Info about Touhou Luna Nights:

Official game description:
  
Touhou Luna Nights is a Metroidvania title with a heavy emphasis on exploration and action.　  
Developed by Team Ladybug, creators of multiple fantastic action games thus far.
Story
-----
“...Now, let’s begin my world.”  
Remilia Scarlet, head vampire of the Scarlet Devil Mansion sends her maid Sakuya Izayoi with no warning to a world much like Gensokyo, but not quite.  
A world full of strange places, filled with strange youkai and her time manipulation sealed.  
What could Remilia’s end game be...?
What's special about this game
------------------------------
・Time stop system from character's Ability and Gimmick maps that use special abilities like time stop.  
・Adapt the "graze" system of the Touhou Project into a 2D game, giving you a sense of tension in approaching to the enemy.  
・Graphics that bring out the appeal of Touhou world, such as attractive dot Graphics.  
A word from the publisher
-------------------------
Team Ladybug began with "Pharaoh Rebirth," continuing with other enjoyable games including "Resurrection of Beldia" and "Shin Megami Tensei SYNCHRONICITY PROLOGUE."  
Since, I have been waiting in anticipation for their next project.  
This time, they have created a fan fiction game based off the world-renowned "Touhou Project."  
From the background to the character's movements and various skills, one can feel the creator's passion for games and love of the Touhou project.  
While it has a Metroidvania style, the game can easily progress without the insistence of repeat elements or collecting items. This has resulted in a spectacular game born from the game production skills cultivated by Team Ladybug.  
And I personally want to highlight the beauty of the anime sprite.  
You can see the attention to detail the creator put into not only the leading character's movements, but the effects and enemy characters.  
Touhou Luna Nights is not only for Touhou fans but one that can be enjoyed by anyone who loves 2D action games.

Release date: 25 Feb, 2019

Categories: Metroidvania, Exploration, Time-based Mechanics, Bullet-hell, Platformer, Resource Management, Single-player Story, Character Progression


- Hardware Profile: No data
Feature extractions:
- Community Price: No data
- Playtime Metrics: No data
- Time-to-fun: No data
- Player Archetypes: No data


Below are summaries of things people say about the game per category.
Each point is assigned a weight that represents how often it is mentioned across all reviews.
What players like:
- Innovative Time Manipulation Mechanics (weight 0.93): Players consistently praise the game's unique time stop and slow-down mechanics, finding them deeply integrated into combat, puzzles, and exploration. This core feature is highlighted as fun, satisfying, and well-balanced, making the game accessible while offering strategic depth.
- Outstanding Soundtrack & Audio (weight 0.63): The game's soundtrack, featuring remixes of original Touhou themes, is consistently praised for being beautiful, energetic, and perfectly complementing the gameplay and atmosphere. Sound effects are also noted for enhancing the combat experience.
- Exceptional Metroidvania Experience (weight 0.61): The game is widely lauded as a high-quality Metroidvania, blending bullet hell elements, platforming, and clever mechanics. Reviewers, including those new to the genre, found it engaging, well-designed, and a refreshing take on the style.
- Accessible Touhou Fan Game (weight 0.47): As a Touhou fan game, it is highly regarded for its quality and faithful adaptation of characters and music. Crucially, it's also praised for being enjoyable and accessible to players with no prior knowledge of the Touhou universe, serving as a great entry point.
- High-Quality Pixel Art & Animation (weight 0.31): The game's visual presentation, particularly its pixel art and fluid animations, receives widespread acclaim. Players appreciate the detailed sprites, charming character designs, and the overall aesthetic that blends classic styles with modern polish.
- Responsive Controls & Fluid Gameplay (weight 0.23): Players report tight, responsive, and smooth controls that contribute to an enjoyable and addictive gameplay experience. The overall feel of movement and combat is highly satisfying, making the intricate mechanics accessible.
- Well-Designed Levels & Puzzles (weight 0.15): The level design is commended for its thoughtful construction, offering interesting obstacles and flowing areas. Puzzles are well-integrated with the time manipulation mechanics, and the difficulty curve is balanced, preventing players from feeling lost or overwhelmed.

