Double Spoiler Review Summary

Engaging and Fun Gameplay: Players find the game to be a significant improvement over its predecessor, offering an enjoyable challenge for both experienced players and newcomers. Its short play sessions and unique bullet pattern challenges contribute to its appeal.

Unique Touhou Experience: The game is considered a unique and valuable addition to the Touhou series, offering a distinct photography-based gameplay style. It's also seen as a good entry point for Touhou fans to practice basic STG skills.

Well-Designed Bullet Patterns: The game features well-executed and creative bullet pattern designs, which are a highlight for many players. While some patterns are tough, the overall difficulty is considered acceptable and engaging.

Flexible Progression System: The game allows players to tackle individual spell cards and skip challenging ones, making progression less strict and more accommodating than previous titles. This flexibility enhances player experience and reduces frustration.

Appealing Character Focus: The game's focus on characters like Aya and the introduction of Hatate add significant nuance and appeal. The presence of characters like Orin and Kogasa also enhances the player's enjoyment.

Extreme Overall Difficulty: Many players found the game exceptionally difficult, even compared to other Touhou titles. This high difficulty level, present from the start and escalating in later stages, makes it challenging for both casual players and those familiar with the series, often leading to frustration and inability to progress.

Frustrating Luck-Based Spellcards: Several spellcards are perceived as overly reliant on luck due to random bullet patterns, leading to repeated deaths and significant frustration. Specific stages and spellcards, such as 'Recalling the Golden Pavilion' and 'Dragon Palace's Messenger Swimming Bullet', were highlighted as particularly problematic.

Hatate Unlock & Treatment Issues: The unlock conditions for the character Hatate are considered too strict, making it difficult for players to access her. Additionally, Hatate receives poor official treatment within the game, including a lack of a dedicated background music, which negatively impacts her character recognition.

Accessibility and Technical Issues: A few players reported being unable to play photography-based games or experiencing technical issues, such as the game not running on their laptops. There were also mentions of being unable to unlock content, likely due to the high difficulty.

Calm BGM Clashes with Gameplay: The calm background music (BGM) is noted to clash with the intense bullet-dodging gameplay. This mismatch can flatten the mood and contribute to player fatigue after clearing stages, making the difficult experience less engaging.

Unique Photography Gameplay: The game is a photography-based Touhou title where players capture images of attacking bosses to progress, rather than using traditional attacks. It blends bullet hell mechanics with a Pokemon Snap-like photo scoring system, requiring a specific number of photos to clear stages.

Unlockable Character Hatate: Hatate is an unlockable character with her own distinct gameplay style and camera mechanics, contrasting with Aya. Unlocking her requires significant progress, including clearing specific 'EX' levels and a high number of scenes.

Vertical Camera Mechanic: A key feature is the ability to rotate the camera between horizontal and vertical orientations. This vertical view is often beneficial for telephoto shots and specific bullet patterns, adding a strategic layer to gameplay.

Short, Intense Sessions: The game is designed for quick play sessions, often less than a minute per attempt, due to its immediate boss battles and instant retries. Each stage requires multiple completions with varied approaches.

Quirky Bullet Patterns: The game features unique and challenging bullet patterns, particularly from characters introduced after Subterranean Animism, which often require specific strategies and timing to photograph effectively.

Aimed at experienced players: This game is highly recommended for players who are already familiar with Touhou bullet hell games, especially those who have cleared previous titles like 'Shoot the Bullet' or can handle Lunatic difficulty. It is not suitable for beginners or casual players due to its high difficulty.

Successor to Shoot the Bullet: Double Spoiler is seen as a continuation for fans of 'Shoot the Bullet,' offering more of the puzzle elements of capturing bullet patterns and expanding on Gensokyo's lore. However, one reviewer still preferred the predecessor.

Support the game: One player purchased the game specifically to support its development, indicating a level of fan loyalty.

More Touhou games on Steam: Players are eager for more Touhou titles, specifically mentioning Imperishable Night and Undefined Fantastic Object, to be released on Steam. They are willing to purchase these games to support the developer.

Secret Sealing Club difficulty: One player noted that Secret Sealing Club Nightmare Diary is considered the easiest entry in the photo-taking series. This provides a specific observation about game difficulty.

Hatate eats salamanders: This point is based on very limited and non-substantive feedback, likely a joke or meme. Its relevance to game analysis is extremely low.