Sun Corporation's history in video games began in October 1978 in arcades with two titles: Block Challenger and Block Perfect.^[1][2] Sun Corporation had several arcade hits in the early 1980s such as Arabian, Ikki and Kangaroo. At the time, its arcade video games were released under its own corporate name of Sun Electronics Corporation.^[1][5] Sun Corporation purchased American arcade game publisher Kitkorp in 1985, rebranding it as Sun Corporation of America to release its games internationally.^[6]

The Sunsoft brand first appeared in the latter of the 1980s when Sun Corporation began developing original games and technology for the home video game console market, with emphasis mostly on Nintendo's Famicom.^[5] Sunsoft had gone international at that time, and it was reputable enough to secure major licenses of the era (such as Batman and The Addams Family).^[5] In the 1990s, Sun Corporation of America joined forces with Acclaim Entertainment to handle ad sales rights to Sunsoft's video games for game consoles. Additionally, a number of Sega games, including Fantasy Zone, Fantasy Zone II and After Burner, were ported for Nintendo consoles by Sunsoft. From 1994 to 1998, Sunsoft attempted to join the fighting game craze by releasing four fighting games: Sugoi Hebereke for the Super Famicom (1994), Galaxy Fight: Universal Warriors for the Neo Geo (1995), Waku Waku 7 for the Neo Geo (1996), and Astra Superstars for Sega ST-V-based arcades (1998).

In 1995, Sun Corporation of America heavily restructured in the face of bankruptcy, and all the company's pending projects were either sold to other companies or cancelled.^[7] Former Sunsoft producer René Boutin spoke on Sunsoft's problems before he left the company. Boutin explained in an interview that