferent gods]], robots and likely at least one [[OurDragonsAreDifferent dragon]].
* ParentalAbandonment: Mr. Kirisame is the only parent of a canon character who is not dead, missing, or otherwise unaccounted for. And even then, he's only mentioned, and Marisa quickly ignores and attempts to change the subject.
* PopularityPower: Popularity is one stat in ''Hopeless Masquerade''. It goes up as you land attacks, declare spellcards, and goes down as you take hits and play too defensively. At 100% Popularity, you can perform a Last Word spell, and if the match goes to a time-out, the player with more Popularity wins, as opposed to the one with more health, as in most fighting games. Toyosatomimi no Miko's special ability is that she gains more power the more popularity she has, complete with her cape changing colors to match.
%%* PowerUpMagnet
* PowerupFullColorChange: In ''Hisoutensoku'', characters with superarmor become red-tinted, while the auto-counterhit state Meiling can acquire is indicated by her becoming yellow.
* PunnyName: Hisoutensoku ("lacking perception of natural laws"), the HumongousMecha that ''Touhou 12''.3 is named after, is a pun on/ShoutOut to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gakutensoku Gakutensoku]] ("learning from natural laws"), Japan's first robot [[{{Steampunk}} built in 1929]].
* PunyEarthlings: Humans in Gensokyo are vastly outnumbered and outpowered by youkai (and other subraces), and the number of humans who can go toe to toe with them can be counted comfortably.
* RealEventFictionalCause: The failure of the Apollo 13 mission is caused by Lunarians who don't want Earthlings on the moon.
* RealityEnsues: As a result of the weather disturbances caused during ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'', the prologue of ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' mentions that there was a bad harvest that year.
* RecurringRiff:
** ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPB_4YeQpEQ Cute Devil ~ Innocence]]'' uses parts of ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqPOgYWVN8c Sleeping Terror]]''
** Marisa's theme in ''Imperishable Night'' Stage 4 (Powerful), ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eA-GscnIOY Love-Coloured Master Spark]]'', is based on her original theme in ''Story of Eastern Wonderland'' Stage 4, ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ex-4Ct9jsZw Love-Coloured Magic]]''.
** ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'' and ''Hisoutensoku'' use various recurring variations of Suika's theme ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6LcKxjICek Broken Moon]]''.
* RedSkyTakeWarning: The plots of ''The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'' and ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'' begin with a red sky caused by the incident inducers.
* ReallySevenHundredYearsOld: Most non-human characters.
* ReferenceOverdosed: The series is full to the brim with references to mythology, science, and some popular culture.
* {{Retraux}}: The soundtracks for ''Perfect Memento in Strict Sense'' and ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' are made in style of PC-98 synth.
* RidiculouslyCuteCritter:
** The rabbits in the Inaba comics.
** There's a meme about depicting Keine's hakutaku form as one.
* RubberForeheadAliens: Most of the the monsters in this series are one or two features away from looking entirely human. Some ''do'' look completely human.
* SacredHospitality: The number one rule for {{Muggles}} in the [[AllThereInTheManual backstory]]: be polite. All the rude people the series focuses on have the firepower - or at least regeneration - to survive not being so.
* SchizoTech: There are actually four different technology levels in Gensokyo: humans and youkai in general, who are pretty much at medieval or mid-19th Century level; items that come from the modern world outside (and, in the PC-98 games, came with the Outsiders themselves); the kappas, who are tinkering and working on {{Magitek}}, including Optical Camouflage and Hellfire-powered geothermal power plants; and the Lunarians, who top the tech tree in canon and have futuristic technology, which in ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' is revealed to be a Japanese version of CrystalSpiresAndTogas. Even the ''outdated'' technology that the renegade Lunarians displayed in an exposition in Gensokyo is far more advanced than anything on Earth.
* SchrodingersPlayerCharacter: In most games the characters the player didn't select still exist, just don't expect to hear from them until the ending.
** In both ''Lotus Land Story'' and ''Imperishable Night'', the character you didn't select shows up as one of the bosses.