Common complaints:
- Short Length & High Price (weight 0.43): Players consistently feel the game is too short for its price, often completing it in 3-12 hours. This leads to a perception of low content volume and poor value, especially for a Metroidvania.
- Poor Map & Level Design (weight 0.34): The map design is heavily criticized for being linear, confusing, and lacking the interconnectedness and exploration typical of Metroidvania games. Poor placement of save/teleport points and repetitive room layouts contribute to a tedious traversal experience.
- Repetitive & Tanky Enemies (weight 0.29): Players find the enemy design lacking in variety, with many small enemies being overly tanky and annoying. Frequent enemy stacking and respawns, especially in later stages, artificially inflate difficulty and make combat tedious.
- Frustrating Save System (weight 0.28): The manual save system, combined with sparse and poorly placed save/teleport points, leads to significant progress loss and repetitive backtracking. This design choice is seen as outdated and a major source of frustration.
- Inconsistent Boss Difficulty (weight 0.2): Boss battles are described as inconsistent, with some being too easy due to fixed, memorizable patterns, while others (especially later or secret bosses) are extremely difficult. High boss HP often leads to tedious endurance fights rather than skill-based challenges.
- Overpowered Time Stop Mechanic (weight 0.13): The core time stop ability is seen as both essential and problematic. While it informs puzzle design, its cooldown can be annoying, and it often becomes overpowered, trivializing boss fights and making the game too easy, especially in later stages.
- Poor Story & Narrative (weight 0.08): The game's story is widely criticized for being weak, simple, and often incomprehensible, especially for players unfamiliar with the Touhou series. Dialogue is described as childish or cheesy, indicating a lack of narrative depth.
- General Gameplay Frustrations (weight 0.07): Players experience various frustrations including low player health, inconvenient healing, collision glitches, and enemies attacking through walls. These issues contribute to a generally unpolished and annoying gameplay experience.
- Lack of Polish & Content (weight 0.06): The game is perceived as having a small scope, lacking diverse spells/weapons, and offering limited exploration content. It's described as not standing out, with weak guidance and an overly simplistic interface, making it less player-friendly.
- Frustrating Platforming & Traps (weight 0.05): Platforming sections, particularly in later stages and specific key areas, are deemed frustrating and maliciously designed. Combined with sparse save points and high damage from traps, these sections often lead to repetitive deaths and re-traversal.
- Mana-Costing Basic Attacks (weight 0.05): The mechanic of basic attacks consuming mana is widely disliked, as it constantly interrupts combat rhythm and forces players to wait for mana recovery or rely on specific, often overpowered, skills. This design choice feels counter-intuitive and frustrating.
- Unbalanced Abilities & Weapons (weight 0.05): Certain sub-weapons, like 'Thousand Flying Knives,' are considered severely overpowered, providing invincibility and high damage that trivializes bosses and makes other abilities redundant. This imbalance detracts from strategic gameplay.
- Low Impact Leveling System (weight 0.05): The leveling and stat progression system is criticized for being unimpactful, with negligible stat increases that provide little incentive to grind. This makes character growth feel unrewarding and superficial.

