What Genre is Touhou? | Worldbuilding Video Essay 

LOL

>watch Touhou video >French slander Another win for the world

On non, le 10735ième french slander que j'ai vu....

@@speaker6532 flûte !

😎

And unlike some of the tricks the fairies of Touhou will pull on you, I don't mind this one. 😊

Common sense is a hindrance in gensokyo

The lack of common sense is a tool. Common says humans can't play Danmaku. But if I believe hard enough I can throw a Batik pattern if I wanted too

Nicely put!

Yeah, I kind of feel the same towards Alternative Facts in Eastern Utopia. I've seen people criticize it for bringing modern problems into Gensokyo, but I think they're missing the point. The articles that bring up darker topics - like a pro-human, anti-youkai stance by Miko that resembles anti-immigrant slogans - are proved in the end to be misconstrued (Miko was actually talking about sweets taking over the food). So those modern problems aren't really finding parallels in Gensokyo. And at the very end of the book, Aya takes a hard look at her new fake news style of reporting, and she decides to reject it and go back to her normal style of bringing the truth. So the things that could sour our view of Gensokyo's paradise were ultimately rejected in the end, and all is well in the fantasy of Gensokyo.

Well said.

While technically correct, I think the message of the video is that Gensokyo _is a real Fairy Story_ , not a lousy Pseudo-Paradise. First, the video said that Gensokyo is honest, and I agree with it. It does not lie to you, but instead creates an illusion, quite self-consciously in fact. Second, the video mentions that one can have as much grief and pain (modern problems included) in the Fairy Story as one likes. Without problems the fantasy world would be dull and uneventful. And third, the essential part of a Fairy Story is the Reason. Indeed, in Gensokyo everything, down to a tiny detail, has a clear purpose. A human eaten by youkai in Gensokyo is necessary for its very existence. In the real world, however, in the grand scheme of things humans are killed for completely made up reasons. In my opinion, this is what distinguishes a Fairy Story the most. People escape the absurdity and irrationality of the Real, not the struggle itself. This is further supported by the fact that the genre of fantasy gained popularity in the modern era of embraced meaningless and immense prosperity, unheard of for the most of the human history. There is less struggle than ever before, yet people escape to fantasy worlds, which can be explained by seeking the lost Reason. TLDR. Your fantasy world does not have to be or pretend to be a Paradise to be a Fairy Story, quite the contrary in fact. The facade of perfection is an integral part of the Gensokyo setting, _not_ a way to somehow avoid interrupting a fairy tale.

the issue is that its openly stated that youkai only need fear to survive and not all youkai eat humans far from it,the youkai that do are just pure hedonists who dont care,thats why yukari implemented limits on it

Thanks for pointing that out!

“Critics who treat 'adult' as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adult themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence. And in childhood and adolescence they are, in moderation, healthy symptoms. Young things ought to want to grow. But to carry on into middle life or even into early manhood this concern about being adult is a mark of really arrested development. When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.” - Guess who

@@CyberDagger003 Very nice!

I'm happy to hear I nailed that conclusion.

Yeah but Touhou Project is evil but they’re three o’s are 666 the number of the demonic beast because it’s a theory.

@@supersaiyaninfinityunivers7193 A GAY THEORY! THANKS FOR WATCHING!

@@PresidentFunnyValentine lmfao ok then

@@supersaiyaninfinityunivers7193 I hope you know I was just kidding around.

Nicely put.

@@GensouChronicle I'm glad you think so that comment was mostly me thinking out loud with text-to-speech on my phone I guess it just came out so well because I was thinking about this stuff for a while for even thought of writing this comment.

​@@izzymosley1970That explains the complete lack of punctuation lol

Exactly.

It's a very Japanese philosophy

Lmao.

Very good examples. I personally love spirited away as a very clear example.

Reading this made me realize why I despise modern isekai plots.

@@timon6427 Good example, when the main character has to die to go to the Faerie, then it's starting out depressing. Look at some of the more modern faerie movies coming out of Japan, I think one was called "The Boy and the Beast" it's about a normal kid adopted by magical creatures. He enters Faerie by being adopted, a much better premise than dying and being reincarnated in my opinion. I think reincarnation was best done in the anime, Angel Beats.

I'm glad it was worth the wait.

I thought he has only one previous worldbuilding analysis?

@@vuhaitran4429 Yeah, I just said it because at 17:22 you can see him also adding the Reimu's abilities video to this series

​@@KurageHimari To clarify on why that's the case, the Reimu video helps to supplement the explanation of Consolation and the inclusion of a Eucatastrophe. It's pretty much key to the conclusion of this video.

Lol thanks

His fairy stories essay is a great read. It's a bit under 40 pages long, but it says some really enlightening stuff. There are some great quotes from it that just didn't make it into the final script.

