What do you want to know about Sunsoft?

[Gazimaluke]

I am researching Sunsoft for my retro game podcast(swedish). The script is 21 pages and I have about 33 pages of interviews. All this will be published after the episode has aired.

What questions about Sunsoft do you guys want to have answered?

[Arkanix38]

We've actually had an ex Sunsoft employee answer some questions on here before, you might find it a useful resource for your podcast.

The link is here if you are interested.

Welcome to FamicomWorld!

[HummerTeam1001]

Why wasn't Lemmings released on Famicom?  They had it on NES, so it could definitely have been on a Famicom cartridge. And Sunsoft had some of their games released in Japan (if I remember correctly) so it wouldn't have been some reason where they didn't have a publisher there.

[Jedi Master Baiter]

I've always wanted to know specifically what instrument/sample/patch was used for their DPCM bass in Journey to Silius and Batman Dynamite games.

NovaSquirrel mentioned Yamaha/Roland synthesizers being used in Gimmick!, but no details on what model(s).

[Gazimaluke]

The link is here if you are interested.

It was actually that thread that got me started. You guys asked great questions but I had loads more.
Iv interviewed David Siller alot, but also Rene Boutin, Richard Robbins, Michael Mendheim(Fester's Quest) and Tomomi Sakai(Gimmick) . And I'm waiting for answers from Yuichi Ueda(Trip World).

[macbee]

Please ask everything you can about the technology in those cancelled "3rd generation of Sunsoft games for NES" mentioned by David Siller.

[Gazimaluke]

Please ask everything you can about the technology in those cancelled "3rd generation of Sunsoft games for NES" mentioned by David Siller.

The technology in those games where the same chips as used in other late Sunsoft games. My understanding is that they were to use them to their full potential.

[macbee]

The technology in those games where the same chips as used in other late Sunsoft games. My understanding is that they were to use them to their full potential.

I'm still very interested to know *anything* about these games. Thanks.

[P]

I guess lots of features of FME-7/Sunsoft-5B was never used in the released games.

[famifan]

I am researching Sunsoft for my retro game podcast(swedish). The script is 21 pages and I have about 33 pages of interviews. All this will be published after the episode has aired.

that sounds very appealing and so much interesting.
just a quick question, are you planning to make english translation?

[Gazimaluke]

My podcast script and interviews will be published in english yes. I don't know where but I will link it here.

Most of the stuff I have is already in the script. Know I'm waiting for answers from three people. I just got questions translated into japanese for Ueda and as soon as I get the answers and from two others then I'll finnish my script. Record the podcast and then I'll start translation of the script.

I have two old NES/Famicom related interviews with Ste Pickford and Manami Matsumae I could post here on Famicom World tomorrow.

[ImATrackMan]

What is the reason for the Sunsoft 5B being the only FME-series chip with audio capabilities?
Did they get an exclusive license from Yamaha that expired after a year?
Did they see the sound as a waste since no games used it when it was introduced?
Why do some Dodge Danpei 2 and Batman carts have 5Bs in them, was there a brief parts shortage?
Why do the Sunsoft mappers follow a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5A, 5B, 7 naming scheme?
Does "FME" stand for "Famicom Memory Expander"?

I realize these are very specific to one series of chips, but I just have to know.

[Gazimaluke]

That's some really good questions. I'll do my best to find some answers.
Post Merge: September 19, 2016, 01:24:53 pm
Here is a sneak peek at the first part of my podcast script translated to English. I will have someone correct the final version with better grammar.


The Story of Sunsoft

Sun Corporation, or Sun Denshi into  Japan, was founded April 16, 1971, by Masami Maeda. Sunsoft was later founded as a game development division of Sun Corporation. Sunsoft was probably founded in 1985 when Sun Corporation began developing games for the Nintendo Famicom.

They had and still has it's headquarters in Konan Aichi prefecture in Japan. The company manufactures electronic equipment of various kinds. One of the first products was a ticket machine that they made for the Tateisi Electric Manufacturing Co. (now Omron Corporation).

In May of 1974 Sun Corporation releases its first system for pachinko. A popular game in Japan where small balls are pushed up and falls into different compartments. A product line that they are still manufacturing today.

Sun Corporation's first step into the arcade industry came in October 1978 with the introduction of the games Block Challenger and Block Perfect.
They had some successes in the arcades in the early '80s with games like Arabian, Ikki and Kangaroo. Three pretty simple game but fairly typical of their time. In Arabian you collect letters to form words, in Ikki (Boomerang / Farmers Rebellion) you walk through levels as two ninjas, defeating enemies with boomerangs. Kangaroo is not entirely surprisingly a game about a kangaroo.

Sun Corporation developed the first game with voice synthesis. Speak & Rescue also known as Stratovox was released in 1980 and is an arcade shoot em up. Voice synthesis means speech are produced by a computer and not recorded digitized speech that could be heard in some older games at the time.
Speak & Rescue was developed under the Sun Electronics name and released by Taito. Taito released all Sun Corporation arcade games at the time.

In 1983 Sun Corporation began to develop games for home consoles. Mainly for Atari's popular Atari 2600. They ported their arcade games Kangaroo and Funky Fisher to the 2600. This was the same year as the so-called video games crash began. Atari that had been the market leader since the late 70s with Pong and the Atari 2600 now lost market shares to the increasingly popular home computers. Atari's attempts to follow up on the Atari 2600 had failed and the console had been flooded by bad games.

The same year, Nintendo released a new console in Japan. The Family Computer was developed to give the players an almost arcade like experience in their own living room. The new graphics and possibilities of the Family Computer made it a big hit in Japan in 1984. The following year it launched successfully in the US as well under the name Nintendo Entertainment System.

In April of 1984 Sun Corporation released it's first in a series of personal computers under the name SUNTAC PC.

In July 1985 they began to release games for the Family Computer under lable Sunsoft. Sunsoft is not the name of a company just the brand Sun Corporation used when they released the games both in Japan and around the world.
Sun Corporation became one of the earliest third-party developers for the format. Like many others they saw how popular the console became and the possibility to sell games for it. Their first games for the system was ports of older arcade games such as Arabian and Route-16 Turbo.

[Hamtaro126]

I've always wanted to ask questions about unused stuff in Hebereke/Ufouria for "The Cutting Room Floor Wiki":

My questions about Hebereke/Ufouria are:

1: the unused, creepy song "Parallel Hebereke", What was the real purpose? Was it part of the title (see Unused Graphics)? A demonstration tune? or is it for a cutscene?

2: There is unused graphics that need verification, such as a Title Screen version of the UFO Cat, Ninja throwing stars, a possible Hebereke clone, and so on. (there is more)

3: At one point, Lives were displayed differently, But there was another counter: A Popoon Counter (FYI Popoons are your weapon, as in that ball you toss at enemies), What purpose does it pose, Was it both your weapon AND currency during development?

BTW I'm new here, so I'm trying to be nice!

[aitsu124]

What was Atlantis no Nazo like during development?