Gameplay feedback:
- Engaging Boss Battles (weight 0.49): Boss fights are a significant highlight, featuring unique Touhou characters with distinct, pattern-based attacks. They require learning, strategic use of time manipulation and grazing, and often multiple attempts to master.
- Protagonist and Touhou Universe (weight 0.38): Players control Sakuya Izayoi, a character from the Touhou Project universe, known for her time manipulation and knife-throwing abilities. The game is a fan-made Metroidvania that integrates Touhou lore and characters, though prior knowledge isn't strictly necessary.
- Metroidvania with Bullet Hell (weight 0.35): The game is primarily a 2D Metroidvania with strong Castlevania influences, featuring exploration, platforming, and ability-gated progression. It uniquely blends in bullet-hell elements, especially during boss fights, and incorporates a 'graze' system.
- Strategic Graze System (weight 0.25): A key risk-reward mechanic is 'grazing,' where narrowly avoiding enemy attacks or projectiles restores HP, MP, and the time gauge. This system is vital for resource management, particularly in challenging boss encounters.
- Compact Game Length (weight 0.22): The main story can be completed in 4-6 hours, with 100% completion taking around 7-10 hours. It's considered a relatively short Metroidvania, offering a concise experience with some post-game content like Boss Rush.
- Linear Progression & Exploration (weight 0.16): While a Metroidvania, the game features a relatively linear progression with less emphasis on extensive backtracking compared to others in the genre. Exploration is present, but the focus is more on action and clearing stages.
- Moderate Game Difficulty (weight 0.14): The game's difficulty is generally considered moderate, offering a challenge that is accessible to beginners but still engaging for experienced players. Some bosses and platforming sections can be tricky, but the time stop mechanic helps manage the challenge.
- Resource Management for Abilities (weight 0.1): Players manage MP for knife attacks and special skills, and a separate TIME gauge for time manipulation. MP is recovered through grazing or picking up knives, while the TIME gauge recovers naturally or via grazing.
- Post-Game Boss Rush (weight 0.05): After completing the main story, a Boss Rush mode becomes available, allowing players to re-challenge bosses for ranks and further test their skills.
- Unlockable Movement Abilities (weight 0.05): As the game progresses, Sakuya acquires new movement abilities such as double jump and sliding. These are crucial for navigating platforming challenges and accessing new areas.
- Skill-Based Character Growth (weight 0.05): Character progression is more focused on acquiring and mastering new skills and abilities rather than extensive level grinding. The game offers various skill growths and a versatile arsenal.

Performance notes:
- Excellent PC Performance (weight 0.06): Players consistently report that the game runs exceptionally well on PC, even on less powerful hardware. It maintains high frame rates, has smooth animations, and is free from stutters or graphical issues, indicating strong optimization.
- Minimal Bugs and Glitches (weight 0.02): Reviewers found the game to be remarkably stable, with almost no bugs or glitches encountered during extensive gameplay. This suggests a high level of polish and quality assurance.
- Flawless Controller Support (weight 0.01): The game offers seamless and fully functional controller support. Players experienced no issues when using a controller, enhancing accessibility and playability.
- Fast Loading Times (weight 0.01): Players noted that the game features extremely short, almost nonexistent loading times. This contributes to a fluid and uninterrupted gameplay experience.

Recommendations:
- Broad Appeal for Metroidvania & Touhou Fans (weight 0.43): The game is highly recommended for fans of both Metroidvania and the Touhou Project, often serving as an excellent entry point for newcomers to the Touhou series. Many players found it enjoyable even without prior knowledge of Touhou lore.
- Recommended Purchase, Especially on Sale (weight 0.27): Players overwhelmingly recommend purchasing the game, frequently suggesting to do so during a sale for optimal value. While some consider it worth full price, many advise waiting for a discount due to its length.
- Mixed Feelings on 100% Completion (weight 0.12): While some players enjoyed completing the game entirely and achieving all achievements, others found the process tedious or unrewarding, suggesting it's not worth 100% completion for everyone.
- Desire for More Content/Sequels (weight 0.03): Many players expressed a strong desire for more content, a sequel, or similar games from the developers, indicating satisfaction with the core experience and a wish for its expansion.
- Varied Rating Scores (weight 0.03): Player ratings for the game vary, with scores ranging from 6.5/10 to 12/10, indicating a subjective but generally positive reception.
- Specific Gameplay Recommendations (weight 0.02): The game is recommended for those who enjoy boss strategies, time manipulation mechanics, and dodge-heavy combat. It's also seen as a good entry point for those not confident in bullet hell games.
- Mixed General Recommendation (weight 0.02): While many recommend the game, some reviewers hesitate to recommend it to a general audience due to its specific appeal and noted flaws, suggesting it's not for everyone.
- Negative Experiences & Refunds (weight 0.02): A small number of players had negative experiences, leading to refunds or strong recommendations against playing, indicating that the game might not resonate with all players.
- Simple Play & Forget (weight 0.01): Some feedback suggests the game is good for a quick, casual play-through without deep engagement, akin to a 'tea break' experience.
- Consider Other Metroidvanias First (weight 0.01): Some reviewers suggest that players new to Metroidvanias or those seeking top-tier experiences might consider playing other titles like 'Bloodstained' or 'Midnight Castle Succubus' first.
- Developer's Other Games (weight 0.01): Some players expressed interest in or appreciation for other games by the same developer, Ladybug Team, noting this game as their best work.
- Character-Specific Appeal (weight 0.01): The game particularly appeals to fans of the character Sakuya, with some recommending other Sakuya-focused games.
- Thrilling Experience (weight 0.01): The game offers thrilling moments that players won't want to miss, contributing to an engaging experience.

