Len'en Ten'eisenki: Brilliant pagoda or haze castle

Len'en Ten'eisenki: Brilliant pagoda or haze castle
Developer: Trick Nostalgie Publisher: Trick Nostalgie Platform: Windows Released internationally: December 1, 2016 This game has unused graphics. This game has revisional differences.

Len'en Ten'eisenki: Brilliant pagoda or haze castle is an ambitious game: branching paths with a choose your own adventure-type plot, upgrades out the wazoo to make an otherwise grueling game much easier, the return of every character from past games, and then some.

Naturally, ambition doesn't always pan out like you'd expect: the game was delayed over a year from its intended release, and the developer ended up hospitalized as a result of overwork.

Unused Graphics

Found in the cell_eff folder, these graphics were probably used for testing the display of midboss names and titles. They translate to "test" and "for experimental boss" respectively.

In addition, a sprite sheet for a test character exists in dat.led under the name test_dot.png, but it is simply a duplicate of Mitsumo's sprite sheet.

Unused Portraits

Suzumi's portraits for the main game scenario include a grand total of four leftover "defeated" portraits from the demo version, where they were one of the possible stage 3 bosses. In the final game, they show up as the final boss on stage 6:0 and have no dialogue after being defeated, giving no opportunity for these to be reused.

Version Differences

To do: Every version before 1.10a + 1.10b, if worth documenting.

Version 1.10a

• All midbosses and bosses now begin with several seconds of invulnerability at the beginning of each attack. This is to prevent more powerful characters (such as Sese Kitsugai) from defeating bosses in a matter of seconds.
• Danmaku capture history is now implemented; the game now remembers the number of attempts made on a single spell card, as well as the number of successful captures.
• New sub-events:
  • "Speed Restriction [Low-Gear]": The player is not allowed to focus.
  • "Speed Restriction [High-Gear]": The player is forced into focused mode, preventing flash bombs from being used.
  • "Expansion of Armaments": The level of the enemies in the cell increases by up to 3.
  • "Duplex Barrier": The length of time a midboss remains invulnerable at the start of their attack is doubled.
  • "It's Slippy, Beware": The player's movement becomes slippery, similar to the "removal of friction" effect used by Medias Moritake.
  • "Giant Sudden Upset": Killing regular enemies causes the player to lose shot power, while killing midbosses will drop large amounts of power items.
• The amount of achievement stars that can be displayed on the title screen was increased from six to 42(!).
• Tweaks to player skill upgrades.
• Various other bugfixes (spell names and menu text now display properly, etc.).

Version 1.20a

• A fourth team known as the "Secret Team" was added, consisting of Suzumi's three personalities. This team can only be unlocked after completing the Extra+α stage with all other teams. The Secret Team has its own scenario and implements the previously-unused shot types from character slots 0C, 0D and 0E.
• The file talk_Kuroji_Suzumi_0.txt, unused in previous versions, was removed altogether. It contained an unfinished version of dialogue between the Scoundrel Team and Suzumi Kuzu, having a particular line which didn't make it into the final dialogue, marked with red here.

Character	Line	Translation
Kuroji Shitodo	お前の悪行も、そろそろ年貢の納め時だとは思わないか？	It's about time you pay for all your bad deeds, don't you think?
Suzumi	あら、そうなの？　　イヤだな～ 期限の延期とかないの？	Oh, really? Don't wanna~ Isn't there a deadline extension or something?

Version 1.20b

• The ability to create a custom team was added, unlocked upon completing the Extra+α stage with the Secret Team.
• Some danmaku patterns have been re-worked for better balancing, such as Kaisen Azuma's Leaping Medicine "Tsukuba Toad Oil", Jun Amanomiya's first non-spell and Kaoru Kashiwagi's second non-spell. Xeno a for example has had their dice changed in the way that, when landing on 3, it no longer turns around and follows the player.
• A snowy-like particle effect was added to the "idiots now thinking" loading image. This came from JynX's Fools Rush In.
• Aoji, Hooaka, Fumikado, Iyozane, Jun, Kaoru, Kujiru, Kurohebi, Saragimaru, Shion and Sukune portraits were given extra facial expression images. Suzumi especially has the biggest amount of new portraits given, due to being playable.
• New upgrades were added for Suzumi Kuzu's EX form (unlocked alongside the Secret Team).
• Due to new upgrades, the maximum level of upgrades has moved from 5225 to 5375.
• When picking a character, you get a little red "upgrade" button on the bottom-left corner, that gives quick access to turning on or off the upgrades.
• Replays were implemented.
• The achievement star system was removed and replaced with a proper achievement system consisting of 30 achievements.
• Very trivial graphic fixes.
• Fixes a glitch where the tutorial would often crash while the game is running under Wine.

Version 1.20e

• Fixes a glitch where the alcohol level would either remain stuck at 0 for the entirety of a run or increase to its maximum very quickly.

Version 1.20f

• Fixes a glitch where the final achievement, "Heaven and Shadow War Record," would not be marked as achieved even after getting all 29 other achievements.

(Source: Len'en Wiki)