No relation to Dr. Wily.
Touhou Kikeijuunote ~ Wily Beast and Weakest Creature is a video game created by Team Shanghai Alice for Windows computers released on August 12, 2019. It's the seventeenth videogame installment in the Touhou Project franchise.
Reimu, Marisa, and Youmu encounter several animal spirits from Hell, who claim that their fellow animal spirits are plotting to take over the surface world, and team up with them to take on this new threat.
This game provides examples of:
- 11th-Hour Superpower: During the final two Spell Cards, lots of animal spirits start constantly flooding into the screen, allowing the player to keep re-entering Berserk Roaring Mode.
- Achievement System: In a first for a mainline Touhou game, Wily Beast and Weakest Creature comes with an achievement system, which includes secret achievements for getting the unique spirits from each boss.
- Animal Motifs:
- The central theme of the game is animals and gods and youkai based on animals, as well as the latter portion of the game taking place within the Animal Realm of Buddhist cosmology.
- Reimu has paw print patterns on her dress and hair ribbon, Marisa has a nekomata (read: youkai cat) on her dress, and Youmu's spirit half manifests a snake head on its tail.
- Another Dimension: The Animal Realm is an Otherworld separate from the Human World and Hell, and requires crossing the latter to reach. Eiki mentions in one of Youmu's endings that events there normally never even touch Gensokyo, implying a massive spiritual distance between both realms.
- Big Bad Ensemble: The conflict is caused by three individuals: Yachie Kicchou, one of the crime bosses oppressing the human spirits who plotted the invasion of Gensokyo to draw in living humans who could defeat Keiki, Keiki Haniyasushin, whose takeover of the Primate Spirit Garden is what prompted Yachie's Enemy Mine with Saki Kurokoma and plot to invade the surface, and Saki Kurokoma, who was also one of the crime bosses oppressing humans and who attempts to invade Gensokyo following Keiki's defeat.
- Canon: Yuuma in Gouyoku Ibun states that it was Reimu and the Eagle Spirit who had helped take down Keiki, confirming the Reimu-Eagle route to be canon. She says the same for Marisa, her route is non-canon, so...
- The Cavalry: For most of the fight against Keiki, the player character is actually retreating due to being in a disadvantageous position. But right before the last two Spell Cards, the tide starts turning as reinforcements arrive in the form of a swarm of animal spirits.
- City Noir: The city created by the human spirits in the Animal Realm seen in Stage 5 has a dark and oppressive atmosphere.
- Developer's Foresight: During Spell Practice, the last two spellcards of the Final Boss are the only ones that can be cleared with a Roaring Mode active. However, if you get hit during Roaring Mode (which cancels the mode and clears a large group of bullets) in Spell Practice, the attempt will not count and you will have to try again. But, if you cut short the Roaring Mode by pressing the Spellcard button, only a small amount of bullets will be canceled and you will not fail the attempt.
- Elaborate Underground Base: Stage 6 takes place within Tumulus Base, which is itself a massive kofun
, an old type of Japanese tomb whose most common form resembles a keyhole from above. - Enemy Mine: The factions of the Animal Realm team up to deal with Keiki. After she's defeated, they go back to fighting each other and Saki takes the opportunity to try crossing Hell in order to invade Gensokyo, setting up the events of the Extra Stage.
- Evil Versus Evil: Crime families composed of animal spirits that oppress human spirits versus a tyrant who offers safety to human spirits through utter obedience. You wind up just being a tool for the former.
- Flunky Boss: Mayumi summons different kinds of haniwa during her Spell Cards. Keiki does the same for her fourth spell.
- Gang of Hats: The four organizations that ruled the Animal Realm before Keiki showed up:
- The Keiga family, led by Saki, comprises beasts with strong claws, fangs, legs, and other bodily weapons, prioritizing physical strength.
- The Kiketsu family, led by Yachie, has beasts that excel at surprise attacks.
- The Gouyoku alliance, led by Yuuma, is an organization of proud flying beasts.
- The fourth, unnamed organization is made up of beasts that specialize in dirty tactics like traps, poison, and parasites.
- Idiosyncratic Difficulty Levels: Named after various animals, in ascending order of ferociousness.
- Easy: Lamb Level
- Normal: Shiba Level
- Hard: Saber-Toothed Tiger Level
- Lunatic: Dinosaur Level
- Extra: Cryptid Level
- Let's Fight Like Gentlemen: Saki, the Extra Boss, is the leader of the wolf spirits. If you play the Extra Stage with the wolf spirit, Saki orders said wolf spirit to continue helping the player character during the fight against her to make the duel fair.
- Little Bit Beastly: The fairies seen in the Animal Realm have animal ears.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The heroine defeating Keiki creates a power vacuum that allows Saki to invade Hell in an attempt to conquer it, the Animal Realm, and Gensokyo.
- No-Sell: The reason the animal spirits require help from the protagonists is that as purely physical beings with no souls to speak of, the haniwa are immune to anything the spirits can throw at them.
- One-Hit Polykill: The eagle spirit allows Marisa's lasers to pierce through enemies like they did in the older games.
- Outside-Context Problem: The animal spirits coming to Gensokyo from the Animal Realm is considered shocking by Eiki because of the massive distance between both places.
- Recurring Riff: "Beast Metropolis" takes quite a few musical cues from "Izanagi Object" in Neo-traditionalism of Japan.
- Smart Bomb: The otter spirit powers up your bombs and increases your starting amount of them.
- The Social Darwinist: The Animal Realm runs on the rule of "survival of the fittest", with humans on the bottom due to being the weakest spirits found there.
- Stating the Simple Solution: Subverted. After being defeated, Urumi asks Wolf Marisa why she didn't just ask a shinigami note to carry her across the Sanzu River into Higan. Marisa responds by saying that she doesn't have the time for a pleasure cruise.
- Super Mode: Each of the spirits have a corresponding super mode called "Roaring Mode". The Wolf spirit powers up the player's focused shot, the Otter provides a bullet-erasing barrier, and the Eagle powers up the player's unfocused shot.
- Thematic Sequel Logo Change: The logo for the game is partially red, has red paw prints, and forms an indeterminate creature to represent the game's focus on animals and the new location of the Animal Realm.
- To Hell and Back: The heroines are travelling to hell on a journey to stop animal spirits from taking over the surface world, but it turns out the real problem is within the entirely separate world of the Animal Realm.
- Vanilla Unit: Collecting five spirits makes you enter Roaring Mode. If you got three or more beast spirits of the same type, you enter Berserk Roaring Mode, which triggers a power depending on the type of beast spirit, as well as giving you some generic benefits like protecting you from one hit. If not, you enter the "vanilla" Roaring Mode, which only offers the generic benefits.
- Viler New Villain: Yachie Kicchou and Saki Kurokoma are much more villainous than the antagonists of previous Touhou Project games, being brutal crime bosses who lack any sort of sympathetic motives for their oppression of the human spirits.
- Worthy Opponent: Saki isn't completely defeated after you finish her boss fight, but decides to back down in recognition of the player character's skills.