** Averted in the versus shooters and fighting games where you get to fight most of the characters you didn't pick. ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'' and all the fighting games have everyone's scenario canonically happening in some order.
* SeinfeldianConversation: Er... often. Some of it is due to the heavy use of references to eastern mythology or folklore and metaphors that only make sense in Japanese.
* SequelHook:
** The question of how Sumireko Usami managed to obtain the Lunar Capital's Occult Ball when it should be impossible for anyone on Earth leads into the story of ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom''.
** The ending of Reisen's scenario in the [=PS4=] version of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' ends on a very open note, seemingly setting up for the incident featured in ''Antinomy of Common Flowers''.
* SinisterSilhouettes: Starting with the Windows era, the box art of each game features a character's sillouette. Usually, it's the game's FinalBoss or Extra Boss, though the spin-offs tend to have a character that's at least important to the game's plot.
* SlaveRace: While hinted at before, ''Forbidden Scrollery'' has Reisen outright stating that the moon rabbits are more or less slaves for the Lunarians.
* SliceOfLife: Very common in official written works, especially the three ''Manga/TouhouSangetsusei'' manga series and the short story serial ''Curiosities of Lotus Asia''. This tends to put off some fans [[GenreShift who are used to the combat-heavy games]], though others enjoy the laid-back view of Gensokyo.
* SlidingScaleOfGameplayAndStoryIntegration: One of the most Integrated franchises in existence, explaining nearly all gameplay mechanics as a function of the setting and exploring the implications of them in the story.
* SlidingScaleOfGenderInequality: All the important characters who actually do anything are female.
* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism: A land full of fairies and beautiful girls in elaborate dresses enjoying sake together, punctuated by such "crises" as ''too many flowers blooming.'' There are a few darker elements tucked away in there, mostly as {{Noodle Incident}}s and OffscreenVillainy. On the other hand, FantasticRacism is a recurring plot point.
* SlidingScaleOfSillinessVersusSeriousness: Canon ''Touhou'' works in general tend to be on the silly side, while fanworks can be anywhere on the scale. ZUN seems to encourage this intentionally, for instance by never explicitly nailing down how dangerous it ''really'' is for humans to live in Gensokyo.
* SocietyOfImmortals: The Lunar Capital, rather explicitly, but also youkai society in general, as youkai are implied to have no natural lifespan. Although most of them don't exactly form societies, other than exceptions like the Tengu.
* SpaceElves: The Lunarians, who are of the "Mystical Enlightened Race" subtype. As their name indicates, they hail from the moon, though they originally lived on Earth thousands of years ago before leaving to escape the Shinto concept of impurity.
* SpaceIsAnOcean:
** The key to making the magic-powered moon rocket in ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' is to realize that they should be thinking of it as a voyage across the sea and call upon gods associated with sailing and seaships.
** More literally, the moon is associated with the sea (as opposed to Earth being a "mountain"). The Lunar Capital is even the same place as the Dragon Palace, meaning that if you get lost at sea you might end up on the moon.
* SpaceStation: Torifune, introduced in ''Trojan Green Asteroid''. It is[[note]]or will be, with the Mary and Renko stories taking place in the future[[/note]] a Japanese space station designed to test terraforming practices. Then it somehow became an illusion and is now a fantasy jungle floating in outer space.
* SpellMyNameWithAnS: Official spellings for character and place names can vary within the series. For example, ZUN writes "Gensokyo" in English in ''Perfect Cherry Blossom''--this is [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Gensokyo predominantly the spelling the fandom uses]]. The back cover of ''Grimoire of Marisa'' spells it as "Gensoukyo." "Gensoukyou" and "Gensokyou" are alternate spellings directly derived from the romanization from the kanji involved, and there has been a push by some fans to make either spelling the common variant.
* SpringIsLate: In ''Perfect Cherry Blossom''.
* StoryArc:
** The first arc is made up of the five PC-98 games. Its canonicity status is vague, beyond a few {{Shout Out}}s in the Windows games.
