Touhou LostWord is a popular turn-based gacha game based on the Touhou Project series, offering fans and newcomers an exciting mix of strategy, gacha mechanics, and fan service. Developed by Good Smile Company, it brings the beloved characters of Gensokyo to mobile devices with an engaging battle system, event-driven rewards, and plenty of fan-favorite elements from Touhou. This guide will walk you through the game’s key features, from rerolling strategies to understanding the combat system.
Getting Started: The Reroll Process
One of the key elements in Touhou LostWord is rerolling, a process where you restart the game multiple times to take advantage of the free pulls offered early on. This allows players to aim for the best characters, or simply their favorite ones, to start strong.
Why reroll?
Rerolling can save time and money in gacha games by ensuring that you start with powerful characters. In Touhou LostWord, you’re granted 10 pulls before the tutorial fight, with a guaranteed friend from a pool of seven characters.
Rerolling can save time and money in gacha games by ensuring that you start with powerful characters. In Touhou LostWord, you’re granted 10 pulls before the tutorial fight, with a guaranteed friend from a pool of seven characters.
Which characters to aim for:
The reroll process can be short, but the goal is to get the best possible character to ensure a smoother experience. While you’ll get key characters like Reimu Hakurei and Marisa Kirisame for free later, other powerful units are worth aiming for early on:
The reroll process can be short, but the goal is to get the best possible character to ensure a smoother experience. While you’ll get key characters like Reimu Hakurei and Marisa Kirisame for free later, other powerful units are worth aiming for early on:
- Youmu Konpaku – A top-tier AoE damage dealer with a powerful Last Word skill that makes her extremely valuable for both farming and difficult content. Most players and guides recommend rerolling for Youmu.
- Reisen Udongein Inaba – While not as powerful as Youmu, Reisen offers utility in terms of Moon element attacks and can solo early bosses effectively.
- Cirno – Known as “The Strongest,” Cirno is useful in challenging content thanks to her Freeze Barrier mechanics, but she lacks reliability for general farming.
- Sakuya Izayoi – Fast and high-damage, but limited in utility compared to other characters.
Combat System and Mechanics
The gameplay in Touhou LostWord revolves around turn-based combat, where you can bring up to six characters—three active and three in the backline. The battles take place across multiple waves, with your characters utilizing a variety of abilities, skills, and spell cards to defeat enemies.
- Basic Attacks:
- Spread Shot – Generates more power for future turns but deals less damage.
- Focus Shot – Deals more damage but generates less power.
- Boost and Graze:
- Boosting allows you to power up your attacks, increasing the number of hits or element bonuses for more damage. You can stack Boost up to three times.
- Grazing grants temporary invincibility by consuming barriers, useful for dodging heavy attacks.
- Spell Cards and Last Word:
- Each character has two regular spell cards and one Last Word (ultimate attack). Last Words are extremely powerful, but once used, they lock the character’s spell cards for the remainder of the battle.
- Last Words are crucial for clearing difficult content or farming efficiently, especially for characters like Youmu with strong AoE abilities.
- Elemental System: Enemies and characters are aligned with different elements (Fire, Water, Wood, etc.), and exploiting enemy weaknesses is key to breaking their barriers. Once barriers are broken, enemies are stunned and take increased damage.
- Yin/Yang Attacks and Resistances: Each character’s attacks are categorized into Yin (physical) and Yang (magical) types, and matching these against the enemy’s weaknesses is crucial for victory.
Story Cards and Limit Breaks
One of the unique features in Touhou LostWord is the Story Card system. Story cards serve as equipment for your characters, boosting their stats or providing special effects when used with spell cards.
Rarity and Types: Story cards come in different rarities (3-star to 5-star) and can be obtained from the gacha along with characters. Some cards provide passive boosts, while others activate additional effects during battles.
Limit Breaks: Characters can be limit-broken up to four times using duplicates or special items called Paper Dolls. These dolls are awarded through daily logins, events, and quests, allowing you to limit break characters without relying on duplicate pulls.
Gacha and Summoning System
Like most gacha games, Touhou LostWord features a robust summoning system where players can acquire new characters and story cards.
- Gacha Currency:
- Coins – Used for summoning and other in-game activities.
- Green Cubes – Used for most summons in the gacha.
- Pink Cubes (God Crystals) – Premium currency used to purchase skins, outfits, and occasionally summon characters.
- Banner Types:
- Unlimited Banners – Always available and feature general pool characters.
- Festival Banners – Limited-time banners with exclusive characters.
- Super Festival Banners – Featuring rare and powerful characters, with higher pity costs.
- Pity System: A pity system ensures that after a certain number of pulls (usually 150), players are guaranteed the featured character. This applies to both regular and festival banners, though Super Festival characters require more pulls for guaranteed acquisition.
Progression and Events
Touhou LostWord features a variety of events and progression mechanics designed to help players build their teams and gather resources.
Daily and Weekly Quests: Complete these for rewards like coins, cubes, and Paper Dolls for limit breaking characters.
Errands and Dojo: Send characters on errands to gather resources, and use the dojo to level up their skills. These passive activities are essential for optimizing your characters.
Events: Participate in time-limited events for exclusive rewards, including rare story cards and festival units. Events often feature higher drop rates for farming materials.
Voice Acting and Customization
One of the unique aspects of Touhou LostWord is its approach to voice acting. Since Touhou Project characters do not have official voice actors, the game offers multiple voice options for each character, allowing players to choose the voice they feel best matches their favorite characters.
Additionally, players can collect skins and outfits for characters, using Pink Cubes to unlock new looks for their units. These skins are purely cosmetic, but they offer fans another way to personalize their experience.
Final Tips for New Players
- Reroll for Youmu: If you’re looking for a strong start, reroll for Youmu Konpaku. Her high AoE damage and utility make her a versatile pick throughout the game.
- Save Your Pink Cubes: Don’t waste your Pink Cubes on additional rolls. Save them for skins or special banners that offer exclusive content.
- Prioritize Limit Breaks: Use Paper Dolls wisely to limit break your favorite characters. These items are scarce, so plan accordingly.
- Farm Efficiently: Focus on farming one-wave nodes for optimal progression, especially during events. Use replays to automate farming and save time.
- Explore Story and Events: Participate in events for rare rewards, and don’t be afraid to experiment with different team compositions to find your favorite playstyle.
In conclusion, Touhou LostWord offers a deep and rewarding experience for fans of the series and gacha players alike. With a rich roster of characters, a strategic combat system, and plenty of events to keep players engaged, there’s always something new to discover in Gensokyo.
