Chapter One
A child ran off from their village, filled with rage. A petty kind of anger; one that the child would have all but forgotten about the next time you saw them. This next time would never come, though. The child disappeared and in their place stood a Destroyer.

Chapter Two
The village seemed different. Strange new people kept showing up, with pig shaped masks covering their eyes. On the surface, they went about their business and chatted like any other villager but the more mind you paid them, the more their words rang hollow. Their thoughts and jokes seemed inorganic; mass produced even. As these Pigmasks gathered in the village, the original people there felt alienated. An old man, once known for his insights and his sharp wit would get angrier and angrier, lashing out at those around him and eventually leaving. More villagers would follow suit, some of them against their will, as this community they saw as a safe haven to share things they couldn’t share anywhere else slowly but surely became part of that “anywhere else.”
Were these Pigmasks to blame for everything? Or was it merely a case of things that always infested the community finally bubbling up to the surface? And what of the Destroyer, a one-time villager, now hailed as the champion of the Pigmasks?

Chapter Three
A monkey walked through a forest with boxes on their back; head and torso fighting a fierce battle to not fall and hit the ground. This grueling process eventually became routine and the monkey’s body eventually went on autopilot. They had all this time to think about if they’ll ever move past this task and if they’ll ever have a purpose.
Did the Destroyer have the same thoughts in this same forest?

Chapter Four
Another village child was not unlike the one who would become the Destroyer. In fact, you could say that these two village children were a single entity; two sides of the same coin. The Destroyer was the head of this coin, facing up and always the topic of conversation from those who saw this “face.” The tail, stuck to the ground, reveled in the attention the head received. They took glee in seeing friends talk about the Destroyer without any clue of its relation to the one standing near them. They searched for other villagers’ words on this mysterious Destroyer and snuck into houses to see them: the praise, the insults, the natural discussions surrounding this new “symbol” of the village.
This was not healthy for the village child. But still, could you blame them? This sensation of feeling important, even if that importance was just a niche micro-celeb in a small village, was much more comforting than the cold reality of meaning nothing in the grand scheme of things.

Chapter Five
A Pigmask working in a tower was a big fan of a rock band. They were utterly awestruck at the sight of that band’s merchandise on the man that entered the tower earlier that day and could not talk about anything other than that band: expressing their love of the band’s work, idolizing the ones behind it as supposedly great people, and elevating the band to some moral paragon because of milquetoast political opinions in its songs.
The Destroyer was in the tower too, watching this Pigmask’s conversation with mere apathy if not active contempt.

Chapter Six
Sometimes, ghosts of the past appear as reminders of what will never come back.

Chapter Seven
The Destroyer pulled a needle out of the ground and felt nothing. They pulled quite a bit of these needles before but something was different this time. The act was now done only out of some perceived obligation; to the Pigmasks and villagers cheering on or to the fake images of hearts that result from the act. It was time for the last needle to be pulled.

Chapter Eight
The Destroyer laid on the ground motionless as its tail pulled the final needle on its behalf. Its supposed stardom was crushed into not even half a star.
It’s over.

"Whew," the enamored g@me play0r sighs out in reverence as the boss clearly designed by someone who thought they were on a job for a mediocre Platinum title did three SICKASS ANIMEY slow-mo front flips, each dealing 70% max health damage to the player with around 8 quintillion HP (which was only reasonable to invest a few points into after getting some from the eleventh Piss-And-Shit-Smeared Tree Spirit overworld boss fight that also netted a BAD. ASS. spirit ash to help you circumvent said bosses in the future except it's objectively worse than half the ones you already have) which they got to by trekking across seven hills, seven lands, seven seas and seven hells, each populated by more barren stretches of land than the last with s p o o k y copy-pasted caves and catacombs breaking up the monotony of running into small platoons of disinterested enemies you can't even be assed to to swing a sword on horseback at on your way to the next 𝓛𝓮𝓰𝓪𝓬𝔂 𝓓𝓾𝓷𝓰𝓮𝓸𝓷 (VERY important areas they put all their ACTUAL level design into! which is why half of them are directionless slogs where everything looks the same and with enemy placement done by the one only Mr Miyazaki'ˢ ⁸⁻ʸᵉᵃʳ⁻ᵒˡᵈ ˢᵒⁿ who really liked the funny jump battan) so that they can find an NPC which mysteriously vanished one Saturday night a few weeks into the playthrough but is crucial for the conditions of one of the many different-colored endings outlined by the Purposely Vague and not frequently Irritatingly Nebulous lore (which is totally okay because that's how they always did quests dude :P it's NOT comically archaic in contrast to the world design xP) but at least there's some World Essence and Snail Drippings to pick up on the way in case you ever bump into an instruction manual that teaches you how to MacGuyver the two into a portable ICBM and then not land the shot because the Lands Between Olympic Champion you're chucking it at read your input had superior reflexes, "From the Software has done it again!"