** The second arc is the "Windows Trilogy" of ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'', ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'', and ''Imperishable Night'', with ''Immaterial and Missing Power'' taking place between the latter two games. This has more to do with recurring characters than any over-arcing plot. The game ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'' is something of a bridge between this part of the series and the next.
** Starting with ''Mountain of Faith'', all main games kick off the plot of the next, until ''Double Dealing Character'', which is stand-alone. ''Ten Desires'' kicks off something of a sub-arc that's continued in the databook ''Symposium of Post-mysticism'' and the fighting game ''Hopeless Masquerade''.
*** ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody'' occupies an odd place; it was released after ''Mountain of Faith'' (and is numbered as such) and canonically takes place after it, but is essentially unrelated to the arc since none of the characters introduced in ''Mountain of Faith'' show up or are referenced in it. In fact, it's probably closer to being part of the previous arc. On the other hand, ''Touhou Hisoutensoku'' is clearly part of this era since it references both ''Subterranean Animism'' in the story mode and ''Undefined Fantastic Object'' in the VS mode.
** ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' leads into ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'' along with both games [[ArcWelding pulling in elements from side materials]], including ''Bougetsushou'', which is already a sequel to ''Imperishable Night''. The [=PS4=] port of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' includes an extra mode featuring Reisen that takes place after ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', which introduces another incident that is the focus of ''Antinomy of Common Flowers''.
* StrongAsTheyNeedToBe: Player characters beat everyone they fight regardless of whether it makes any sense. Most blatant with Kokoro, who spends nine storylines losing, only to then beat absolutely everyone without resting, finishing with Miko, Byakuren, and Reimu ''at the same time''. [[BoisterousWeakling Cirno]] is also able to beat anyone she's up against whenever she's a playable character, even though it's stated that while she's strong for a fairy, she's still weak compared to most of the other characters. Though, this is also played with: In ''Fairy Wars'', while the Extra Stage boss is [[spoiler:Marisa]], Cirno doesn't so much "win" as "fight until she's had enough of [[spoiler:Marisa]]'s ridiculous barrages".
* StrongerSibling
-->'''ZUN:''' 'When it comes to Gensokyan sisters, in general the younger one is "broken"'.
* StrongerWithAge: A general rule of the setting. Animals will turn into youkai if they manage to live long enough, and something similar appears to apply to humans, going by the immortals we've seen.
* StupidStatementDanceMix: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB5IIsX0wS4 ''It Stops at the Affected Area and Immediately Dissolves ~ Lunatic Udongein'',]] best known for its EarWorm (O-Over Dr-drive! O-O-Over Dr-Dr-Drive!) is a prime example, but quite a few of Music/{{IOSYS}}' ''Touhou''-inspired songs could easily count.
* SufficientlyAnalyzedMagic: Interestingly, magicians are shown following UsefulNotes/TheScientificMethod ''more'' than the obviously technology-based characters, though most of the latter are closer to engineers than scientists. Rinnosuke even refers to the modern technology of the outside world as "a type of magic that requires no [[{{Mana}} spiritual power]]".
* SuperSargassoSea: The Great Hakurei Barrier between Gensokyo and the Outside World ''attracts'' things or concepts which have "become fantasy" in the outside world. While it's mainly a justification for the existence of youkai, it also attracts other things like extinct or endangered species, and yes, a bunch of lost items from the outside.
* ThanatosGambit: One of the chapters of ''Forbidden Scrollery'' involves [[spoiler:a fortune teller's plot to become a youkai by committing suicide and then resurrecting as a vengeful spirit by having his work plagiarised]].
* ThemeMusicPowerUp: In ''Hopeless Masquerade'' a unique theme for every character starts playing once they reach Max popularity.
* ThemeNaming: Both ''Manga/WildAndHornedHermit'' and ''Manga/ForbiddenScrollery'' use theme ''[[BossSubtitles titling]]'', though it's more obvious in Japanese.
