In a recent interview with Denfaminicogamer, former Artdink developer Kazutoshi Iida discussed the influences behind his work on 1996’s Tail of the Sun, one of the company’s most memorable and bizarre titles.
In the game, which was first released on Sony’s original PlayStation, players control a primordial human and scavenge for food and other resources to develop their character and expand their tribe. The goal of the game is to construct a tower made of mammoth tusks that reaches high enough for players to catch the titular “tail” of the sun.
According to Iida, who served as director on the game, one of the game’s key influences was the impact and aftermath of the 1995 Kobe earthquake, the deadliest natural disaster Japan had faced since 1923. On the morning of January 17th, 1995, all Artdink employees were gathered for an assembly in their office in Tokyo, where they were informed that the city of Kobe – as well as the surrounding Hanshin and Awaji regions – had suffered a major earthquake. With a death toll well over 5,000 and hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of property damage in its wake, the disaster cast a shadow over the nation that would only be surpassed by the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami 16 years later.
In the days and weeks that followed, Iida followed the news on the rescue and reconstruction efforts going on in Kobe. He was struck by the resilience shown by volunteers who were forced to deliver food and supplies on foot or by bicycle due to the heavily damaged roads. “At the time, I happened to be reading a book concerning primitive humans, and I thought what I could do was to make “the power of humanity to survive” the theme of my next work. I wanted to applaud the spirit of the people who were striving for recovery,” he said.
“However, it’s always bothered me how it felt like I was exploiting the disaster somehow,” said Iida, who didn’t live or work anywhere near Kobe in 1995. After the 2011 Tohoku earthquake directly impacted his ability to work in Tokyo, Iida stated that he’s since moved to Hyogo Prefecture (where Kobe is the capital city) to better understand the place that once inspired his creative output.
Tail of the Sun was re-released in 2025 on the Nintendo Switch eShop and on PC via Steam. However, it bears mentioning that while these versions are available for purchase in North America, they are a straight conversion of the game’s original Japanese release and do not feature an English language option.
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