I gotta be honest man I think this formula has the studio stuck spinning their wheels and given ER's astronomical success they're probably not gonna try reinventing it anytime soon. The game isn't bad. I'll still play the DLC. But seeing it heralded as the zenith of the genre let alone Fromsoft's masterwork gives me a fucking migraine.

TLDR - This game has so much swagger and is so fun go play it.
ouble Dealing Character kicks off the 3rd and most current generation of mainline Touhou games on Windows. It is at this point in the series where the series starts to feel modern, the past of no visible hitboxes and (relatively) low resolutions. ZUN started exploring the style of each game here, or at least started doing it well. What once felt like "gimmicks" in SA and UFO now feel like style, undeniable personality these games are flowing with that dominates the fell of the 3rd Windows Generation. Double Dealing Character sets the expectation of what it means to own the concept of style. This game isn't the most notable on the surface, the patterns aren't as absurd as LoLK, the difficulty isn't as looming as UFO, the gameplay mechanics aren't as in depth as UM, however, it excels at polish in gameplay feel, presentation, and having the best self-contained plot in the series. In every aspect of the game you get a unshaking feel of professional execution. This isn't to say that this game is some higher art and transcends the scope of the series, it is still a Touhou game, but through and through it is excellent.

ZUN has really honed his craft by this point in the series and I feel this is the last tried and true, pure to the Touhou formula game in the series and I believe the effort, precision and quality are shown best through the natural progression of the game. During stage one, you visit an area seen often before, the Misty Lake, but it now looks and feels modern, and the music sounding more realistic, using more natural sounding instruments. These more natural and "earthy" instruments are consistent through the game, making the feel of the soundtrack stand out in comparison to most of the series, focusing more on execution and tone more so than bombastic melodies or insane pace that other soundtracks are known for. Some of my favorite songs from Double Dealing Character are Magical Storm, Illusionary Joururi, The Shining Needle Castle Sinking in the Air and Primordial Beat ~ Pristine Beat. All of the aforementioned tracks are more low-key in production but all add to the atmosphere of their respective sections in the entry, Primordial Beat getting special mention for incorporating Raiko's main feature, drums, for the solo of the song, creating an even more thunderous atmosphere for the Extra boss.

With Raiko being mentioned, it is hard to ignore the strength of the latter half of the cast of Double Dealing Character. Benben and Yatsuhashi being a personal favorite pair of the genre of characters that show up in pairs. Seija being one of the coolest characters in the series, so much so ZUN thought that he could make a spinoff with her (Impossible Spell Card). Personally Shinmyoumaru isn't fantastic to me but I can't deny her danmaku being interesting and her motives are fun to play with and consider for the entire hierarchy of Gensokyo. Raiko leaks swagger like a broken faucet and is a joy to fight and look at. Not to mention there's not a single design in this game that isn't interesting to look at or marvel. These characters all have that sense of individuality that looms over this entire game. I wouldn't say any of them are lacking love design wise or personality, they all fit in with the overarching theme of this game being society being flipped on its head. With that theme being considered, these designs aren't overtly glamorous or colorful (outside of Seija lol) but have the sense of quality and planning put into them, which in turn makes them all feel thoroughly fleshed out.

