This generation has seen a surprising, but very welcome, return of Sunsoft. These guys were pretty big players back during the NES days, but started falling off kinda hard by the end of the 16-bit era. Now decades later, they’ve started making some fascinating headway, most recently going all-in on their resurrection with their “Sunsoft is Back” initiative. So, how’s it going? Let’s find out. 

The first game that Sunsoft’s resurgence can be attributed to would have to be Blaster Master Zero. Blaster Master was one of the company’s first real breakout hits on the NES, and probably their most enduring brand. It saw sequels all the way into the PlayStation era, and an attempted reboot on the Wii. (Clearly, it didn’t stick). 

But back in 2017, they teamed up with IntiCreates to make Blaster Master Zero, and it was a smashing success. What started as a super cool 3DS eShop game, got ported to every modern platform from Switch to PS4, and followed up by two excellent sequels, telling a complete story across all three entries. 

It’s been a few years since Blaster Master Zero 3, but that’s really not as much of a bad sign as it may seem. The third game was just as much of a success as its predecessors, but it also wrapped up the story. It’s not by any means impossible to start a new one, so I suspect we’ll see Blaster Master again someday. 

Now, I can’t say this for sure as I’m not a Sunsoft executive, but it’s my guess that the success of the Blaster Master Zero trilogy is what led Sunsoft to start taking their return seriously. The next game they properly announced though, was rather unexpected. A long time ago, back on the Famicom, Sunsoft released a game called Ikki that was basically the origin point for the term Kusoge, or “crap game” in Japan. And Sunsoft had the fortitude to do what I sincerely wish more companies would do. Instead of remaking a good game, they reinvented a bad one, and tried to fix it. And apparently they did! I don’t think Ikki Unite has been any flavor of truly successful, but apparently it’s actually a pretty decent game. They took the original game’s format and turned it into something not entirely unlike Vampire Survivors, which has become basically an entire genre unto itself. 

Ikki Unite was announced during Sunsoft’s first in a series of livestreams called “Sunsoft is Back.” Well, livestream isn’t quite the right word, I don’t think. It’s like a Nintendo Direct, except it’s hosted by a weird v-tuber who doesn’t have the tightest grip on the English language, making the American version of the presentation somewhat challenging to get through. 

Ikki Unite launched on February 14, 2023, and would be the only properly original release of the year, but it wouldn’t be the only thing Sunsoft put out. Sunsoft hit the remaster train in a big way, and the results were pretty dang solid. Throughout 2023, they released HEBEREKE: Enjoy Edition, Gimmick: Special Edition, and Trip World DX. All three of these releases are pretty significant, as none of these games were ever released in North America during their original runs, and all three have become various degrees of legendary. 

Trip World was originally released for the Game Boy, and was really quite a special little game. It was only sold in limited quantities, and it was a spectacular visual showpiece for Nintendo’s aging monochrome handheld. For its re-release, Sunsoft went all out, partnering with Limited Run Games for a Carbon Engine port with all the trimmings. They issued an actual physical Game Boy cartridge for US players for the first time, but the coolest thing by far was the addition of full color. The game’s original creator came back and worked with the team to create a full color version that actually works on a real Game Boy Color! It’s a gorgeous game in its color form, and the fact that this unusual adventure finally got to find its way into more players' hands is a marvelous thing. It wasn’t a new game, but it was the next best thing. 

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But in February 2024, a brand new game did make its way out into the world, in the form of Ufouria 2. Ufouria was almost released on the NES in North America, but wound up being canceled at the last minute. It did make it out in Europe though, and it featured some weird localization. They changed a bunch of the characters around, which sure, that happens when the originals are maybe a little too weird for audiences outside of Japan, but if anything, these new versions of the characters are even weirder than their Japanese counterparts. Regardless, Ufouria did eventually make it to North America by way of the Wii Virtual Console, and has earned a pretty decent amount of notoriety since. 