Other player notes:
- Metroidvania with Touhou Flavor (weight 0.1): The game is a well-executed fan-made Metroidvania, drawing heavy inspiration from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. It successfully blends traditional Metroidvania mechanics with the unique aesthetic and characters of the Touhou universe.
- Quality from Team Ladybug (weight 0.06): Developed by Team Ladybug, the game maintains the high quality expected from their titles, showcasing a passionate small development team. It's seen as a positive step in their development trajectory towards future games.
- Engaging Boss Fights & Music (weight 0.05): Boss fights are a highlight, with players praising the atmosphere, music, and challenge. The soundtrack consists of 16-bit style remixes of main Touhou themes, adapted to the game's genre.
- Controller Recommended, UI Issues (weight 0.04): The game is best played with a controller, and players are advised to remap buttons for a better experience. Some users noted issues with the UI and menu operability.
- Story is Functional, Not Deep (weight 0.04): The story, centered around Sakuya in an alternate world created by Remilia, is concise and serves primarily to drive gameplay. It's not considered a strong point, but it doesn't overwhelm players or require deep lore knowledge.
- Powered by Mogura Engine 2 (weight 0.02): The game utilizes the Mogura Engine 2, a modified version of GameMaker Studio 2, which contributes to the developer's recognizable side-scrolling style and detailed pixel art.
- Achievement Frustrations (weight 0.02): Some achievements, particularly the 'no continues' or 'one-life clear' ones, were found frustrating by players, with some resorting to save file manipulation for completion.