Visually this game is fantastic, the Misty Lake return already being mentioned in how revitalizing it feels, but the same applies to the Bamboo Forest of the Lost. The stage, in all aspects feels like playing Imperishable Night stage 4 all over again with a modern twist. And with IN Stage 4 being one of my favorite stages in the series, is an extremely fun call back. The storms that crash upon Stage 4 and the Extra Stage have fun elements of music syncing with lighting crashes on the stage, and a real sense of motion moving above the skies of Gensokyo. But obviously the greatest visual piece in this game is the Shining Needle Castle, the intro to Stage 5 with the castle being actively flipped and the stage enemies spawning in what seems to be an upside down pattern is one of the most memorable moments in the series and still takes my breath away sometimes. While flipping is being mentioned, obviously Seija does it too, and its fun there as well. Visual clarity in this game is fine too, no real complaints about it. The danmaku in this game looks fantastic, Banki throwing her head around, Shimmy making her bullets big and then making you big afterwards is fun, Seija flipping everything is fun too, great overall.

Gameplay wise, DDC is in a bit of a weird spot. The patterns and raw difficulty of dodging is rather high, but the main gameplay mechanic is extremely intuitive and abuseable almost. This is where I mention how busted half of the shot types in this game are; for each character in this game you get the choice of using a cursed weapon with them or not. For Reimu this is her Gohei, Marisa it is her Hakkero, and Sakuya it is her knife. Each character has something busted. Reimu A can tap focus with her Gohei out to keep it over a boss to melt them quicker than intended. Marisa B has a bomb where you can farm life pieces with it if used correctly. Sakuya A has the second best survival bomb in the series that can refund you a bomb eventually with enough uses. Everyone has something busted, which in a way makes sense with the plot, instruments are being put on top of society so of course instruments used by the MC's would be better. This added tool of busted shot types and rather abusable way to gain lives in this game don't make it too tough to 1CC, but it does require some commitment to route. The main mechanic of this game is rewarding the player with either a spell card fragment or a life piece dependent on how many items are collected at the Point of Collection. This mechanic isn't a drastic, gameplay changing one like the mechanics in UFO or UM, but it is there and is constantly on the players mind on how to utilize it. I'd call it classy in execution and feel, it feels fantastic to chain life pieces from jiggling around the POC and rewards routing to find when the best times to go to the POC are.

Classy is the best way to descibe this game in my opinion, everything feels classy and polished, nothing extremely foreign to the series (outside of the screen FLIPPING), but this is done well. The old stuff is polished and feels modern, and the new stuff added feels like logical continuations of standards set in the series. I don't believe ZUN was trying to go back to basics with this game, unlike he deliberately stated for HSiFS, although how I'm describing this game it may seem like it. I believe his goal was more to set the standard for the modern Windows generation. That standard being a focus on building on what the past 13 games had laid the groundwork for and making these games still feel unique, even after (at that point) 17 years of installments. And in this he succeeded. DDC is fantastic, a great starting point for those turned off by early Touhou crust. DDC set the standard for what it means to be "modern" for a very in concept and practice at times archaic series.

Playing this game is a process of gradually tuning your mind to its frequency like a radio station, learning the languages it speaks as well as the gaps in what it says, until it feels like your whole body is resonating in harmony with it. It's a constant dance between fascinations: as soon as your mind is wholly absorbed with the first-order tile puzzles, the game zooms out and gets you thinking about the world it takes place in. The moment you start to really dig into the lore, it crashes back in close and reminds you that it's really about the deeply personal love and loss of each of the characters. And to see more of those characters, of course, you must do more sokoban.

It's hard to talk in detail about the game without spoilers, but I'll say this: I filled four pages with notes about this game, spilling over into a spreadsheet, a screenshot folder, and a large collection of video recordings. The expertise with which its layered puzzles are assembled is extraordinary, hitting a perfect difficulty point where you feel like a genius for each solve but (almost) everything feels like it's using the same design language that you can become fluent with. It stands with Riven as one of the best puzzle games I've ever played.

But that's not even the thing I'll remember most about Void Stranger. What will stay with me long after I forget the trick to B213 or the best way to route bulls is the love the characters hold for one another and the fucked up beautiful lengths they'll go to enact it. In the end, the heart of the game is summed up in the words uttered by Eus's statue... which I'll let you discover for yourself.