[h2]Early Access 1st Anniversary Announcement[/h2]
It's been one year since Touhou: Lost Branch of Legend first launched in early access.
We are thankful for your love towards the game and feedback from the EA experience!
Until now, I've been using Steam announcements for announcing updates and changes to the game.
For the Anniversarry, I'd like to explain future plans for LBoL from a a more holistic perspective.
[h3]Playable Characters[/h3]
Koishi Komeiji and Alice Margatroid are confirmed to be in production!
Koishi can switch between three different Mental States, with cards having different effects depending on her current state.
Mental State preferences will vary based on her Mana and cards obtained.
Alice uses her dolls to assist her in combat each with various effects, both passive and triggered.
She can enhance her dolls' stamina, use them as spell-casting resources, detonate them, or use them to enhance certain card effects.
Of course, there's no way to tell if the above design will end up as the final one for them, based on our experience developing the previous four characters.
Based on how long it took for Cirno to release, we expect one of them to be complete by the next anniversarry.
We're not sure which character will be released first.
[h3]Enemies[/h3]
We don't expect to add any new enemies at this point.
Some existing enemies will be reworked or adjusted, e.g. Hata no Kokoro.
We plan to have every enemy character animated by the time of the full release.
This is why it's difficult for us to add further enemies currently, especially named Touhou Characters.
The only exception would be secret final bosses, we would consider adding one or two among Yukari Yakumo, Kaguya Houraisan and Watatsuki no Yorihime if we have good ideas for them.
[h3]Events[/h3]
6-10 more events are planned to be added!
After the Hecatia T-Shirt event was finished, our previous event illustrator, 尼特蠕动人, is no longer available for illustrations with such degree of completion.
It was thanks to their event illustrations that we've set such an upbeat tone for the game(A more tongue in cheek story like my personal favorite series, "Ranma 1/2")
We will commission other artists to fill their shoes for those new events.
[h3]Miscellaneous[/h3]
We plan to implement lifetime stats and the achievement system in the near future.
Other frequently asked questions：
1.Versions on other platforms, especially Nintendo Switch
A major problem we're facing is that LBoL has a complex interface not designed for gamepads in mind (such how is one supposed to seperate mana on the bottom left with pad controls)
Overcoming this problem will take time and isn't a priority at this time. Once we'll figure out a solution, we'll proceed with a Switch release.
2. Steam Workshop
An extension to the above question. Apart from requiring more development time, there's also more questions to be answered: How do mod authors mod danmakus, for example?
In addition, we're not sure if the game has sold enough to warrant such mod support.
Only after the game has developed a solid enough playerbase may we consider having official Workshop support.
Of course, we don't object to mods being made and distributed privately at all. In fact, there's people making and talking about mods and right now on Discord.
When I started development on LBoL back in early 2018, I didn't expect competition between the various StS-likes to be so fierce.
For this reason we had to be more innovative than just Slay The Spire under a Touhou coat of paint (though even that would have been hard on its own).
Many fellow developers have to ask this question: What makes your game differentt from StS?
My answer would be the colored mana system, how cards are distributed between colors, and the various strategies each color can provide.
That's definitely interesting so far, but it seems to turn off more casual players due to its complexity.
All in all, we're proud that we've been able to release Touhou: Lost Branch of Legend.
However, the game's sales/development cost ratio is still less than ideal, and a few of our contributors had to find other ways to make ends meet. Huge thanks to their contributions all along.
Let's end things on a more positive note.
Developing this game has been enjoyable, and we've made more friends along the way.
After the game launch, fans from across the globe have provided high quality translations of various languages voluntarily, which reminded me of the internet in the 2010s and the Touhou fanart community in general.
Tha alone fills me with enough enthusiasm to keep on working!
Till we meet again in the next major udpate!
Alice
Alioth Studio
