東方眠世界 ~ Wonderful Waking World

Hours played at review time, across 42 reviews with recorded playtime.

positive critical· bar length = how often the theme comes up

A surprisingly solid fan-made Touhou danmaku shooter that answers the age-old question: [i]"Where did all the bubble attacks in Touhou go?"[/i] Because wow, they all ended up in this game. [b]There are SO. MANY. BUBBLES![/b] Outside of the extreme amount of bubble-based attacks, there are no real mechanical "gimmicks" in this game. You are always at full power, and resources are dished out in full increments only (no pieces), so you can focus purely on the gameplay, which the game itself excels at. Music on the whole is [i]excellent[/i], and provided by a variety of artists (Stage 5 boss and Ex boss themes in particular are *very good*). Visuals are charming and clean, and the danmaku uses the same design language as the official games (which means essentially no unexpected or wonky bullet shapes to throw you off). My only criticisms are that there are quite a few attack patterns that are either heavily inspired or redressed versions of attacks already seen across the official series (this goes beyond a certain bootleg magician ripping off spells - she's excused), and that the Ex stage difficulty is [i]significantly[/i] higher than the base game. Whilst Ex stages being a jump in difficulty is par the course, this one feels far too high relatively speaking (it really reminds me of how the Ex Stage feels in Subterranean Animism). With that said, the game is distributed for free (???), which is absurd for a game that has had so much passion and care put into it. This is a MUST play for any fan of Touhou danmaku shooters, and especially so for those that are looking for a clean and pure danmaku experience. It's just you, some limited resources, and a lot of bubbles/bullets. Have at it.