** In ''Wild and Horned Hermit'', all of the titles take the form of four kanji describing the character (usually an idiom), followed by the character's species. For example, "The Sparrow of Two Birds With One Stone".
** In ''Forbidden Scrollery'', all the titles are a brief descriptive phrase followed by their job/role ''in English'', which is naturally difficult to convey through translation.
* ThinDimensionalBarrier: The Road of Reconsideration and Muenzuka are places where the Great Hakurei Barrier between Gensokyo and the Outside World are particularly weak, and youkai take advantage of this in order to prey on the hapless Outside World humans who get brought to Gensokyo by barrier fluctuations.
* TitleConfusion: Most entries in the series have a Japanese title and an English subtitle. Often, Japanese-speaking fans are only familiar with the Japanese part of the title, and English-speaking fans are only familiar with the English one.
* TitleDrop:
** The final spell cards in ''Perfect Cherry Blossom, Imperishable Night, Mountain of Faith, Ten Desires'', and the story mode of ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''. Also tends to happen in dialogue.
** Some character names borrow kanji from the Japanese titles themselves but are [[AlternateCharacterReading read slightly differently]]. These characters are also central characters in their respective games (Sanae borrows from ''Mountain of Faith'' and half of the ''Touhou'' title, while Eiki Shiki borrows two from ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View''). This gets funny when a forum post joked that the then-upcoming FinalBoss of ''Hisouten'' would be called "Hisou Tenko" ("-ko" being a common suffix for female names) shortly before it turned out to be "Tenshi" (same kanji as Tenko, different reading).
* TooDumbToLive: ''Perfect Memento in Strict Sense'' marks fairies as such. Fortunately (for them) they respawn.
-->'''Marisa:''' "Only death can cure that level of stupidity."
* ToServeMan: There's multiple mentions that the youkai of Gensokyo eat humans. [[UnreliableExpositor Akyuu]] says in ''[[AllThereInTheManual Perfect Memento in Strict Sense]]'', though, [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Perfect_Memento:_Monologue that it doesn't happen so much today]] [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Perfect_Memento:_Road_of_Reconsideration unless you're]] [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Perfect_Memento:_Encyclopedia:_Outsider an outsider]] [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Perfect_Memento:_Hermits or a hermit.]] The [[http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Perfect_Memento:_Draft_of_Spell_Card_Rules Hakurei Spell Card Rules]] may have been responsible for this change.
* TranslationConvention: Their language is described in-universe as "human", in contrast to youkai languages. ZUN has [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] this:
--->Is the language the girls use Japanese?
--> Gensokyo IS Japan. :-) However, note that even if they use obscure or archaic words, so long as there is no precise intent, they basically express themselves in Japanese in the games.
* TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture: The stories with Maribel and Renko are partially set in the near-future of the outside world.
* TwoLinesNoWaiting:
** Chapter 18 of ''Wild and Horner Hermit'' runs parallel to ''Hopeless Masquerade'' but we see events that happen from Kasen's perspective.
** Chapter 10 and 11 of ''Forbidden Scrollery'' takes place during the same game's final ending but from Kosuzu's perspective.
* UndyingLoyalty: A staple archetype of the series by now. Sakuya towards Remilia and Youmu towards Yuyuko are the most obvious examples, but Futo towards Miko and Murasa towards Byakuren are becoming more popular as well.
* UndergroundCity: Former Hell.
* UniverseCompendium: All of the artbooks, though ''The Grimoire of Marisa'' is less conventional.
* UnmovingPlaid: Utsuho's cape in ''Hisoutensoku''. It has stars and galaxies on it, which always appear at the same angle. Sumireko's cloak in ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' as well.
* UnnaturallyLoopingLocation: This is one effect of the Great Hakurei Barrier that separates [[FantasyKitchenSink Gensokyo]] from the outside world. According to Marisa in ''Manga/TouhouIbarakasenWildAndHornedHermit'', she once tried flying as far as possible, but the same scenery kept repeating over and over no matter how far she went. When she looked back, she found herself in the same spot she started.
