Bad Apple!!
"Bad Apple!!" is the sixth track in the soundtrack of the 1998 bullet hell video game Lotus Land Story, the fourth entry in the Touhou Project series created by Team Shanghai Alice. The instrumental theme was originally designed to be played during the third stage of the game, as chiptune on the Japanese NEC PC-9800 computer platform, at 161 beats per minute using a frequency modulation synthesis chip. The Lotus Land Story version that has more than 1.4 million views on YouTube is a remake of the song from an official Touhou album named Akyu's Untouched Score Volume 1 and was released on the 21st of May, 2006.
"Bad Apple!!" | |
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Cover art of Lotus Land Story | |
Song by ZUN | |
Released | 14 August 1998 |
Genre | Electronic, chiptune |
Length | 1:22 |
Label | ZUN Soft |
Composer(s) | ZUN |
It is notable for leading to a much later cover by Alstroemeria Records and a subsequent accompanying black-and-white shadow puppet-video – commonly called Shadow-art. The video became a Japanese internet meme in the late 2000s, correlating with the peak of Touhou's popularity, and experienced a resurgence in the mid-2010s when the black-and-white video was ported to esoteric media such as obsolete hardware, displays created within sandbox video games (e.g. Minecraft), and other unusual media (such as a mechanical television) as a graphical test. As of October 2023, it has achieved more than 80 million views on YouTube.
Since then, Alstroemeria Records' version has been licensed to various other video game companies that acquired a Touhou licence, and has been guest featured in many rhythm games such as Groove Coaster, Muse Dash and maimai. It has even been used in officially licensed spin-offs such as Touhou Spell Bubble as the game's tutorial track and free play song.