Drillimation-Studio Emiko Feud, Explained

After the release of Touhou Chouhatsuyou ~ Burgeoning Tresses of Longevity back in April, Drillimation’s relationship with the Vietnam-based Studio Emiko entered into a feud. As such, the involvement of Studio Emiko in Drillimation games is currently on hold as Drillimation Systems founder and CEO Susumu Takajima wishes to assess the issues that plagued the company in its previous games. Their games largely target beginners, but it was later revealed that creating a series of beginner-oriented Touhou Project danmaku games was not the way to go, and it turned away a lot of long-time fans.

This doesn’t mean their relationship has ended, though. In response to the middling reception that Burgeoning Tresses of Longevity suffered following the release of the beta and the official game, Studio Emiko shifted its focus to VTubing, namely their Ciel Chandelleur project. It came after its chairwoman Emiko Hosokawa criticised the direction the game took despite pressure to change its image to focus less on the long hair that is a core part of the game’s story.

A lot of players, including on one Discord server, stated that Drillimation went too far in the narratives of their games despite wanting to try something unique. Takajima admitted that this was a big mistake following its release. For months, Hosokawa had been criticising the project late in the development of Touhou Kichouden ~ Mythos of Phantasmagoria 2, and as Burgeoning Tresses of Longevity was in its two-and-a-half-month development earlier this year.

She stated that if the game was completed and released, it would undermine Drillimation and the work she did on previous games, including Touhou Meijinka ~ Song of Divine Tempest. Shortly after dropping out of the Burgeoning Tresses of Longevity project, she started focusing more on the Ciel Chandelleur VTuber project before going full-time following the game’s release, even after a hacking incident that locked her out of Discord for the past two months.

According to Hosokawa, her artistic direction, which is greatly influenced by the aesthetics of multiple “subgenres” of visual kei, is the factor that most likely put her at odds with Drillimation, aside from the highly fantasical vibes of her storywriting in comparison to Drillimation’s more “realistic” urban fantasy lore they have written for the Chuhou Joutai trilogy. As of June 2025, Hosokawa is working on a (very likely) final rework on the concept of the Studio’s VTuber Ciel prior to the talent’s planned debut in July of the same year. The new concept is said to come into fruition after Hosokawa came across the song “Messiah -Kyuuyaku-“ by visual kei solo project DAVID, and the circumstances behind this are foreshadowed by Ciel’s official Bluesky account via a post claiming that Ciel’s “yandere” side towards D’s Asagi was nerfed after listening to the song any number of times.

Takajima even stated that had Hosokawa not dropped out, she would have steered the game in the right direction. There have been suggestions that later this year or the next (or even when she returns to Discord), she may direct another project with Drillimation, though Takajima has plans to direct another manic shooter that would be a canon entry to the Drillimation Danmaku Universe and set between the events of the two Mythos of Phantasmagoria games. When Takajima was asked by Melody Harmonia of Atelier in Wonderland about the project, he responded in a comment on YouTube that the game was the worst mistake of his career.

Drillimation Systems is currently working on its next project Shining Shattering Sky ~ Reverie of Breaking Unreality, which is set to be the company’s first original game and installment in the Chuhou Joutai series since Chuhou Joutai 3: Three Nights of Scarlet Abscess in 2022. The company also has future plans to partner with a multi-channel network to help fund development for its games.