* UnreliableCanon: The series has problems with this. It's not clear if the first few games are canon, the ones we're sure about are still vague on which ''route'' is canon, and all the {{Universe Compendium}}s are written from the point of view of openly biased sources. And that's ignoring the things that just plain contradict each other.
* UrbanLegend: The main gimmick of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' is the cast having fun with these, going as far as putting them into their Last Word spells. They carry over to ''Antinomy of Common Flowers'' with new additions.
** Reimu - The Girl in the Gap: Catches the target in several painful ropes before splitting open a dimension gap right into them and emerging from it. Almost certainly imitating Yukari, who is the genuine article. [[labelnote:The Legend]]The titular girl is a spirit that hides in impossibly small gaps between furniture and appliances. Once first found, she'll ask to play Hide and Seek. Once seen again, she drags the victim to the underworld.[[/labelnote]]
** Marisa - Hanako-san: Whacks the enemy far away, right into a bathroom stall where Hanako's hands catch her and drag her in. Marisa then locks the door from the outside. [[labelnote:The Legend]]In Japanese culture, the legend goes as follows: knock on a bathroom stall three times and ask "Are you there, Hanako-san?" She'll reply that she is, and the asker opens the door. What happens next depends on the version of the tale; ''[=ULiL=]'' goes with the one where a pale hand drags the victim inside.[[/labelnote]]. Marisa's overall Urban Legend is TheSevenMysteries of School, which Hanako-san is part of.
** Kasen - The Monkey's Paw: Makes a wish, turning the paw into a huge claw of energy that crushes the victim. [[labelnote:The Legend]]This comes from the [[Literature/TheMonkeysPaw famous 1902 short story of the same name]], possibly the Ur-Example of the JackassGenie. The paw gives you three wishes, each one having a terrible downside relative to the wish.[[/labelnote]]
** Nitori - LochNessMonster: Summons ol' Nessie and blasts the enemy with its BreathWeapon. Heavily implied to be mechanical, though... and given it's [[GadgeteerGenius Nitori]], this ''is'' something she'd do. [[spoiler: Though in the ending of her scenario, she ends up attracting the real one and turning it into a tourist attraction.]] [[labelnote:The Legend]]The Loch Ness Monster is possibly one of the oldest folk tales of all, depicting a (usually large) sea monster inhabiting the lake of Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands. All that is known about it are confined to photos, all implied to be hoaxes.[[/labelnote]]
** Byakuren - Turbo Granny: Runs the opponent down with a motorcycle. [[NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer Yes, really.]] [[labelnote:The Legend]]Turbo Granny is an apparition that shows up when people are speeding, by knocking on their window. If the driver catches sight of her, an automotive accident immediately follows.[[/labelnote]]
** Miko - Aka Manto: Slashes the victim with endless streams of red and blue that her cape transforms into. [[labelnote:The Legend]]Aka Manto literally translates to "red cape", and is a being that haunts a bathroom stall, asking the occupant if he wants red or blue toilet paper. Answering red gets him cut to ribbons by red paper. Answering blue gets him strangled by the blue paper. Answering a different color has Aka Manto simply drag them to hell for being a smart-ass. The correct answer is to say you need ''no'' paper, after which he leaves you be. Versions of the tale with a Blue Cape (named Aoi Manto) or choosing capes instead of toilet paper also exist.[[/labelnote]]
** Ichirin - Hasshaku-sama: Summons the titular entity, which assaults the target with dark power. [[labelnote:The Legend]]A 2008 ghost story posted on 2ch's occult board, widely regarded as one of the best in the thread. Hasshaku-sama is essentially a female [[Franchise/TheSlendermanMythos Slenderman]], a freakishly tall StringyHairedGhostGirl wearing a white sundress and straw hat. She kills her victims out in the open when they see her.