AlammoFM

Touhou Reiiden — Highly Responsive to Prayers#

• Title: Touhou Reiiden — Highly Responsive to Prayers (東方靈異伝 ～ The Highly Responsive to Prayers)
• Release Year: 1997
• Release Date: August 15, 1997 (Comiket 52)
• Original Platform: NEC PC-98
• Developer: ZUN Soft
• Publisher: Amusement Makers
• Creator: ZUN (Jun’ya Ota) — Programming, Graphics, Music
• Genre: Action, block-breaking (Arkanoid-style), bullet hell elements
• Perspective: Top-down
• Art Style: Anime / Pixel art (16-color)
• Gameplay System: Players control Reimu Hakurei, bouncing a Yin-Yang Orb to hit cards and bosses across 20 stages, with a branching path (Hell route or Makai route) after Stage 5
• Setting: The Hakurei Shrine has been destroyed by something inhuman — Reimu enters the gateway to either Hell or Makai seeking revenge
• Themes: Shinto mythology, youkai, shrines, revenge
• Playable Characters: Reimu Hakurei
• Development Timeline:
  • 1995 — Game completed by ZUN as a “study project” while attending Tokyo Denki University
  • November 1996 — First public showing at the 20th Hatoyama Matsuri (Tokyo Denki University festival)
  • August 15, 1997 — First commercial sale at Comiket 52, sold alongside Story of Eastern Wonderland
• Legacy: The very first Touhou Project game; unique within the series as it is not a shoot-‘em-up but an Arkanoid-style game; introduced Reimu Hakurei; only ~30 copies sold initially; some sources incorrectly list 1996 as the release year due to the Hatoyama Matsuri showing, but the official sale date is 1997
• Composer: ZUN
• Sound Chip (PC-98): Yamaha YM2608 (OPNA) — the only PC-98 Touhou with a single soundtrack version (no separate YM2203 version)
• Music Driver: Mdrv2