I'm glad they elicited such a strong reaction. More video essays are on the way.

I'm glad someone noticed Pompeii man lol

I felt it was most appropriate. Thanks!

I really wanted to surpass what I did with the first Worldbuilding essay. So I'm happy to hear people call this one my best yet.

I always love seeing other people that have an appreciation for both Tolkien and Touhou on these videos! I did have a question though. Did Tolkien explicitly say influence of the real world spoils secondary belief? I interpreted his comments on the matter as being in reference of pushing some political agenda- as I think he was often accused of pushing anti-industrialism in Lord of the Rings. And thus specifically in regard to placing real world matters within the world in a way that does not fit. I kept it a bit vague in the video(purposely), but this is what I meant in reference to topical issues. Either way, I agree with your take specifically in that simply aspects of the 'real world' would not spoil belief. Touhou is the perfect example of that.

@@GensouChronicle Well, I'd say myself that to give a human mind so much power as to freely choose what it produces is folly. No matter what, reality seeps into fiction and whomever may engage with it will notice it, analyze it, apply it to reality - there's no true escape from reality because fiction by itself is a way to "honor" reality, no? So, while Tolkien may have been annoyed that he was ascribed to consciously perpetrate some message, it was undountable that messages have been sent, by the mere coincidence of his experience and the angle from which these experiences he manifested onto page. So, all that taken, what might one lose from more consciously trying to view not just the in-fiction but what it creates itself in turn? To make a conscious effort to engage with reality through fiction? Well, that's how I think of it, anyway. I'm frankly rather tired of people going off about "agendas", so frequently uttered in nothing short of ignorance and narrow-mindedness , that the word itself just kinda lost its meaning to me, now relegated to being a dog whistle. So, this is a charged comment, I guess is what I'm trying to say.

@@thosebloodybadgers8499I agree with this 100%. You can try your best not to put any political subtext in your story, and a reader can try their best to ignore it, but that doesn’t mean it’s not there. Even if it wasn’t Tolkiens intention, the way people interpret and consume media and the messages they gain can’t be changed. And especially with the historical context it’s easy to see why people thought he was against industrialism. Fact of the matter is, it’s impossible to escape politics in media. As long as you want to provide something of any substance to an audience, that will inherently be political by nature. Even the absence of substance can be a political view itself. Most of the time people have a negative view of “pushing political agendas” but it seems like many people don’t even know what that means or they just use it incorrectly. Anytime you reaffirm your beliefs you are “pushing” your agenda. There’s nothing inherently wrong with having a political agenda, that’s what makes you a conscious human with opinions and beliefs.

I think both of the people above me are missing the point. Yes, the way an author views the world will naturally influence their writing, but there's a difference between these themes emerging naturally and being subtly woven into the rest of the story, and an author simply making the "good guys" an obvious stand-in for their preferred political ideology, and the "bad guys" an obvious stand-in for the one they don't like. The first one has potential to be interesting, and to lend your world an extra level of depth, while the second will inevitably break your audience's immersion and just make them think of whatever political conflict you've chosen to make your story an allegory for. If they agree with you, they get a nice sense of confirmation bias, and if they disagree, they're just left annoyed; either way, there's no interesting result, and nothing is accomplished.

@@hrgrhrhhr Exactly this. Thank you.

Oh wow, this was great! It gave me some ideas for my own stories as well, love the vid!

Glad to hear that. The purpose of these videos is to express the identity of The Touhou Project in its purest form for people to gain a wider appreciation for it. If that has succeeded in its goal, then I consider this video a success.

Thank you! There were a lot of really good quotes I wanted to use, and as a result, I ended up making the video longer to fit them in. But I'm glad they are appreciated.

I'm glad you find them relaxing.

100% intentional. That rendition of the song I felt HAD to be played during that section.

Definitely agree that the Sumireko saga was a moment in which this topical issues were very obvious and that might be hard to navigate through without failing as a fairy story. I do think still that topical issues have always been a part of Touhou and still are, although in a more subtle way. Curiosities of Lotus Asia referring to Japanese imperialism and the "memory" of societies to not make the same mistakes again, the talk of contradiction of spirituality and progress with Miko, Hijiri and Yasaka, and later the physical market stuff with the pandemic.

You might be conflating what I referred to as topical issues with just any modern events. Referencing modern events is fine. What breaks immersion is when there is an ulterior message fueled by modern-day political contention and other similarly debated topics. Things like that end up feeling forced, and instead of thinking about the media itself, it draws attention to some real-life issue that has no business being present.

@@GensouChronicle Thank you for the response! I was including thoughts on traditionalism, history revisionism, philosophy and the such that are present in Touhou as topical issues alongside more heated modern contention points, but I wasn't thinking of those as instantly breaking the immersion (I'm pretty sure some written works can make some readers immerse even more and others break out of it completely). I think I agree with what was said that breaks immersion in Fairy Stories. Also, you've made me remember that I should probably read more of what Tolkien had to say, as well as more of his works. I have some in my family that refer to him as "The Professor" lol so I definitely have someone to talk about his works.

