Classic game publisher Sunsoft will try again

polygon.com:

Game publisher Sunsoft, best known in the West for 8-bit era games like Blaster Master, Batman, and Fester’s Quest, is attempting a return to publishing and developing video games. On Thursday, the new Sunsoft — which, technically, never went away — outlined its plan to rerelease and revive its classic game catalog, starting with the Vampire Survivors-inspired Ikki Unite and releases of beloved retro games Gimmick! and Ufouria (known as Hebereke in Japan) for modern platforms.

Sunsoft is even hinting at bringing back Aero the Acro-Bat, the anthropomorphic bat who appeared in a pair of Sega Genesis and Super NES games near the peak of the console mascot platformer.

The publisher’s first game under the new plan, Ikki Unite, is a sequel of sorts to Ikki, an arcade game (that was later ported to Nintendo’s Famicom) about a medieval Japanese farming village’s uprising against its feudal overlord. Ikki Unite will expand upon the original single-player game with online multiplayer, and is unmistakably inspired — if not outright copying — 2021’s smash hit Vampire Survivors.

Yuichi Ochi, general manager of Sunsoft, told Polygon in an interview Wednesday that Ikki Unite is being built upon Vampire Survivors’ game design and viral success to help find an audience for the Ikki brand, which he admitted does not have global awareness. (The Famicom port of Ikki is infamous for its shoddy quality, and reportedly the basis for the derogatory phrase “kusoge,” or “shitty game,” in Japan.)

Only slightly better known than Ikki are Gimmick! (which saw a Scandinavian release) and Hebereke (which features Metroid-like mechanics and was released in North America for the NES under the name Ufouria: The Saga). But Sunsoft hopes to give those