The late 80’s and early 90’s were a magical time for gaming. There was so much innovation an experimentation, as well as many attempts to cash in on big name properties. These latter efforts were often a mixed bag, with most licensed games for the NES not being particularly good. One company that did produce great licensed games however, was Sunsoft, Sunsoft produced the amazing Batman NES games and Gremlins 2 and almost produced a Superman game as well, but the license was revoked. While Sunsoft tried to salvage the project as Sunman, it was ultimately cancelled.
Another would be licensed game from them would have been The Terminator on NES. It was far into production when the license was pulled ( speculated to be the increased value and wanting more money but still unclear). Unlike Sunman however, this game was able to be saved. It was rebranded, given a new story and named Journey to Silius. The game, while not super well known today, became a cult classic for its amazing music, its tough as nails gameplay, and its fun atmosphere. There is also the fact that there was a lot of leftover elements of Terminator in the game, both in the code and the music, as well as some of the enemies.
Journey To Silius has not gotten a lot of attention in recent times, except from retro fans. That is something I feel needs to change, as the game could be awesome as a modern game. Obviously I don’t mean a big 3D game but a small scale 2D revival along the lines of Blaster Master Zero from Inti Creates. Incidentally Blaster Master was another Sunsoft game, and in fact, Journey to Silius takes place in the same universe as Blaster Master. There is so much that can be done with the game., such as expanded levels, high quality visuals, taking the best parts of the original game that made it fun and bringing it over and so on. In the original game, the first level had attacks coming from the background into the foreground, and this could be one element redone to make the game still challenging. There could even be a proper ending and post game content unlike the original game, where it just restarted without much difference.
This is a property that should not be left in the past. With the right tweaks, it could be an even better platformer with the negatives removed and the story expanded on and moved past its origins.
Not to mention, the amazing music should not be forgotten.