taisei/doc/GAME.rst

.. _taisei-project--game-manual:

.. role:: strike
    :class: strike

Taisei Project – Game Manual
============================

.. contents::

Introduction
------------

Taisei is a shoot-em-up game. Lots of bullets cover the screen and if
you are hit by one, you die. To make things easier, your hitbox is very
small-- much smaller than your character.

If you get hit you lose a life (displayed on the right hand side in the
HUD); if you are out of lives, it’s Game Over, but you get a few
Continues to keep playing (without scores or replays).

Controls
--------

+-------+------------------------------------------+
| Name  | Default Key                              |
+=======+==========================================+
| Shoot | ``Z``                                    |
+-------+------------------------------------------+
| Bomb  | ``X``                                    |
+-------+------------------------------------------+
| Focus | ``Left Shift``                           |
+-------+------------------------------------------+
| Move  | ``Up``,\ ``Down``,\ ``Left``,\ ``Right`` |
+-------+------------------------------------------+

Using the Gamepad is also supported. See options to set up controls.

Users of non-qwerty keyboard layouts: Don’t worry, Taisei’s controls are
not based on layout but key location.

Shotmodes
---------

The different playable characters have different shots. You start out
weak and have to raise your power meter to get stronger.

Try a few modes to find the one that fits you best.

Focus
-----

While pressing ``Shift``, your movement is slower and the weapon will be
more focused, hence the name *Focus* to describe this mode. It is useful
for accurate dodging, but you shouldn’t stay in this mode all the time.

The white circle appearing in this mode is a representation of your
hitbox. As you can see it is really small.

HUD
---

The numbers in the HUD are

-  **Score** Your current score. Raise this by shooting enemies,
   grazing, and collecting items. As you accumulate score, the game will
   reward you with life and bomb fragments. Be sure to catch those!
-  **Player** How many lives you have. Only full stars count.
-  **Bombs** How many bombs you have.
-  **Power** How strong your current weapon is. Maxes out at 4.
-  **Graze** If you are fearless and kiss bullets by going really close
   to them, this will increase and raise your score.

Items
-----

Killed enemies drop various amounts of items. They may look like bullets
at first, but they are safe to touch.

These are:

-  **Blue** Increases your score.
-  **Red** Gives you more power.
-  **Green Star** Bomb. Appears either filled (full bomb) or as an empty
   outline (bomb fragment). 5 fragments make up one bomb.
-  **Pink Star** Life or Life fragment.

If you fly near to the top of the screen, all the visible items will be
picked up (shown as flying towards you).

Bosses
------

Taisei has 6 levels (called *stages*). Each stage has a boss and a
midboss in some form. They are much stronger than normal enemies and
have different attacks with time limits. There are different types of
Attacks:

-  **Normal**: A signature move every boss has. They are a break between
   the other, more fierce attacks, but some say there are Normals in the
   game that are way too hard.

-  **Spell Card**: This is where the Bosses concentrate their powers
   (resulting in a background change) and hit you with really hard and
   unusual patterns. They give a lot of extra points when you *capture*
   them. That means shooting down the HP within the time limit without
   getting hit or using bombs.

   You can revisit spellcards you have encountered in the *Spell
   Practice* mode to get better at the ones you frequently die on.

-  **Extra Spell**: *Capture* every Spell Card of a boss in succession
   and you activate their *Extra Spell*.

   These are super hard, unique spells that will take all your skills
   and creativity to dodge. Special safety magic has locked your Bomb
   and Life meters so they can’t hurt you, but you can’t use your bombs
   either.

-  **Survival Spell**: Rarely, a very strong boss can invoke a Spell Card
   that makes them completely invincible-- turning their health bar
   blue.

   You are on your own here. Try to survive somehow until the timer runs
   out.

Bombs
-----

Your characters are, of course, no less apt at magic than the bosses, so
they have Spell Cards of their own. These are called *bombs*.

You can use them to clear out bullets and enemies from the screen.
However you only get a limited amount of them, so they are best used
when you are in a pinch. When used against a boss' Spell Card, it voids
your capturing bonus.

Rumor has it that if you get hit by a bullet and hit the bomb key fast
enough, you can avoid death. This is called *Death Bombing* and people
who master it-- so the lore goes-- will find their bomb meter becoming a
second life meter.

Difficulty
----------

:strike:`If you found this guide helpful, you probably should start
playing Easy mode.`

Taisei is a very hard game, especially for newcomers to the genre. In
many modern games, *Easy* is a placeholder and *Normal* is the easy mode
so people playing it don’t have to feel bad. So you might feel inclined
to start at Normal like in your other games.

This approach doesn’t work for Taisei though. Easy is balanced around
maybe being not impossible for newcomers, so it’ll require some
training. On the positive side it still contains enough bullets to show
you the beauty of all the patterns. ;)

There is no shame in playing Easy. Some say that even the dev who
initially founded the project and wrote this section can’t beat Easy…

More info
---------

Knowing this much should help to get you started!

If you want more tricks and hints on how to *“git gud”*, check out
resources on how to play *Touhou*, the game Taisei is based on.

Enjoy playing, and if you want to contact us, visit us on Freenode IRC
#taisei-project or on `Discord <https://discord.gg/JEHCMzW>`__.