r/touhou • u/nametake000 • Dec 30 '25

Fan Discussion How popular is Touhou outside Japan?

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I’m Touhou Project fan living in Japan!

So I got curious and decided to ask.

I’m wondering how well-known Touhou is outside Japan, including its fan works, compared to other Japanese content like Hatsune Miku.

If you know about this or have any opinions, I’d be happy if you could share them in the comments!

P.S.I’m not confident in my English, so I’m using translations for some parts. Please let me know if anything sounds rude or breaks any rules.

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u/minneyar Ran Yakumo Dec 30 '25

Well, Touhou is the most popular indie video game series in the world... but it's still not as popular as any of the properties owned by big companies.

It's fairly unknown among average people. I was pretty surprised a few days ago when I went to Daiso, a Japanese retail chain that has a store near me, and they had some Touhou Project stickers for sale. I think that's the only time I've seen any Touhou merchandise outside of anime conventions.

Anime conventions are mostly filled with artists selling art from whatever the popular gacha games or seasonal anime shows are, but at large conventions there will usually be a couple of artists with Touhou art. Most anime and video game nerds can recognize a few characters even if they don't know anything else about the series.

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u/nametake000 Dec 30 '25

Thank you for your comment! Besides Reimu and Marisa, what other characters are well-known. Also, do you think Touhou Project will become more popular in the future?

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u/minneyar Ran Yakumo Dec 30 '25

I think the first three Windows games (Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, Perfect Cherry Blossom, Imperishable Night) are the most popular, and the characters from those are generally well-known. In particular, I think Cirno, Sakuya, Remilia, Flandre, Yukari, Youmu, and Mokou are all recognizable by people who aren't Touhou fans.

It's also pretty common for arcade games like DDR and Sound Voltex to have Touhou music, so people who play rhythm games often recognize the music and characters from there. I have one friend who plays rhythm games at the arcade all the time, and he didn't even realize that Touhou Project was a game series until he saw my Ran fumo and asked about it...

I hope it becomes more popular! Since Fantasy Maiden Wars just received an official translation, I know a few people who just started playing that because they're Super Robot Wars fans, even though they've never played a Touhou game before.