page_title: Touhou Project
section_title: Reception and fanworks
hierarchical_section_title: Touhou Project / Reception and fanworks
caption_attribution_description: 中文（台灣）‎: CWT41第一日下午，《東方Project》博麗靈夢cosplayer。
context_page_description: The Touhou Project, often referred to simply as Touhou, is a bullet hell shoot 'em up video game series created by one-man Japanese dōjin soft developer Team Shanghai Alice. Since 1995, Jun'ya "ZUN" Ōta has independently developed programming, graphics, writing, and music for the series, self-publishing 22 main titles as of August 2019. In addition to the bullet hell games, Team Shanghai Alice has produced various related print works and music albums, and collaborated with developer Twilight Frontier on six official spin-off fighting games.
  The setting of the Touhou Project is Gensokyo, a "fantasy land" sealed from the outside world and primarily inhabited by humans and yōkai, legendary creatures from Japanese folklore. Reimu Hakurei, the main character of the series and the miko of the Hakurei Shrine, is often tasked with resolving supernatural "incidents" caused by other Gensokyo residents. The first five titles were developed for the Japanese NEC PC-9800 computer series, with the first, Highly Responsive to Prayers, released in August 1997; danmaku mechanics were introduced in the second game, Story of Eastern Wonderland.
context_section_description: Many derivative works based on Touhou have been created since the release of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, including dōjinshi, dōjin music (many of the songs had been made remixing the original games' music), dōjin anime, and dōjin games (even though the Touhou games themselves are dōjin games). The vast scope of Touhou derivatives prompted commentary, noting that Touhou Project became an unmissable aspect of Japanese consumer generated media. These dōjin activities are mostly responsible for adding original attributes to characters that ZUN may not have intended. ZUN, for the most part, had acknowledged, appreciated, and even encouraged these derivative works by imposing very few restrictions on the use of his works. The major restrictions are on unauthorized commercial distribution (as opposed to dōjin) and the spoiling of endings; proper attribution to Team Shanghai Alice is a recommendation. ZUN stated himself that he did not want the Touhou Project game series to be officially commercialized. The first recent publication of Touhou derivative doujinshi occurred during December 2003, following the release of Perfect Cherry Blossom; seven circles sold Touhou derivative works at Comiket 65 in December 2003. At Comiket 74 in August 2008, a total of 885 circles had Touhou derivative works on display or for sale, out of a total of 35,000 circles participating at Comiket. At Comiket 77 (December 2009), 2,372 circles were dedicated to Touhou, breaking the previous record held by The Prince of Tennis at Comiket 66 (August 2004), which had 2,130 circles. At Comiket 85 (December 2013), Touhou was still in the lead, with 2,272 participating circles selling Touhou derivatives, far outpacing those of other franchises.
  The dōjin games based on Touhou include adaptations of other game series' mechanics with Touhou characters, such as Kōmajō Densetsu: Scarlet Symphony (a parody of the Castlevania games with the title being a play on the Japanese title of the series, Akumajō Dracula), Age of Ethanols (based on the Age of Empires series), and Touhou Puppet Dance Performance (based on the Pokémon games). The music of Touhou is also very popular and many arrangement CDs can be found for sale at Comiket and other Japanese conventions.
  At Tokyo Game Show 2014, ZUN announced a collaborative project with PlayStation bringing unofficial, fan-made Touhou Project dōjin games to the PlayStation 4 (PS4) and PlayStation Vita platforms.
  Among the most popular derivatives are the series of Flash videos created by the dōjin music circle IOSYS. Many of them, like "Marisa Stole the Precious Thing", are popular on otaku internet forums and Nico Nico Douga.
  A short derivative animated project, Anime Tenchou x Touhou Project (アニメ店長 x 東方Project) was produced by Ufotable to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Japanese goods chain Animate as a promotional video for the store combining Touhou with Animate's mascot, Meito Anizawa. Several fanmade anime have also been made for Touhou. A dōjin anime project by the dōjin circle Maikaze, titled A Summer Day's Dream (夢想夏郷), is a fan-made anime adaptation with an original plot featuring Touhou characters, with four episodes released from 2008 to 2016, and the 2.5th episode released in 2014; the last episode will be released in 2020. Albeit created by an amateur studio, the project featured professional voice actors. Another dōjin anime by the circle Manpuku Jinja, titled Fantasy Kaleidoscope ~ The Memories of Phantasm (幻想万華鏡) (without voice dubbing but with background music and sound), was released at Comiket 80 in 2011, with one episode released based on the storyline of Perfect Cherry Blossom. There are 14 episodes as of 2019.
  Kyoto Fantasy Troupe, a Chinese dōjin circle, made a dōjin anime titled Hifuu Club Activity Record ~ The Sealed Esoteric History (秘封活动记录). The first episode was released at Comiket 89 in late 2015 and Chengdu TouhouOnly05 in early 2016. It also featured professional Japanese voice actors when it was re-released later. The second episode was released in 2017. Another Chinese dōjin circle, Perpet
caption: Cosplay of Reimu Hakurei, a prominent Touhou character.
exif: {"Image Make": "FUJIFILM", "Image Model": "X-T1", "Image XResolution": "240", "Image YResolution": "240", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6.3 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2015:12:14 07:54:24", "Image ExifOffset": "202", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "924", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "16057", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/450", "EXIF FNumber": "9", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "400", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Standard Output Sensitivity", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2015:12:12 13:45:45", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2015:12:12 13:45:45", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "8813781/1000000", "EXIF ApertureValue": "126797/20000", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "179/20", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "18/5", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "133/5", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "68269609/32768", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "68269609/32768", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "3", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "40", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[18, 135, 7/2, 28/5]", "EXIF LensMake": "FUJIFILM", "EXIF LensModel": "XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR", "EXIF LensSerialNumber": "43A07069"}