Sunborn

Logo for Sunborn Network.

The Mica Team logo introduced in Codename: Bakery Girl. There are many small variations around this design.

Alternate Mica Team logo briefly used in 2018.

Reverse Collapse: Code Name Bakery development team logo from the game's splash screens.

Sunborn (散爆), long form Shanghai Sunborn Network Technology (上海散爆网络科技有限公司), is a Shanghai-based game developer directed by Huang Chong (黄翀, born 1989), better known under the pen name Yuzhong (羽中), formed around the development team called Mica Team (云母组).

Subsidiaries

• Darkwinter Software (暗冬网络): Established in Shanghai on 15 June 2017. Operator of Girls' Frontline and Project Neural Cloud outside Taiwan, Korea and Japan. Operator of Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium in certain regions outside Taiwan, Korea and Japan. Other operators maintain the game in other regions.
• Sunborn Japan (株式会社サンボーンジャパン): Established in Tokyo on 14 March 2018. In charge of the regional Dolls' Frontline IP. Official Website.
• Hecate Team (上海黑卡蒂网络科技有限公司): Established in Shanghai on 16 October 2024. Developers of Girls' Frontline: Fire Control and Girls' Frontline: Blue Butterfly Contract, assembling developers with prior experience in the shooter genre.

“Mica Team” is not an independently registered entity, but Sunborn's internal development team.

History

From doujins to Girls' Frontline

Mica Team was formed in 2008 by 19-years old animation college freshman Yuzhong, as a doujin circle to produce the visual novel Girl of the Bakehouse which was released in 2009. The circle comprised three people, and Yuzhong dropped out in his second year, preferring to gain experience working on real projects. Yuzhong had only joined college at the insistence of his father, who reportedly supported his creative endeavors nonetheless by renting the studio used by the early Mica Team and driving him between Shanghai and the family home in Jiaxing.

While working on more Bakehouse projects, the group also published doujin artbooks: a K-On!/Haruhi Suzumiya crossover, Touhou Modern Warfare, a book dedicated to Touhou's Suwako Moriya and the Guns&Girls series.

The Bakehouse projects eventually led to a partnership with studio GameMaster to develop the strategy game Codename: Bakery Girl, released in 2013.

On 25 October 2015, Mica Team incorporated under the name Jiaxing LBX Network Technology (嘉兴市拉布熊网络科技有限公司) and announced their mobile game Girls' Frontline. LBX are the initials of Lā Bù Xióng (拉布熊), roughly meaning “spreading light”. The name Jiaxing LBX was used in the earliest marketing only and was quickly changed to Shanghai Sunborn (上海散爆). The name Sunborn evokes the birth of a star in continuity with the meaning of LBX, while the Chinese form 散爆 uses the characters “scattering, coming loose” and “exploding”. After three beta tests and development troubles, Sunborn launched the game in Mainland China in 2016, in Taiwan, Hong Kong and South Korea in 2017, and in a global English version and in Japan in 2018.

The company was short on cash as it started: employees worked in a rented apartment with folding tables for work desks, and meals were cooked rather than ordered in to save money. There were only 4 employees at the start of the development, but the team had grown to 35 when the game launched in China, then to 117 in 2018 and over 300 in 2020. A Sunborn Japan branch was opened in March 2018 to manage the game in this key market, starting at 20 employees. In March 2020, as the contract ended with Digital Sky, which was Girls' Frontline operator in Mainland China, Sunborn announced that the game's operations were transferred to Darkwinter Software Co., Ltd. (上海暗冬网络科技有限公司), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sunborn. Darkwinter is listed as Sunborn games distributor in the English-speaking app stores.

• 
  LBX and Mica Team logos used in 2015, alongside Wave-Game logo.
• 
  Colored logos from the original website.
• 
  Yuzhong (right) with then-producer Yao Meng (姚蒙, left) from Yostar, in Sunborn's office during the development of Girls' Frontline.
• 
  Yuzhong (right) with Dax Production casting director Shinji Sakai (笠井信児, left) in September 2016.
• 
  Yuzhong (right) with Dawei (大伟, left) from Mihoyo in November 2017 for the Hitoribocchi collab stream.