[[/labelnote]]
** Futo - The Tale of Okiku: Summons the well from the story and sucks the enemy into it, whereupon the titular Okiku kicks them out. [[labelnote:The Legend]] "Banchō Sarayashiki", or, "The story of Okiku and the Nine Plates", is a famous Japanese folk tale. Several adaptations exist, but the general premise is the same: Okiku is a beautiful maidservant with an AbhorrentAdmirer whom she wants nothing to do with, and is eventually tricked into or framed for losing one of the ten precious delft plates her master owns. The admirer (usually the culprit himself) agrees to help resolve the issue...if she marries him. She again refuses, so the admirer kills her and throws her down a well in his rage. She then returns as a vengeful spirit haunting the well and occasionally coming back to count the nine remaining plates, but is unable to find the tenth and lets out an unholy shriek as a result.[[/labelnote]]
** Mamizou - TheMenInBlack: Deals a heavy beatdown, then wipes their memory with a [[LaserGuidedAmnesia Neuralizer]]. [[labelnote:The Legend]]Anyone familiar with the [[Film/MenInBlack movie series]] knows the type: the Men in Black are the black-suited, shade-wearing, emotionless agents of the Government who uphold TheMasquerade. Extremeness of their methods varies depending on the tale, but most have them wiping the memories of anyone who has seen or heard things they shouldn't have.[[/labelnote]]
** Kokoro - Slit-Mouthed Woman: Performs a JumpScare using her horned mask. [[labelnote:The Legend]]If a child goes out late at night, it's said they might encounter this woman wearing a surgical mask, who asks if they're pretty. Saying no means death, saying yes has her remove the mask to reveal her mouth gruesomely slit from ear to ear. She asks again; saying no once again means death, saying yes [[MortonsFork has her slit the child's mouth to look like hers]]. The correct answer is to say she looks "so-so".[[/labelnote]]
** Koishi - Mary-san: [[EvilPhone Calls the victim]] with eerie messages before saying she's behind them, then slashing them with a knife. Astonishingly fitting given Koishi's chronic habit of sneaking up on people. [[labelnote:The Legend]]Mary-san was a doll that was abandoned by her owner and [[PerversePuppet swore revenge]]. She gained it by constantly calling her former owner over the phone, telling him what floor of his building he was on before saying she was at his door, and finally, [[EnemyRisingBehind right behind him]]. The doll kills him then, and investigators find no evidence of the crime except for a doll covered in blood...[[/labelnote]]
** Shinmyoumaru - LittleGreenMen: Except not so little when Shinmyoumaru uses her Miracle Mallet on one, who then [[GiantFootOfStomping stomps the enemy]]. [[labelnote:The Legend]]A pretty old tale, little green men are simply Martians so small that we don't notice them.[[/labelnote]]
** Mokou - SpontaneousHumanCombustion: Mokou lights herself up like the 4th of July and explodes in a ''powerful'' blast before [[{{Immortality}} reviving]]. Considering her power over fire, she may well be a literal example of the legend. [[labelnote:The Legend]]SpontaneousCombustion is what occurs when something that is self-heating eventually exceeds operation temperature and explodes. There have been recorded cases of this happening even to humans, but none have been witnessed, hence how it became a legend.[[/labelnote]]
** Sumireko - UsefulNotes/SevenWondersOfTheWorld: Channels power from said wonders, or rather the "[[MacGuffin occult orbs]]" she collected from them, manifesting as a purple column of energy that crashes into the opponent from above. The power of the orbs allows her to breach the Hakurei Barrier and enter Gensokyo. [[labelnote:The Legend]]A slightly modified version to fit the setting as is Touhou tradition, the seven wonders in this setting are places in the outside world with the strongest supernatural presence: the Pyramids of Giza, Stonehenge, the Tower of Babel, Yomotsu Hirasaka, the Nazca Lines, Shigakogen's Hell Valley, and the Lunar Capital. If you think something is off with how Sumireko got that last one, [[SequelHook you're absolutely right.]][[/labelnote]]. In ''[=AoCF=]'', it is replaced with {{Doppelganger}}, though her Last Word is the same.
