Touhou Project trivia and other interesting information you may not know!

General Trivia

  • ZUN named his game company "Team Shanghai Alice" because Shanghai is a multicultural city where east and west meet. Alice was chosen for its fairytale-esque vibes.

  • ZUN has tried and failed to create a male character for Touhou before (Myouren Hijiri was planned to be the final boss of Touhou 12), but he claimed that male characters would ruin the balance of the series.

  • The only male character who was added is Rinnosuke Morichika, who unlike everyone else, generally stays out of larger events. Based on how ZUN draws and talks about himself, he seems to be somewhat of a self-parody.

    • ZUN's self-portrait. Click to enlarge.

  • Touhou holds the record for "The World's Most Prolific Fan-made Shooter Series".

Game Trivia

  • The pause sound effect is actually a sped-up version of the "Story of Eastern Wonderland" motif.
  • Another character was planned for Touhou 6, but she got scrapped early on. All we have about her are two lines of hex code, which reveals the name Rin Satsuki (冴月 麟), two spellcards, Flower Sign (花符) and Wind Sign (風符), and based on its placement near Reimu and Marisa, the fact that she was supposed to be a playable character.

    • Rin Satsuki in Touhou 6's code


  • Originally, the stage 6 theme of Touhou 12, Fires of Hokkai was supposed to feature actual heartbeats, but ZUN concluded that that would be too quiet and opted to use drums instead.

Character Trivia

  • Reimu Hakurei was inspired by the game Rocky and Pocky, which is one of ZUN's favorite games.

  • Marisa Kirisame's portrait art in Touhou 3 was actually traced from the Black Nurse of the Rance series of games.

  • Alice Margatroid's last name comes from a character's of the same surname from the novel "A Murder is Announced" by Agatha Christie. Alice herself, is otherwise based off of the Alice of the Shin Megami Tensei series, who was inspired by the Alice of Alice in Wonderland.

  • Sakuya Izayoi was inspired by Dio Brando, the antagnonist of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. She's a skilled knife thrower and is able to stop time. She even has multiple spellcards that do so, one of them being called "The World", referencing Dio's ability. Her character design was inspired by the maids of the manga series Sarai.

  • Remilia Scarlet prefers Type B blood.

  • Toyosatomimi no Miko is the only character with a confirmed birthday, as she wasn't based off of, but is Prince Shoutoku. She was born on February 7th, in the year 572.

  • ZUN apologized for basing Mamizou Futatsuiwa off of Danzaborou-danuki, because it's "cliché".

ZUN Trivia

  • He originally wanted to make music for fighting games, because they were popular at the time, but ended up making the first Touhou game and composing music for it at the age of 19.

  • ZUN is actually a shortened form of his name Jun'ya Oota (太田 順也). As such, it's pronounced "Jun".

  • He's known for his love of beer. His favorite brand is Kirin.

Fanwork Trivia

  • One of the most popular Touhou inspired shmup series is called "Len'en". It focuses more on Japanese history, and unlike Touhou, all of its characters are genderless.