Lower Youkai Society

Inspired by the Touhou Original Character Compendium, we now set out to cook up our own danmaku game, perhaps using some of the creations in the aforementioned thread.

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Project Status:

• Story/Characters — Overall story done-ish?
• Programming — To do: game engine. From scratch.  ^*
  ^{('Cause that's how I roll)}
• Other subprojects pending.

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So, Adela's game. Are we doin' it, Durazno?

edited 1st Mar '11 7:05:03 AM by KylerThatch

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

We could, if people like the idea. If not, I'm willing to help with whatever we come up with.

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For those who weren't around for the discussion in the OC Compendium thread, the proposed game's storyline involves a heavenly (jellicle?) cat named Adela Rumpleteazer trying to stake a claim on Mayohiga, the village where humans are not.

My thought was that you could choose between playing as Chen and Adela, but only the dialog would be different between them until stages 5 and 6. (This would be Adela beating up and recruiting her minions, then Chen coming along and defeating them.)  ^*

Chen's story would be about this obnoxious upstart sweeping into Mayohiga and subjugating the cats. She'd have two shot-types that would result in different dialogue - Sheriff of Mayohiga is the canon shot-type, making the story emphasize her desire to become a worthy protector for her fellow felines, while Ran-sama's Shikigami emphasizes her territoriality and has her calling upon Ran's power to drive Adela out of her town right freaking now. Stage five boss is Adela, stage six boss is Makaviti, the Mystery Cat. (MOAR TS ELLIOT!)

Adela's story would be about coming to Gensokyo, deciding to take Mayohiga over and whoa holy crap what's happening to the laws of physics!? It turns out the Gap Youkai's bizarre manor is hidden in Mayohiga, and after fighting Chen in stage 5, you descend into a nightmarish Escher-space to confront her master. If you beat Ran, then Yukari steps in and smooths things over before she gets serious.

So far, the only other characters we have are Adela's "mobster minions", who serve as her options, and a horrifyingly powerful but terminally inept Tiangou named Meili, aka "Mungojerrie."

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I should stress that we are open to other ideas, of course.

edited 25th Feb '11 7:28:30 PM by Durazno

I might be able to do the character artwork, I have other stuff to do but I can do dialogue and art.

Well, I liked the idea, partly because I was impressed by the plot, partly because it would mean a portion of the plotweaving already done with. But if someone wants to do something else, just pitch the idea, and we'll decide from there.

Possible alternative that I remember from the Compendium was the SDM fairy uprising. Anyone else remember any others?

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

Well, if you're open to other ideas, I've sort of been kicking around the idea of a game starring Mokou. Sort of a continuation of her chapter of Cage in Lunatic Runagate, where she resolves to one day climb the Youkai Mountain and seek an audience with Princess Iwanaga, perhaps to ask forgiveness for what happened with Tsuki No Iwakasa.

Since this involves climbing the Youkai Mountian, a few possible opponents present themselves nicely: Momiji in full boss capacity comes to mind, as does Kanako. Ideas for them include a survival spell from Momiji at the midboss portion of her stage in the form of a preemptive strike: Momiji's still at the top of the waterfall, but she's using her telegnosis to attack Mokou from long range to driver her off. Meanwhile, Kanako thinks that the goddess Mokou is looking for his her, and she's very put off when it turns out that she's only the stage 4 boss, and Mokou just blows past her.

I was thinking that, at the 5th stage, just before she meets Iwanaga, Mokou runs into Shikieiki, and Mokou decides to humour her lecture while she waits for the goddess to appear. After all, she thinks, she's immortal and won't have to face her judgement. I was thinking that Shikieiki's attacks could be themed after sins that Mokou has incurred. Spell titles like "Wrath: Immortal Grudge" and "Sloth: Millenium of Regret" and such.

The final stage would be Mokou against Princess Iwanaga. Iwanaga's spells would consist of spells based off of Mokou's own spells, but twisted a bit to refer more directly to Mokou's past, and altered accordingly. For example: "Death: Dormant Fujiyama" instead of "Hourai: Fujiyama Volcano"  ^*

. It could involve familiars like in Fujiyama volcano that collapse, break apart, and fall instead of flying and exploding. I think her last spell could be named "Beg Forgiveness For an Honest Man's Death".

Perhaps Kaguya could make for the Extra Boss.

Unsure of shottypes for Mokou: Perhaps a spreadfire one based of of Phoenix's Tail, and a more focused, explosive one based off of Flying Phoenix.

I have a message from another time...

