Youyou Kengeki Musou

This game, by AnnkakeSpa, was released the previous Comiket 81. Featuring Konpaku Youmu as our main character, this game is a hack and slash game where you make your way through fairies and a few Touhou characters. It’s quite a short fun game, doesn’t take long to clear.

Story

Gardener of Hakugyokurou, Konpaku Youmu, is troubled.
The master she is working under, Saigyouji Yuyuko, hasn’t attended her sword training for days.
Youmu is Yuyuko’s sword instructor.
Yuyuko was never too thrilled about sword training, however, she hasn’t declined this strongly before.
Although Youmu points this out to her, Yuyuko becomes evasive. In the end, Yuyuko gave Youmu one condition:

“Defeat Hakurei Reimu, then will I think about training.”

If Youmu were to challenge Reimu to a head-on fight as she is now, she would not be able to win.
Lady Yuyuko requested such an unreasonable demand, she simply wants to skip practice doesn’t she?
That was the conclusion Youmu came to, she can’t come up with any other ideas.
Can I really defeat Reimu? With new worries, Youmu leaves Hakugyokurou.

The game is simple to play. You control Youmu in a 3D environment as you make your way through the stages. She has an attack, jump, special, and Spell Card button. Missing is a block button, which would have made it a bit easier to fend of strong attacks. However, Youmu’s sword slash can cut through most bullets, so it can be used defensively.

Also, you can use the special button as a defense method. Switching to the green icon (bottom left side of screen), you can use a bomb which takes cares of weak faeries and bullets. I choose to play aggressively and almost always used the orange icon, which made a dashing slash towards the enemy.

The times you can use the special attacks are show with those orange balls above Youmu’s green life bar. You start with three, but you find pieces inside of orange vases through the stages. Three pieces equals one new orange ball.

The blue icon, if you’re wondering, shoots a slash beam towards the enemy. Meant to be used as a long distance attack.

What I found a bit frustrating, was the platforming. The majority of my deaths were because I kept falling off while trying to jump from platform to platform. I don’t think it’s the game’s fault though. It’s my gamepad’s fault. Seems the jump button (think square button on PS3 controller) is a bit worn out. I use it as my shoot button in every other Touhou game so it’s usually held down, which gets it stuck in that position when is pressed down it seems. lol

Although the platforming was a bit frustrating, it was well done.

Dying is very forgiving in this game. You can die as much as you want and continue from a checkpoint as much as you want. The only repercussion is that you lose some of your score points. I wasn’t playing for score, so I didn’t care much about it.

Also, you can quit the game and continue from your last checkpoint. That makes the game easier, not having to start from the very beginning. The difficulty lies with the stage bosses though.

Spell cards were integrated very well in the 3D environment. Dodging them takes some quick timing and good jumping skills. You can try to slash your way out of them, but you’ll get hit too many times and die very quickly. And the damage they do is huge (compared to other damage), especially cards which trap you or corner you, like Marisa’s up there.

The bosses use their spell card when their health is dropped to a certain level, once activated, you can’t hurt them (maybe you can, I didn’t try as I was too busy avoiding getting hit! lol) so you have to wait it out.

But bosses aren’t the only ones with spell cards, Youmu also has one!

This is my favorite screenshot, I love that illustration of Youmu~

You can’t use the spell card whenever you want, you have to fill the small bar next to the special icons all the way up. Once it’s filled, you can use your spell card and deal massive damage. It’s best to save it for the bosses and cut their life bar down. I like to use it as a finishing move though, looks so much cooler~!

Filling the bar is easy, all you gotta do is hack and slash at your enemies, then before you know it, it will be filled up.

Like I said before, the game isn’t very long. You will probably clear this in one sitting, but it’s very fun and a quick way to spend some time you may have.

Give it a try!