** Reisen - Kunekune: Has the titular creatures surround her as she activates her Lunatic Eyes.[[labelnote:The Legend]]The Kunekune is an urban legend created on Japanese Internet sites in 2003 taking the form of a thin, vaguely humanoid figure that appears pure white in the countryside and pitch black in the city. If someone tries to look at it up close (Or through binoculars or a telescope), they will go insane. If someone touches it or simply comes too close, the Kunekune will kill them. If they instead just leaves, the Kunekune will ignore them.[[/labelnote]]
** Tenshi - [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Frequency_Active_Auroral_Research_Program HAARP]]: Uses antenna arrays to call forth a giant lightning storm. [[labelnote:The Legend]] The HAARP program has brought forth a lot of conspiracy theories regarding its true purpose, with the most popular one being that it is a WeatherControlMachine.[[/labelnote]]
** Yukari- Teke-teke: Traps the foe with her gaps, then uses her fingernails to slice them in half.[[labelnote:The Legend]]Teke-teke is said to be a ghost of a woman who has lost the bottom half of her body, usually from being run over by a train. She would chase after a victim by running with her arms, making a "teke-teke" sound and would do something with the victim if she catches them, with one example being slicing the victim in half and stealing their legs.[[/labelnote]]
** Doremy - Sleep paralysis: Binding the opponent inside their dream soul with metal chain and lock. [[labelnote:The Legend]]Sleep paralysis is a medical condition when, during awakening or falling asleep, the still conscious person is incapable of moving their body, often experiencing hallucination or nightmare. Various cultures attribute the sleep paralysis as a supernatural disturbance, with the Japanese specifically calls the condition as ''kanashibari'' (bound in metal).[[/labelnote]]
* VagueAge: Basically everyone that isn't the Scarlet sisters, who have known ages although their ''apparent'' age is more of an open question[[note]]Different artists have drawn them as looking like anything from teens to pre-schoolers[[/note]], and the characters of ''Ten Desires'' who are specific historical figures with documented birth dates. We have a rough idea of what centuries Mokou, Kaguya, and Byakuren came from, and that's about it. Even the normal humans have so little past and such rough art that's hard to tell, though there are two notable exceptions: Sumireko, (who's explicitly stated to be a first year high school student, and since Japanese high schools start at tenth grade this would make her 15 or 16) and Akyuu (who was apparently born in August of 1994 according to an article celebrating her birth in ''Perfect Memento'').
* VampiresSleepInCoffins: Remilia Scarlet insists that she would never sleep in a coffin, saying they're for dead people. [[BrickJoke Eventually, however]], we're shown her actual bedroom, and it contains an elaborate four-poster bed... with a coffin on it.
* VanHelsingHateCrimes: The playable characters care little if the youkai standing in their way are actually evil or not, they're getting shot anyway.
* ViolenceIsTheOnlyOption: Enforced in ''Urban Legend in Limbo''. The occult balls cannot change hands without battle, so even when Miko is willing to pay for Nitori's in her scenario, combat is inevitable.
* WeatherDissonance: Basically the premise of ''Scarlet Weather Rhapsody''.
* WebcomicTime: Averted: stories take place in the year they're released, give or take a few months to set them in the right season. Since games tend to be released roughly annually, Incidents also occur annually.
* WhaleEgg: In one of the manga, it's suggested a couple of times that a mysterious egg may be from a ''cat youkai''. The same chapter also confirms crow tengu having eggs, and while they're related to birds, the two examples we've seen of that species look basically human.
* WhamEpisode: Despite being a spin-off, ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' has a couple of plot twists that change the image of some characters. [[spoiler: The Occult Orbs that everyone are gathering turn out to be power stones that can punch through the Hakurei Barrier, and Kasen, rather than risk the barrier getting destroyed completely, punches a hole in the barrier with the stones herself and sends Marisa to stop the perpetrator while she takes advantage of the gap to search for her arm. Also, the perpetrator of the incident, Sumireko Usami, is the founder of the Sealing Club from the Music [=CDs=] and is heavily implied to be Renko's ancestor. And if that weren't enough, the Lunar Capital snuck their own power stone in with the others, with the probable intention of connecting Gensokyo directly to the Lunar Capital, leading into ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'']].
