Sunsoft

Infobox Company
company_name = Sunsoft
company_
company_slogan =
company_type = Public
foundation = April 16, 1971
location = flagicon|Japan Tokyo Japan
industry = Computer and video game industry
revenue =
num_employees =
key_people =
products = List of games released by Sunsoft
parent =
homepage = [http://www.sun-denshi.co.jp/soft/ http://www.sun-denshi.co.jp/soft/]

nihongo|"Sunsoft"|サンソフト is a Japanese video game development company founded on April 16, 1971 as a division of Sun Corporation, itself a division of Sun Electronics, or "Sun Denshi" (サン電子) in Japan (its U.S. subsidiary operated under the name Sunsoft of America, though games they published showed a logo that read only SUNSOFT). Originally, they specialized in creating products for the home video game console market, specifically the NES, PC games, and coin-operated arcade games, usually based on popular movie licenses of the day (e.g. Batman, The Addams Family, etc.)

Outside Japan, the definite golden era for the company was the 8-bit NES, on which their games were practically the state of the art in graphical and aural prowess. By the time 16-bit home consoles rolled out and Sunsoft switched to them, however, there was a marked drop in the overall quality of their games (compared to the general games of the time, AND to Sunsoft's earlier accomplishments), and finally in 1995, they heavily restructured in the face of bankruptcy, eventually resurfacing with a scant number of video games for the PlayStation and the Game Boy Color. Additionally, a number of Sega games, including Fantasy Zone, Fantasy Zone II and After Burner, have been ported for Nintendo consoles by Sunsoft.

The last games released and published by this company in the USA were "Eternal Eyes", ', ' and "Power Quest". Citing several factors, like yet-another "next generation" console transition, and high overhead production costs, Sunsoft closed its offices in America and Europe, and initiated a re-organization. To this day, Sunsoft has continued to operate in Japan, developing and publishing a steady trickle of RPGs, pachinko games, mahjong games and such. On September 14, 2006, Nintendo Co., Ltd. announced that the developer was a partner on the Wii's Virtual Console.cite web|url=http://gonintendo.com/?p=5586|title=NCL Wii Event|publisher=GoNintendo.com]

Products

: "For a list of video games released by Sunsoft, see List of games released by Sunsoft."

References

External links

*ja icon [http://www.sun-denshi.co.jp/soft/ Sun-Denshi] Sunsoft's Japanese website