Exactly. This is why I want to make that distinction. Touching on history or referencing pop culture isn't immersion being for Touhou because it's a core part of its fantasy. Pop culture slowly bleeds in. Likewise, history is shared.

​@@GensouChronicle I would disagree that topical issues are by default immersion-breaking and violate the principle of "escape". Touhou offers a lot of commentary on social issues that are definitely more subtle but nevertheless vital parts of why the stories work the way they do. For instance, the Hifuu CDs often have Merry and Renko discussing a world that's implied to be devastated by ecological collapse and wealth hoarding, where the super-rich take moon tours while plants do not grow and children do not smile anymore. ZUN himself states that the series serves as a diary of sorts for him. In ULiL, Sumireko is motivated to go to Gensokyo partly because she’s sick of the chilled outside world where she thinks people are increasingly fake and shallow, and embraces an attitude of chuunibyou which ZUN himself endorses in one of the music CD afterwords. On this topic, ZUN states, “The true nature of this adolescent posturing is the heat of life. It's an explosion of one's imaginative power. It's a form of resistance against a chilled society, wielding both purity and creativity. Lately, I've been thinking: how can I maintain that "eighth-grade" attitude until the day I die? If I can do that, I can enjoy sake for my whole life.” I think rather than shying away from topicality, ZUN embraces it in a way that doesn’t really “shove it in your face” or feel out of place; as you say, everything has to make sense for subcreation proper to work, and the ways in which these topics pop up make perfect sense. The other, perhaps even more important part is that ZUN infuses his topicality _with_ the fourth element you describe, consolation. By writing the various character arcs and sometimes the attitude of chuunibyou itself as pathways to eucatastrophic (or at least contented, satisfied) endings to problems that are sometimes parallels to what we see in the real world, ZUN gives us hope in that similar answers and similar joy can be found _in_ the real world by embodying those principles. This IMO is what separates Touhou from a lot of other would-be similar works, which peddle overtread tropes like “hard work” or “struggle” or “fighting to the bitter end and fighting better” as the answers to conflicts societal and personal. Sure those are important, but those can only take you so far. To ZUN, the fantastical isn’t just an escape from your problems while the world burns; it’s the answer itself.

It's that exact frustration I hear from certain fans that I'm partially trying to placate with my two worldbuilding videos. There doesn't need to be a progression and conclusion. It just needs to be Gensokyo. And from within that world, any number of stories can be built.

Very nicely put.

@@GensouChronicle I am curious. Which of the games or licensed novels and manga represents gensokyo best in this manner you described it in?

Thank you. As much as the research took a while, it was perfecting the script that I think took the most effort. Especially the 4 elements.

Glad that I inspired you to read it. I definitely recommend checking touhou out. It can seem a bit daunting with how big the series is, but even starting small will let you appreciate it. And of course, I have a guide to the canon that I've made.

@@GensouChronicle In fact, I tried Touhou 1 and it was very disturbing because it seems more like a hard brick-breaker game without story so it made me stopped. But after watching your video I really want to try Scarket Devil and some mangas too (like Forbidden Scrollery), I didn't know that official mangas exists !

@@tailstails6896 Haha, yeah. Touhou 1 is very different from the rest of the series. I'm glad you're trying it out. And yeah, official manga as well as some full-sized lore books with character profiles.

Thanks. This was my intention with all of my video essays to this point. I'm glad it has been felt.

It's a short but dense read. (Less than 40 pages.) But super enlightening and full of great lines from Tolkien. Even the bit I have at the beginning of the essay is what he says very close to the opening of it.

Thanks! This is what I wanted to portray.

Naturally.

Yay. I'm a gift.

Glad that the ending was felt.

Very well put on all of your points. Especially on the point of some answers remaining ambiguous being a necessity as opposed to a feature.

And it only took 2 months. lol

More video essays!

I have. I don't think I'll be doing them for a while, though. I have a lot of ideas that need to precede them.

I love them too! Someone uploaded a bunch of them, but I think they stopped a while ago, unfortunately.

Hopefully.

Glad to hear you read it. It's definitely one of, if not my favorite doujin. Thanks for watching!

Thanks. This video was a lot of work, but I'm always happy to see people enjoy it.

@@GensouChronicle You're welcome. The visuals were pretty great too.

Yup. It only took more than half a year!

Very true. It would be nice to have stories like that once more.

You're welcome, Brian.

Glad you enjoyed it!

Your comment made me smile.

To be fair, this video took a little over 2 months with just the research alone. But either way, I'm very happy with what I made.

Thanks!