* WhamShot: One before the penultimate fight of Marisa's route of ''Urban Legend in Limbo'' that demonstrates the stakes of this incident. [[spoiler: Kasen activates the Occult Orbs...and the ground falls apart, revealing ''the Outside World''.]]
* WhereTheHellIsSpringfield: Gensokyo is located somewhere deep in mountainous inland Japan, but its exact location is unknown. However, due to Youkai Mountain's appearance being that of Mt. Yatsugatake, before Konohana-Sakuyahime reduced it to the mountain range we know today out of jealousy according to legend, it's believed that it's probably within Nagano Prefecture.
* WhiteAndGreyMorality:
** Those who are [[DesignatedHero good]] are [[BystanderSyndrome apathetic to everything]] unless it affects either their interests or Gensokyo itself.
** Most of the final bosses in the series are more selfish or irresponsible than outright evil, having a lack of consideration for the rest of Gensokyo whether due to selfish interest (Remilia), lack of foresight (Eirin and Kaguya), or outright stupidity (Utsuho Reiuji).
** A few notable exceptions: the Saigyou Ayakashi of ''Perfect Cherry Blossom'' - a mindless, man-eating tree; and Taisui Xingjun, provided he actually exists.
* WingsDoNothing: ''Everyone'' in Gensokyo has a method for flying, whether they use wings or not. One footnote in ''Perfect Memento'' says that "... even without wings we can all fly." This shouldn't be too surprising given that EveryoneIsASuper.
* WitchSpecies: "Magician" is both a species and job description. Natural magicians are born able to use magic and don't need to eat, but are otherwise identical to humans. Human magicians need to learn a spell to replicate the bit about not eating. After that, they can both learn spells to stop aging, at which point they're considered "complete" magicians.
* WordSaladTitle: The titles of most official materials tend to be a 3 kanji compound word followed by an English subtitle. Sticking to this pattern makes a lot of them way more complicated than they need to be.
* WorkInfoTitle: ''Touhou'' '''''Project'''''.
* WorldBuilding: The point of the artbooks. Fan works do this extensively, and it's seemingly half the reason the fanbase is so big.
* AWorldHalfFull: While Gensokyo is definitely a dangerous place, especially to normal humans, it nonetheless has things about it worth appreciating.
* WorldOfActionGirls: Almost all characters are female powerhouses. In contrast, the few [[NominalImportance named]] male characters aren't known to be fighters, with the sole exception of Unzan.
* WorldOfBadass: Everyone has some kind of power and, due to the spell card rules, can put up a good fight. Indeed spell card battle is "the most beautiful pointless game in the universe", according to Marisa and everyone plays it.
* {{Youkai}}: Youkai of various types make up a very large portion of the cast, even when not taking the minor stage bosses into consideration. The term is also used to describe Western mythical creatures such as vampires and hobgoblins.
* YouGottaHaveBlueHair:
** For actual blue-haired characters, Remilia, Nitori, Tenshi, Kogasa, Cirno, Seiran and Doremy count, though Remilia's initial appearance featured her with white hair. Hecatia also qualifies, as her [[RemoteBody Earth body]] has blue hair.
** Even excluding the youkai, there are the silver-haired Sakuya, Youmu, Keine, Mokou, Eirin and Sagume, though the last two of these are from the Moon.
** And the green-haired Sanae. Green-haired youkai include Yuuka, Kyouko, Kisume and Wriggle.
** {{Lampshaded}} by Sumireko in ''Violet Detector''. When taking a picture of a character with blue hair, one of her possible hashtags is "[=#GottaHaveBlue=]".
* ZigzagPaperTassel:
** Reimu's and Sanae's ''haraegushi''.
** Kanako's and Tenshi's ''shimenawa''.
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