Touhou Koumakyou: The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil

HISTORY

Touhou Koumakyou ~ The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil (Japanese: 東方紅魔郷 〜 the Embodiment of Scarlet Devil.; lit. "Eastern Lands of the Scarlet Devil") is a 2002 bullet hell video game developed by Team Shanghai Alice. It is the sixth entry in the Touhou Project series, and the first to be released for Microsoft Windows. It follows either the miko Reimu Hakurei or the magician Marisa Kirisame as they battle enemies through the world of Gensokyo to find the cause of a red-colored mist which has covered the sky in the midst of summer.

ZUN, the creator of the Touhou Project, had planned to end the series after the release of Mystic Square in 1998. After graduating, ZUN started work at Taito as a game developer and composed music for games created by Amusement Makers, publishers of the original five Touhou Project games released for the aging PC-98 computer. Leaving Amusement Makers in 2001 but remaining at Taito, he formed the doujin circle Team Shanghai Alice as its sole member, initially applying as a music circle to the 61st Comiket. After being denied, ZUN instead decided to develop a full game to submit at Comiket 62, reviving the Touhou Project series. The jump from PC-98 to Windows represented a "clean slate" for both the series and its developer, and Embodiment of Scarlet Devil served as a soft reboot of the series.

Embodiment of Scarlet Devil was released on 11 August 2002 to positive reviews but low sales, being sold for one day at a single Comiket booth. Over the next few months, ZUN would start to open mail orders online; it soon became a commercial success and earned the Touhou Project a substantial cult following, being followed by numerous sequels starting with Perfect Cherry Blossom in 2003. At Comiket 63, four months after release, there was a single derivative circle dedicated to the Touhou Project; this number would grow to 2,372 circles seven years later, breaking the convention's record. The series' move to Windows allowed for Embodiment of Scarlet Devil to reach a much wider audience than previous installments, having been given retrospective praise for its characters and soundtrack.

A remake was announced on June 9, 2026 under the title Touhou Koumakyou: New Classic ~ The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. It is being developed by Shanghai Alice Reprise and published by Alliance Arts, and will release for Steam, Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2, and PlayStation 5 on September 9, 2026 with support for eleven different languages, including Japanese and English.

Gameplay

Embodiment of Scarlet Devil is a vertically scrolling shooter. The game offers two playable characters to choose from, each having two distinct shot types with unique sub-weapons and bombs. Reimu A utilizes "Homing Amulets" that automatically track off-axis enemies alongside the "Fantasy Seal" (Musō Fūin) bomb, which excels at clearing basic enemies, while Reimu B pairs straight-firing "Persuasion Needles" with the "Evil-Sealing Circle" (Fūmarin) bomb, offering a highly balanced and defensive playstyle. On the other hand, Marisa A uses "Magic Missiles" and the "Stardust Reverie" bomb, providing concentrated power against bosses but limited screen coverage, while Marisa B features the penetrating "Illusion Laser" and the highly destructive "Master Spark" bomb. The player can enter "Focus Mode", which slows the player character to allow for more precision when dodging projectiles. Embodiment of Scarlet Devil is the last game in the series that does not show the player's hitbox while in Focus Mode—this is remedied in Perfect Cherry Blossom. The player has the option to use bombs, which will grant temporary invulnerability, clear the screen of enemy bullets and deal immense damage; however, bombs come in limited supply, meaning they must be used cautiously. Bombs act differently depending on the character and shot type chosen. If the player is hit by an enemy bullet and uses a bomb within a six frame window, they can avoid losing their current life. Unique to Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, the amount of time in which a player can perform this technique is decreased each time it is done successfully until the player loses a life.

Bosses and minibosses appear at the end and middle of stages, respectively. Embodiment of Scarlet Devil is the first entry in the series to utilize the "Spell Card" system. Each boss in the game possesses various attack phases denoted by a named spell card which change elements of the game: examples are changing projectile types and stopping the player's control temporarily. These represented by multiple lifebars in contrast to the previous games having just one lifebar for each boss's various phases. They are used in a specific order; depending on the chosen difficulty and chosen shot type, certain Spell Cards are swapped for completely different ones or skipped altogether. Each Spell Card has its own countdown timer: clearing it before time runs out will grant a point bonus, and a further bonus is given if they are completed without any lives lost or bombs used; timing out will cause the boss to switch to its next attack with no bonus given. There are 64 Spell Cards in total, and they can be viewed in the "Score" menu once the player has encountered them.

Points can be acquired in various ways. The "Graze" system grants the player 500 points for each bullet they narrowly avoid. Shooting enemies and collecting point and power items that they drop on defeat will also increase the number of points, with point items being worth more if collected higher. Power items increase the player's shot power, giving it a larger cone of fire and potential for dealing more damage to enemies at specific values, and when at the maximum power of 128, the player can move to the top of the screen to collect all on-screen items at once. Reaching specific score values will grant the player extra lives. When enemy bullets are erased, whether by boss pattern ending or the player bombing, they are turned into star items that grant further score. The amount of lives and bombs the player starts with can be chosen in the options menu – the default for each is three, and starting with more lives will apply a negative multiplier to the player's score. A "Play Rank" system also exists, which makes the game slightly easier if the player loses a life, and slightly harder if they score more points.

The game features six stages and four levels of difficulty. Easy difficulty prematurely ends the game after stage five with the game's bad ending, a decision that at the time was made due to assumption that the game would be played mostly by pre-existing shooter fans. Depending on difficulty, a positive or negative multiplier bonus is applied and given at the end of each stage. As with previous games in the series, an additional "Extra Stage" is unlocked in the main menu if the player completes the game without using a continue.

Plot

Setting and prologue

The Touhou Project is set in Gensokyo, a region sealed from the outside human world and primarily inhabited by anthropomorphic yōkai alongside a small number of humans. One of them is Reimu Hakurei, the miko of the Hakurei Shrine (which in Perfect Cherry Blossom would be revealed to be located on the border of the Great Hakurei Barrier separating the outside human world and Gensokyo). The main protagonist of the series, she is generally tasked with resolving supernatural "incidents" caused in and around Gensokyo. Marisa Kirisame, the other main playable character of the series, is a smug human who has become a magician through sheer hard work and prioritizes self-interest and her own kleptomania over the interests of others. The player chooses either to play as Reimu or Marisa, who each have separate scenarios.

In the summer of the game's events, the sky over Gensokyo becomes covered in a thick scarlet mist. This event, later revealed to be known as the Scarlet Mist Incident (紅霧異変), blocks out the sun, causing the temperature to drop and making the environment cold and dark. The mist is toxic to humans, forcing them to stay inside their homes for safety. Reimu becomes determined to find the cause of the mist to prevent it from spreading to the human world, while Marisa sets out hoping the person responsible possesses valuable items to collect.…

STORY

During a peaceful summer in Gensokyo, an unnatural scarlet mist appears without warning and covers much of the land. It is strong enough to block out the sun, causing the affected areas to become dark and cold. Reimu Hakurei, a shrine maiden working at the Hakurei Shrine, and Marisa Kirisame, a magician, set out to find the source of the mist. Their search will lead them to the Scarlet Devil Mansion and to its eccentric owners...