This article has a talk page!the Embodiment of Scarlet Devil is the 6th game of the Touhou Project, and a major turning point: leaving the PC-98 behind in favor of Windows, renaming ZUNsoft to Team Shanghai Alice, and dropping Amusement Makers' publisher credit. 24 years later, the game finally received an HD-remaster and an official international release.
It also started a brand-new world for Gensokyo, but still keeping the main girls Reimu and Marisa.
Development Info
Prototype Info
Prerelease Info
Extra Stage TrialUnknown trial compiled sometime in September of 2002. Released to few doujin stores.Full Unlock Code#
Embodiment of Scarlet Devil (along with Perfect Cherry Blossom, Imperishable Night, and Phantasmagoria of Flower View) features a code to automatically unlock all extra content.
On the Extra Stage records screen, hold either Shift or Ctrl and:
- Version 1.02f or earlier: press F12 five times, Q two times, and S three times.
- Version 1.02g or later: press Home five times, Q two times, and S three times.
If done correctly, you'll hear the 1up sound, and the Extra Stage and all practice stages will be unlocked for both characters and shot types.
(Source: Original TCRF research)
Unused Character#
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At one point, there was going to be a third playable character named Rin Satsuki, who would have wielded "Flower" Sign and "Wind" Sign bombs. Unfortunately, she was cut due to time constraints, and the only remnants of her existence are these score menu name strings. They can be seen by opening 東方紅魔郷.exe in a hex editor that supports Shift-JIS encoding and navigating to address 6BB80. Due to the way the strings are stored, type B (Wind) is listed before type A (Flower). The same goes for Reimu (Dream/Spirit) and Marisa (Love/Magic).
(Source: Rian Sakuragi, etc.)
Unused Dialogue#
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The very first line of dialogue in Reimu's scenario does not appear in-game, as the ID of the string conflicts with the very next one (which is displayed instead). Translation patches typically rectify this by placing both strings together.
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Flandre also has a line of dialogue in Reimu's Extra scenario after being defeated that goes undisplayed. Unlike the one above, however, there is no clear reason for this, and no way to get it to appear through hacking (as it's sandwiched between Reimu's dialogue).
Unused Enemy Graphics#
Stage 1#
A boss graphic from Stage 1's sprite sheet (stg1enm.png) looks to be a very early design for Rumia. As with most of the other bosses, Rumia's sprites are located on a separate sheet (stg1enm2.png). It was likely used very early in the development of the game, as ZUN stated that the first stage of the game was also used as a test stage in Strange Creators of Outer World.
Rumia's concept art has a clenched fist on her left arm. With the clenched fist appearing here too, it confirms this was an early design for Rumia. Nevertheless, there are 3 Rumia sprites in the new classic version that seem to take the appearance of the enemy.
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初めてWindows版を作るに当たってのテストのために作ったみたいなステージです。作りながら「こういう作り方でいいんだ」みたいな気になる。あとは、１面にいきなり闇の力をもった妖怪が出てきたら驚くんじゃないかなって。それから、難易度を上げたら中ボスでもスペルカードを使ってくる。いろいろと意外性を詰め込んでみました。 |
This was a test stage I made for the first Windows game. While I was making it, I began to feel it was a good way to handle things. I also thought it would be a surprise to have a youkai who could manipulate darkness right at the start. As the difficulty level goes up, she even uses a spell card as a mid-boss, so I made her full of surprises. |
(Source: Original TCRF research)
Extra Stage#
The Extra Stage sprite sheet features an unused colored variant of Koakuma, likely due to the fact that these sprites were modified from the stage 4 sprite sheet by hue shifting the whole image.
(Source: Touhou Wiki, etc.)
Unused Item#
An unused item is in the spritesheets for the bullets and items, on the top row where the other items are. It might've been a proto-cherry item, as it is replaced with it in PCB.
(Source: Original TCRF research)
Unused Difficulty Variants#
Stage 6#
Watch on YouTubeWhen playing on Easy mode, Stage 6 is typically unavailable as the game ends after beating Sakuya. However, in v1.00 and v1.01 it is possible to access an Easy version of Stage 6 in Practice mode by exploiting a glitch: go to Practice Start and select Stage 6 on Normal, Hard, or Lunatic. Exit the stage, then go back to the difficulty screen, select Easy, and select a character type. If done correctly, none of the stage choices will be highlighted, and pressing Z to confirm will take you to Stage 6. As can be expected, it's a tamer version of the stage on Normal, with a few minor differences:
- Remilia's opener is missing the mid-sized bullets.
- Remilia's second non-spell shoots only one stream of bullets at a time. On Normal, she shoots four streams aimed at the player then several streams in all directions.
The Stage Practice bug was fixed in v1.02, so this version of the stage is not accessible with the unofficial English patch without hacking the game or using thprac.
Mercury Poison#
Patchouli's Water & Metal Sign "Mercury Poison" is part of her five combined spells in Stage 4, which all have difficulty variants. However, on Easy mode only the first of three spells are used by her and there are only four different playable characters, making Mercury Poison, the only spell which isn't the first for any character, have its Easy mode variant go unused. It is simply the Normal variant but with even less bullets.
(Video: puckish angel)