Luckily, this is when fan creations come in and bring their own perspectives. A lot of them are really nice.

@@GensouChronicle is there somewhere and index of them? I know the sinner in blue and the fairies series. The rest I know are nsfw doujin

@@octapusxft Check out my guide to touhou canon video and the touhou wiki. Lists everything.

Thank you.

Thanks!

Very well put. This is how a good fantasy should make us feel.

Thanks!

There's a Lord of the Rings joke I could make somewhere lol

Thank you. And yes, that story is a very good read. I took the time to mention it in my Canon Guide in the hopes more people read it.

Yup. Hopefully, it will be a bit better lol.

Very thanks.

Haha. Already working on getting more.

Lol

There was a planned third part that would look into when touhou actually started Worldbuilding. I'll make it depending on if this video ever takes off, though.

Happy to see this interested you in the series enough to check it out. Thanks.

Thanks. And yeah, good to know on the name bit.

It's in his On Fairy Stories essay. I believe it's in the very beginning.

the goat

Reimu does age, as confirmed by ZUN. Touhou used to go in real time, but thar had to change as the story continued onwards. You can still reason an answer as to how time works logically in Touhou, which is why I specifically used it as an example. I'm not sure what you mean in regard to Yukari though.

​​​​​​​​@@GensouChronicle my point is that Gensokyo is stagnant as hell. Many incidents, new faces - and no actual change at all. IRL there are Krakatau, which bursted its island into pieces; Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear plants, which led to a long-term desolation of wast territories; Middle-Asian earthquake, that destroyed several cities and even moved the whole part of the world for several centimeters. Not even mentioning the current war, which leads to the desolation of Donbass region for decades. Nothing like that in Gensokyo. No Black Death, no radiation, no proper war (LoLK hyped a little bit on that topic, but ceased right after started) and other catastrophes. Gensokyo has no loss. And that feels really fake. My point about Yukari was connected with our previous dialogue, as I was convinced that, though slowly, comparing to the Outer world, people of Gensokyo will gradually collect and save their experience, passing it to new generations, and new generations will put more and more questions towards the Gensokyo's order of things, like: "Where do we live?", "Can we leave this place?", "What do we know about our past?", "What lays beyond that mountain?" and so on. That's how humanity has developed IRL, with curiousity and need being main drivers of the progress. And I assert that it will touch Gensokyo sooner or later, but you say "Yukari Yakumo"... and I simultaneously have nothing to put against and have to notice that it kills the whole magic of Gensokyo. It has no loss, no fundamental conflict, no real threat, which could be considered serious, because no problem can be considered serious if you have Yukari on your side (btw, why doesn't she pass a border between present and past? It's a border as well, isn't it?) And a tale, especially fantasy tale, needs all of them. Otherwise there would be no taste of victory, no taste of salvation, no taste of living.

This sounds more like a distaste for mundane fantasy on your part rather than an objective observation. You do not need crazy events for things to be interesting- at least for a lot of people who enjoy Gensokyo as a setting. But, I'm also wondering what you think Yukari is. Because it's heavily implied she's nowhere near as strong as people think, and it's all a front so she never actually has to fight seriously.

@@GensouChronicle emmm not, I don't think so. The world of Gensokyo doesn't move anywhere, doesn't develop, and what is worse - doesn't intend to. What is fundamental conflict of Gensokyo? It's absent. Imagine LoTR being a series of how human, elves and gnomes kill newer and newer types of orcs in a routine way. Like, for 19 episodes. It wouldn't, because it would lose their financing after the 3rd part. Instead, it showed a huge confrontation between two sides, it showed fear, death, and neither of sides felt unbeatable. And that threat was the driver that mediated all foregoing events. In Gensokyo there's no threat, so no need to develop any problem; and all logical ASSUMPTIONS of what possible conflict can really ruin the balance of Gensokyo are destroyed by the existence of local superhero Yukari, who can teleport to any spot, spies on everyone, that is, knows most of the information, and can pass the border of conceptions (like in 15.5 she crossed the border between slave and master - how? - because!:D). She's just invincible, as she is unachieveable. OP, imba. In these conditions with no conflict and threat you can't take seriously what is going on in the plot. Some guys came from "insert_location" and make chaos? Pfff, Yukari will deal with it (if not even some bold Reimu or Marisa). The tale turns into a soap opera, and a soap opera doesn't need a proper worldbuilding. But soap operas can be entertaining, indeed.

Gensokyo isn't simply really far away. There is real magic to its fantasy. Travelers' tales don't involve magic. It's just going to an undiscovered place far away within the real world. Does that answer your question?

​@@GensouChronicle Initially I was confused with the example of tagline "A long time ago in a galaxy far far away" onto a Fairy story, but after taking into consideration your comment (particularly the "undiscovered place" part), I understand now, thank you!