This was good enough to get my first rating!! The setting is ominous and saccharine at once, made possible in large part by the opportune use of borrowed auditory media. The footsteps added a nice touch, treading lightly but firmly. I wish that the same could be said for the actual motion of the character. My initial critique was that the difficulty was overwhelming right out the gate. While the game successfully expands in scope as the player ascends, becoming easier in direct proportion to skill level, I did not feel that an effort was made to “train” the player to play it by warming up to the harder levels gradually. The sheer drops, often mitigating half an hour’s worth of practice, seem more akin to some of the early Boss Levels in the Pinball Levels of Sonic the Hedgehog (chills) than the start of a whimsical but challenging adventure. Nonetheless, I powered through it and my frustration was vindicated by relief with each consecutive breakthrough to a higher level. I still had to gather 7 faeries and 14 pages by the end of it, but by that point I just wanted to get as far up as possible regardless. I should say as well that I really enjoyed the puzzle wherein a hanging ladder could be shot and turned into a rickety bridge. That element made it feel like a “puzzle” platformer rather than just a game about wall jumps. That being said, it did not feel consistent with the themes of Touhou or Identity in its design. They were inspired by the brief, but they did not seem to respond to it. In other words, this game could have been about anything and the gameplay would have been precisely the same. Yet playing as Marisa was fun, naturally.
Rinzai.