I suppose Adela might be a good place to start with because (Ran and Meili aside) the power level is generally pretty low and it gives a sense of stuff going on in Gensokyo that Reimu isn't around for.

EDIT: Ninja'd by Enlong with a not-too-shabby idea! Shikieki is kind of Beyond Phantasm material though, isn't she? EDIT EDIT: In fact, wouldn't that make a good plot for an EX Stage? Mokou facing her sins in life because she'll never be able to afterwards?

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Apart from Adela and the fairy revolt, there was...

• The false conartist kitsune goddess, who I think you even made a bullet pattern for.
• The slug goddess, who I tried to include in a round of philisophical roshambo with Suwako and Kanako.
• Xion had an alien landscape one, but I think he'd want to be at the forefront of that.
• Kagamichi Glace, as well, though I think she was conceived of as a fighting game character.
• Akumu's plot to escape the dreamworld, which we didn't hear much about.
• The sinister depredations of Ms. Wisdom, in connection with the Heavenly Staff Sarges.

I had two or three plots on the side as well, but we have more than enough to work with already!

edited 25th Feb '11 11:22:44 PM by Durazno

Ooooh, that actually sounds very good.

Good news for Kanako, too. Now she gets to be a 5th stage boss.

Of course, that still leaves me with only the last 3 stages' worth of ideas. Not sure who she'd run into for the first 3 stages.

Heh. wouldn't it be funny if the Stage 1 boss was Kaguya? Like, Mokou just doesn't have time to fight her today, so she beats one or two cards and runs off, and Kaguya is very put out by the whole situation.

edited 25th Feb '11 11:22:12 PM by Enlong

I have a message from another time...

Of course, we'd probably have to call ourselves something other than the Lower Youkai Society if we made games starring monstrously powerful characters like Mokou.

I do enjoy that idea for Kaguya, with the addition that she has several additional lifebars, but Mokou just zips off without touching them.

As for Adela's story, it looks like there are at least three slots to fill.

• Meili/Meili
• Stage 2
• Stage 3
• Stage 4
• Chen/Adela
• Ran/Macavity
• EX Boss - double fight against Chen and Adela as Reimu(?)

Plus assorted sub-bosses, supporting characters and random enemies. Also, if we have more we want to cram in, the paths could diverge earlier, but that would make more work.

edited 25th Feb '11 11:29:54 PM by Durazno

Oh, true...

I have a message from another time...

Well that's also because the thread was based off of the original characters made and less about the canon characters, and as I said when I first came up with the idea Lower is not indicative of power but of how important you are in Gensokyo.

Anyway I'll probably just make this by myself later but here is the full story for Kusari I wasn't able to post.

Lower Youkai Society: To the World and Onward, is split into three parts, the first is Summer which introduces Kusari and Tenshou, it functions as the introduction and base of the story while also introducing important characters like Kusa and Koga and near the end will introduce Iya as a character and will mostly consist of a short story set-up.

Then comes Autumn where the majority of Iya's story is fleshed out and the last notables are introduced like Nana, the Nurikabe girl, and Iya's associate, the final introduction parts are finished and the beginning of the main conflict is begun at the end involving a power struggle in the lower society.

The climax is Winter, where the main plot comes to a head and the main action takes place, characterization comes to a head and Kusari's growth as a character comes full circle as he is able to overcome his extreme fear and paranoia and finally grow as a person as both him and Tenshou are reincarnated for their efforts and are born into the human world at the beginning of the new year.

There is also a small epilogue Spring, which shows the effects of the ending about 15-16 years after the final close of Winter showing the resolution of the three main-characters Kusari, Tenshou, and Iya.

First, something I'd like to take note of. To make this work, we'll have to be organized, so I'm dividing the whole big thing into this list of smaller sub-projects:

• Story/Characters — writing the plot and dialogue, character design
• Sound/Music — sound effects and stage/boss themes
• Background/Portrait Art — backgrounds, character portraits, etc.
• Sprites — pixel art for the game proper
• Level Design/Playtesting — designing the danmaku patters, making sure Easy is easy and Lunatic is impossible really freakin' hard.
• Programming — coding up the game engine^*, putting everything together, building the executable

I would not be surprised to see people taking multiple roles. We likely won't be starting all these sub-projects at the same time, but at the very least, we should start with Story/Characters. Meanwhile, I'll get to work building a game engine.

(Note to self: make a dependency chart.)

Now, we're aiming to make an actual product here, so I'm expecting a level of quality. For the portrait art, for instance, try not to make it as bad as ZUN's is famed to be, m'kay? I'm not forcing professional professional level quality, but let's have some standard.

