Touhou: Scarlet Curiosity Review – Bullet Hell Boredom

Touhou: Scarlet Curiosity Review

While I’d like to think I’m well versed in the world of JRPGs, I’ll admit there are quite a few titles I’ve missed due to their Japan only release. The Touhou Project series is a series of Japanese bullet hell shooters developed by Team Shanghai Alice that began in 1996. While the one man team mostly had released games on Windows PC, what sets Touhou: Scarlet Curiosity apart from previous games is that it is one of the few games that made it to consoles. Also, it’s one of the few Touhou titles to get a Western release despite having started out as a fan made game.

Touhou: Scarlet Curiosity follows Remilia Scarlet, the so-called “Scarlet Devil”, who at 500 years old, has begun to bore from her more than mundane life. After stumbling upon a news paper article about a powerful and mysterious being, Remilia wastes no time in chasing down this creature in hopes for a thrill. However, unsuccessful in her search, Remilia finds her way back to her manor, now in shambles, she vows to hunt down the beast that has destroyed her home as well as find a way to kill her growing boredom.

The story is simple at best and falls a little short. After doing research, I’ve learned that the series has been a little light on story since the beginning, which is understandable as it is a bullet hell game; however, I was left feeling extremely underwhelmed. Perhaps I’ve been spoiled with so many great games, but as someone who has never picked up a Touhou game before, this might not be the best one to start with.

Despite the negatives, I appreciated the games cool blend of bullet hell mania and dungeon crawler elements. While going around and clearing the dungeon maze-like setting, you’ll have to recognize bullet patterns, dodge projectile attacks and wait for the perfect moment to strike. Though I’ve heard the Touhou series is infamous for it’s difficulty levels, I found this game to be quite lax. The two playable characters can soak up a good amount of damage. By absorbing hits, replenishing health with frequent power-ups and drops (which you find a lot of) spamming AoE attacks, I found that I was able to disregard a lot of the apparent bullet patterns and just blasted on through. When it came to boss fights, one in particular proved to be quite the challenge where I had to focus on memorizing those bullet patterns in order to win.

While there aren’t any extra game modes, players can choose to play either Remilia Scarlet or her loyal maid Sakuya. While the two campaigns don’t differ from each other too greatly, it is certainly the combat that sets these two characters apart. Remilia relies more on death blows and strong attacks to blow enemies away while playing as Sakuya picked away at enemies with combos, range and lighter attacks.

As far as the graphics are concerned, I was a bit underwhelmed. I am fully aware that this is a fan made game; however, I still expected a bit more. Although graphically it is on par with this year’s hit I Am Setsuna in terms of quality of the 3D; however, I suppose I was more forgiving of that series as it was far more emotionally captivating.

Overall, Touhou: Scarlet Curiosity fell flat. With repetitive combat and a lackluster story line, Touhou: Scarlet Curiosity didn’t deliver the experience I was hoping for. There are moments of pure joy and the game finishes much stronger than it starts, yet at the end of the day this is a game best left for hardcore fans of the franchise.

***A PS4 review code was provided by the publisher***