It’s a Metroidvania type game that’s just the most intensely bizarre thing you can imagine. In preparation for the new game, as mentioned earlier, they released a pretty barebones version of the first one called HEBEREKE: Enjoy Edition (Hebereke is the original game’s name in Japan) and this is actually just the Japanese version of the game. It’s not even properly translated. It is, however, a fairly decent way for people in North America to play the game with the original cast of characters, who also reprise their roles in Ufouria 2. Why they didn’t call HEBEREKE: Enjoy Edition Ufouria as well, (or Ufouria 2 Hebereke 2, for that matter) is beyond me, but whatever. 

Ufouris 2 is a real gem. It’s got a Yoshi-style crafting art direction that works extremely well with its weird world. It’s got a hub area now instead of one continuous sprawling world, but it works in the game’s favor. Ufouria is not a franchise I expected to find a second life, but I couldn’t be happier with the way this has all turned out. 

But even better than that is how things are going for Gimmick. Gimmick was another one of those games that almost made it out in North America, but couldn’t quite make it past the finish line. It’s a phenomenal game that has been making the emulator rounds for years, and earned itself a really solid reputation. It’s honestly one of the best games in the NES’s library, in my opinion. The original game was recently re-released as Gimmick: Special Edition, and it was… fine. Gimmick is a physics-based platformer, so introducing any input lag is hugely detrimental to the experience. Second to Punch-Out!! I can’t think of another NES game where input lag can ruin a game faster. And at least on the Nintendo Switch, Gimmick: Special Edition is a bit of a laggy mess. It’s not terrible, but it’s noticeable. Gimmick’s proper re-release deserved a lot more care put into it, but this is absolutely better than nothing. 

But then, we got an actual honest to goodness sequel! I was pretty nervous about it at first, but it turned out wonderfully well. It seems like it’s performing pretty okay in the sales department too, having gotten a handful of streamers playing it online and a pretty nice slate of positive reviews. It takes some of the original game’s more puzzly aspects and runs with them more so than its action elements, and I honestly couldn’t be happier with it. It’s got a David Wise soundtrack too, which is always a good thing. 

Finally, we have Sunsoft is Back!: Retro Game Selection. As the name suggests, it’s a collection of old Sunsoft games packaged together for modern audiences. And well, this one’s an interesting package. It’s got three games on it, Ripple Island, Wings of Madoola, and Firework Thrower Kantaro’s 53 Stations of the Tokaido. If you’ve never heard of them, that’s probably because they’ve never been released in the US before. Well, they’re here now, and umm… that’s good? These are three perfectly acceptable games that really only showcase how mediocre Sunsoft was before they started churning out genuine hits on the NES. Their older stuff just isn’t all that good. It’s neat from a historical perspective, but nothing in this package comes anywhere close to the likes of Blaster Master or even Aero the Acrobat. 

Speaking of Aero, I guess it’s also worth mentioning that Aero the Acrobat is making a bit of a comeback as well, albeit in just about the dumbest way possible. Instead of putting together some sort of collection of the classic Aero games, Sunsoft is releasing them all one at a time as individual releases. Aero the Acrobat, Aero the Acrobat 2, Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel, and Aero the Acrobat: Rascal Rival Revenge are all hitting modern platforms at about $6 a piece. That last one, Rascal Rival Revenge is the Game Boy Advance remake of the first game, which wasn’t super clear by the trailer they released. I don’t know, the Aero games are pretty decent, but I can’t imagine making four individual purchases for these games, especially when compilations of better games already exist out there. 

And that about wraps it up. It isn’t perfect, but Sunsoft is making more of a go of things now than they have in a very long time, and they seem to be getting a lot of what they’re trying to do right. Someone needs to make a compilation of all theri DC properties so we can play the likes of Batman for NES, Justice League: Task Force, and the like on modern platforms. But all in all, I’m happy with the way things are going. Here’s hoping things don’t eventually fizzle out again, and Sunsoft remains with us for years to come.