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Okay, I didn't want to decide right away on which game idea to run with, this being something of a major decision and all, so I decided to sleep on it. Now, I know everyone wants something different, but due to the nature of this project, we'll have to stick to one thing.

So here's what we'll do: pick up to three of the ideas presented thus far, ranked in order of preference... only if you think you're dedicated to seeing this thing to completion. I'll try to pick something everyone wants to do.

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

This includes the ideas presented in the Original Character Compendium, yes?

Sure, why not?

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

I figure y'all are either thinking about it, or are enjoying your weekend, so I'll give it one more day before I call it. (Hopefully it's not because I scared everyone off?) Meanwhile, a bit of rambling.

Part of the reason for calling it the "Lower Youkai Society" is because I really want to emphasize the OC's we've made (or are going to make). And because I don't want to muddle the line between canon and fanon by making something centered around established characters. I know, I know, this is Touhou, and Touhou is all about the fanon, but that's... well, it's just not how I roll. Bear with me?

With that said, these would be my own three picks, to give you an example of what I was asking for:

• 1. Adela's game — Personally, I find it interesting enough to want to work with it right away, and part of the work's already started.
• 2. The SDM fairy uprising — The best part is while it could be a big deal for the fairies involved, to the "big shots" (read: Sakuya), it's just another bother, easily forgotten.
• 3. Akumu's game — Because Akumu. Possibly, we could reweave the whole thing and make her the protagonist somehow. I dunno.

edited 28th Feb '11 1:29:51 AM by KylerThatch

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

My list is pretty similar, actually, but it's not in any particular order.

• Adela's game. It already has a rough beginning, middle and end. It bounces a bunch of OCs off of a popular-but-fairly-minor canon character. It gives us a chance to experiment with odd shottypes. There's a lot of potential here... for greatness or ruin.

• Natsune's game. Illusory bullets from a conartist kitsune godling! There are a lot of fun things we can do with this. Also, I would move that Natsune's scheme to net followers involve the dream world in some way so that Akumu can be our EX-Boss. (I don't know, I think it's a pretty good fit.)

• Shinkusu's game. In the tradition of Great Fairy Wars! Sadly, we seem to be missing a Ruki...

Looks like we're doing Adela's game after all... er, all two of us... ah well, moving on...

Story/Characters, the (other) heart of the project! Here's where we'll have to complete our cast of characters, fill in the entire plotline (or set of plotlines), and write the dialogue for the game. May or may not be in that order.

First off, Durazno, you mentioned two variations of Chen's story, and I thought of something similar with Adela. One of them focuses on recruiting henchcats to establish her base of power in Mayohiga (and then stumbling onto Chen somehow). The other one emphasizes her finding out about Chen, and deciding to get all up in her hair (after gathering allies, of course). You know, challenging Chen's territorial claim and all. Dunno what you'd call the shot types, though. Heaven's Fluffy Mobster and Upstart Cat Youkai, respectively?

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

Something like that, sure.

I was thinking that, as with Chen, the different shot-types could represent different states of independence. Adela A would be her striking into Gensokyo to see what she can do for herself and her minions, while Adela B is more her acting as a minion to the Mystery Cat. How's that?

I like that idea. Of course, now I want to know more about this Mystery Cat.

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

Is it really just you and me on this thing, by the way? I'm sort of wondering whether we should switch modi for talking about this particular game, but then leave this thread open for people who want to join us or talk about other projects?

1. I need to do a better job of recruiting, while not getting so many contributors that we end up "spoiling the broth". Too bad I suck at recruiting.

2. I'm with you there, one thread is hardly enough for a project of this scale. Just not sure what a good alternative is. Google Wave? An off-site wiki? An off-site forum?

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...

I volunteered to do the character act, and submitted my own story...

If you're open to character/story suggestions, are they suggested in this thread?

At this point, I'm quite committed to seeing one project idea getting off the ground. That was the whole point of asking for the votes earlier this week, to settle on the one project idea.

Now, if you want to branch off as another group doing another project, that's your decision to make. Just remember that for anything more than flights of fancy, you'll need at least several people putting in significant amounts of effort. Colossal, if you're even thinking of trying to pull a one-man "team". (The Katawa Shoujo dev blog mostly comes to mind as I type this, as well as Dan Remar's remarks on the creation of Iji.)

Finally, as it is, I want to keep this thread as a recruiting station, as well as a place to post status updates on the current project. It wouldn't be very feasible to be discussing two (or more) separate projects in one thread, anyway.

This "faculty lot" you speak of sounds like a place of great power...