Scoring works similarly to many other Touhou games.
Enemies
Any damage dealt to an enemy, whether it be dealt by a shot or a bomb, will increase the player's score, Cherry, and Cherry slightly. Defeating enemies will award the player with a slightly more points, although these tend to range in the hundreds, per enemy.
Grazing
To graze a bullet, the player must come dangerously close to an enemy's bullet.. Depending on the phantom gauge, the points for grazing differ. Starting from the left, grazing while the meter is dark blue (-80% or -30%) each graze is worth 2000 points and adds three to the graze counter (for a total of 6000 points for each bullet grazed). Between this and -20%, each graze is worth a total of 4000 points and adds two to the graze counter. From here on out, grazes increase your graze counter by 1. From -20% to 20%, each graze is worth only 2000 points and adds one to the graze counter. From 20% to 80% (or 30%, for Youmu) grazes are worth 4000 points each. And when the gauge is above the last threshold, grazes are worth 6000 points each. The graze counter is used to calculate the Clear bonus and star item bonuses.
It is possible to graze a bullet only once, meaning there will not be any additional points or grazes if a bullet is followed, although lasers can be continually grazed throughout their duration.
Point Items
Whenever an enemy is defeated, there is a chance that it will release a point item. Whenever a point item is collected for maximum value, the number will be shown in yellow.
Mini-point items (little blue circles) are worth about 1/10 of a regular point item. A regular point item is worth the amount listed under the phantom gauge. This amount goes up by 10 for every 2 time orbs that are collected.
Picking up point items while the gauge is above -80% (or -30%, with Youmu) will double the value of the point items.
Power Items
Whenever an enemy is defeated, there is a chance that it will release a power item. These increase the player's shot power, as well as give 10 points per item. When the player's shot is fully powered up, all onscreen power items become point items, and instead of power items being dropped, point items will drop instead.
Star Items
A star item will appear anytime an enemy bullet has been cancelled out, which can happen when the player defeats the Spell Card/attack pattern of a boss, reaches maximum power, defeats a certain type of enemy, or when a bomb erases the enemy bullet. The value of a star item is based on the number of grazes the player has, as shown in this formula:(graze/40)*10 300.
Time Orbs
Exclusive to Imperishable Night, time orbs are believed to slow the passing of the night, and are essential to scoring in the game. The value of a time orb depends on the number of total point items that the player has collected. They are worth [# of point items / 2] X 10, and the minimum value of a time orb is 100 points.
Time orbs appear in one of five ways:
- Collecting a spell card bonus
- Firing at enemies while in -80% human mode
- Grazing during bosses while in 80% phantom mode
- Causing enemy slaves to be detonated by destroying their master
- Destroying enemies while in -80% human mode or 80% phantom mode
The effects of collecting them are:
- If a certain number is collected in a stage, the game clock only advances 30 minutes, as opposed to an hour. The player will also have a chance to face the stage boss' last spell.
- For every two orbs collected, the point counter increases by 10 points.
- Each time orb that is collected in human mode bumps the phantom gauge toward the human side. The reverse happens when a time orb is collected in phantom mode.
- Collecting a time orb during a spell card will increase the spell card bonus by 8000 points.
Enemy Bullet Bonus
Whenever a boss or mid-boss' health bar is reduced by one, or their Spell Card is defeated, all onscreen bullets are nullified, and they are tallied up to calculate the enemy bullet bonus. The more enemy bullets onscreen at the time, the higher this bonus becomes.
Spell Card Bonus
Whenever a boss or mid-boss' Spell Card is defeated within the allocated time limit, without being hit or using a bomb, the player will recieve a Spell Card bonus, which is added to the total score. The intial value of the Spell Card bonus will vary depending on which Spell Card is being used, however, as the timer decreases, so will the value of the bonus recieved as well, which is usually rounded to the nearest five-thousand, however, it will increase by (Cherry / 1,500) x 20 2,500 for every graze the player has.
Clear Bonus
At the end of each stage, you will be provided with bonus points based on how well you performed. The bonus is calculated like this:Stage - 10,000,000 (Stage 1)
-15,000,000 (Stage 2)
- 20,000,000 (Stage 3)
- 25,000,000 (Stage 4, Uncanny or Powerful)
- 30,000,000 (Stage 5)
- 35,000,000 (FinalA)
- 40,000,000 (FinalB)
- 66,600,000 (Extra)
Point x 50,000 (point items collected in the stage)
Graze x 500 (graze count for that stage)
Time Orbs x 1,000 (time orbs collected in the stage)
In addition, if the stage happened to be the last stage, the following is added:
- Player x 25,000,000 (lives in stock, not including the current one)
- Bomb x 5,000,000 (bombs in stock)
- Night Bonus x 20,000,000 (every 1/2 hour left before 5:00 am)
Finally, depending on the conditions played under, the result is multiplied by these modifiers, rounded down to the nearest 10:
- 4 Initial Lives: x 0.5
- 5 Initial Lives: x 0.2
- 6 Initial Lives: x 0.1
- 7 Initial Lives: x 0.05
- Easy Difficulty: x 0.5
- Normal Difficulty: x 1.0
- Hard Difficulty: x 1.2
- Lunatic Difficulty: x 1.5
- Extra Difficulty: x 2.0
The end result is then added on to your score.