Emotions:
- Satisfaction (weight 0.34): Players felt satisfied by the game's high overall quality, including its polished Metroidvania design, engaging combat mechanics (especially the unique time stop and graze systems), and excellent boss fights. The beautiful pixel art, outstanding soundtrack, and rewarding exploration also contributed significantly to this positive emotion, often leading to a sense of accomplishment upon completion or mastering abilities.
- Frustration (weight 0.13): Frustration stemmed primarily from poor map design, including inconvenient save/warp point placement and tedious backtracking due to enemy respawns on screen transitions. Players also found specific enemies, traps, and platforming sections to be unfairly difficult or poorly designed, leading to repeated deaths and a sense of artificial difficulty, particularly in later stages or during achievement hunting.
- Disappointment (weight 0.12): Disappointment was frequently caused by the game's short length and perceived lack of content, especially given its price. Players also expressed dissatisfaction with the story, map design, and the feeling that Metroidvania elements were underdeveloped or unrewarding. Some found the game too easy or felt that certain mechanics, like the shop system, were not impactful.
- Enjoyment (weight 0.1): Players experienced enjoyment from the game's fun and fluid gameplay, particularly the unique time stop and knife-throwing mechanics. The engaging boss battles, beautiful pixel art, and excellent soundtrack also contributed to a highly positive and entertaining experience. Many found the game to be a fun adventure, whether casually playing or mastering its systems.
- Excitement (weight 0.09): Excitement was generated by the game's overall high quality, its thrilling action, and the unique time stop and knife-throwing mechanics. Players were excited by the challenging boss fights, energetic soundtrack, and the game's potential to become a favorite or a gateway into the Touhou franchise. The game's appeal as a high-quality Metroidvania and Touhou fan game also fueled this emotion.
- Admiration (weight 0.03): Admiration arose from the game's exceptional quality, particularly its top-notch pixel art, outstanding soundtrack, and innovative time manipulation mechanics. Players admired the well-designed boss fights, the unique blend of bullet hell and Metroidvania genres, and the overall craftsmanship and attention to detail demonstrated by the developers.
- Appreciation (weight 0.03): Players appreciated the game's unique identity, especially its novel time stop combat mechanism and high-quality sprite work, soundtrack, and controls. Many expressed appreciation for the game's value as an excellent Touhou fan game and its ability to introduce them to the Touhou universe or remind them of classic Castlevania titles.
- Joy (weight 0.03): Joy was a direct result of the game being simply 'very fun' across all its aspects, from the engaging gameplay and unique time control mechanics to the enjoyable boss fights. Players found immense pleasure in the overall experience, including the satisfaction of throwing thousands of knives and the relaxed, positive atmosphere.
- Anger (weight 0.01): Anger was primarily caused by perceived poor or malicious game design, particularly frustrating map layouts, unfair enemy placements, and ridiculously high boss HP. Players expressed anger over having to re-traverse long sections after mistakes and specific design choices that made progression feel punishing.
- Confusion (weight 0.01): Confusion stemmed from various issues, including inexplicable small operations, unexpected bugs during boss fights, and a lack of clear narrative or lore for non-Touhou fans. Players also expressed confusion over the game's identity as a Metroidvania, the purpose of teleports, and the overwhelmingly positive reviews for what they considered an average game.
- Surprise (weight 0.01): Players were surprised by the game's unexpected high quality, especially for a fan-made title or one made with RPG Maker. The advanced story, UI design, and the effectiveness of Sakuya's time stop ability also contributed to a positive sense of surprise, often leading to a newfound appreciation for the Touhou franchise or the Metroidvania genre.
- Amusement (weight 0.01): Amusement was derived from humorous elements within the game, such as Alucard-like animations, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure references, and the bizarre nature of certain bugs. Players also found humor in hyperbolic descriptions of abilities and the game's unique character and time-stopping mechanic.
- Annoyance (weight 0.01): Annoyance was caused by specific recurring issues, such as the constant sound notification for mana recovery, tedious movement paths for 100% collection, and specific trap and enemy placements. Backtracking due to limited teleport portals and glitches also contributed to player annoyance.
- Recommendation (weight 0.01): Players recommended the game due to a strong positive overall experience, its accessibility for newcomers, and its appeal to a broad audience, especially fans of Metroidvania and Touhou. The desire to share a positive experience and the game's value, particularly when purchased on sale, also drove recommendations.
- Challenge (weight 0.01): The game's challenge was a significant cause, specifically strong and difficult boss fights, challenging rooms, and an overall high difficulty across all stages. Players found the controls quick to learn but hard to master, contributing to a demanding but engaging experience.
- Interest (weight 0): Interest was sparked by the game's unique mechanics, particularly the novel and nuanced time stop system, and its engaging story. The game's ability to pique interest in other games from the Touhou franchise or similar titles also contributed to this emotion.
- Desire (weight 0): Players expressed a desire for more content, including additional game length, a sequel, or more varied boss attack patterns. There was also a desire for a better fast travel mechanic to alleviate traversal issues.
- Neutrality (weight 0): Neutrality arose from the game not exceeding expectations, with some players finding the bullet hell aspects, story, and sound effects to be merely okay or mediocre, preventing a strong positive or negative reaction.
- Love (weight 0): Love for the game stemmed from its overall high quality, its ability to keep players deeply engaged, and its nature as a 'love letter' for Touhou fans. This emotion was often tied to a pre-existing love for Metroidvania games.
- Mild disappointment (weight 0): Mild disappointment was caused by the game being perceived as too easy, having some rough edges, or offering limited exploration. These factors prevented the game from reaching its full potential in the eyes of some players.}