Girls' Frontline's expansion

Between the third and fifth year of Girls' Frontline’s operation, Sunborn started planning to expand its universe into a franchise. The commercial success of Girls' Frontline enabled Sunborn to announce a remake of Codename: Bakery Girl in 2019 titled Reverse Collapse: Code Name Bakery, and three Girls' Frontline-related games were announced in 2020: Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium, Project Neural Cloud and Girls' Frontline: Glitch Land. Sunborn's strategy at the time was reportedly to remain in its niche market and rely on internal evaluations rather than compete with high-budget games reactive to market trends, based on the idea that the studio's DNA lied in the “2D + Strategy” niche. Sunborn held many in-game Collaboration Events in partnership with other game developers.

Development updates were shared with some regularity through the Beilan Island Shelter Broadcast livestreams, hosted by Yuzhong, Smoke (Executive Producer for Girls' Frontline 2) and Kamie (Executive Producer for Project Neural Cloud) talking through Live2D avatars (very cursed). Girls' Frontline 2 and Reverse Collapse were delayed with no release date due to the Covid pandemic. Neural Cloud received a first closed beta test in October 2020, then a second closed beta called “Singularity Test” in December 2020.

On 21 April 2021, Tencent gained a 20% stake in Sunborn. According to Yuzhong, the deal involved a 9-figures investment from Tencent and Sunborn would still publish its own games in Mainland China. At the time the studio had more than 450 employees, with about 200 working on Girls' Frontline 2. Yuzhong reportedly retained ownership of Sunborn at 70% and sent an internal letter reassuring that the studio would remain independent. Girls' Frontline 2 received its first closed beta test in July 2021 (CBT-1) and a second (CBT-2) in October 2021. Neural Cloud was released in Mainland China in September 2021.

Development ceased on Glitch Land in early 2022 but progress on Girls' Frontline 2 and Reverse Collapse was shown during Girls' Frontline 6th Anniversary livestream on 14 May 2022. After a Global beta in October 2022, Neural Cloud released in other regions in November 2022.

On 20 May 2022, a recruitment post on Sunborn's HR WeChat group announced positions related to a project called “Project Panda” (代号Panda). Cross-referencing with LinkedIn profiles of Sunborn members pointed to a game within the Wandering Earth IP. Sunborn's involvement in the Wandering Earth Mobile strategy game was announced on 22 January 2023. Mica Team is not included in the announcement. On 1st May 2023, during the Girls' Frontline 7th Anniversary livestream, a partnership between Exilium and the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology was announced and received a promo video at ChinaJoy in July. The partnership didn't result in any content beyond the PV. In an August 2023 interview, Yuzhong stated the studio had grown to over 700 employees and teased a yet-unannounced project. Sunborn was one of the speakers of the 9th Inven Games Convention in Seongnam on 13 October 2023, where Yuzhong held a conference on “conveying emotional value through games” and teased the character Klukai. Yuzhong held the same conference at G-STAR 2024 in Busan on 15 November 2024, where Leva was teased. The company donated a million yuan to the Chinese Red Cross the day after the 18 December 2025 earthquake in Gansu.

Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium launched on 21 December 2023, and in a similar manner to the first game, met significant issues. In April 2024, Sunborn worked with Shanghai's internet authority against slandering videos impersonating investors and other Sunborn figures. Selected players were allowed to visit Sunborn's offices as part of their Open Day on 6 July 2025. On 31 October 2024, Sunborn announced that the CN server of Girls' Frontline would close temporarily due to legal issues with launch partner Digital Sky. Chuapp reported that between 50 and 100 people worked on the game at that time. In November 2024, Sunborn registered the trademark 少女前线: 回响视界.

Sunborn partnered with the Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture to promote the local pomegranates and historical Huili City for the 2024 Mid-Autumn Festival. Makiatto's “Embroidered Bamboo, Blooming Shadows” costume was used to showcase traditional Su embroidery, a short documentary was published in Exilium's Bilibili channel on 18 January 2025, and translated in English for the Global release of the costume in March. In a July 2025 interview, Yuzhong revealed that Sunborn maintained an internal database compiling existing stories, setting and characters, with a franchise team signing off on new narrative choices to preserve its consistency. The interview also stated that Sunborn used AI for organizational tasks, but will aim to "respect creators" as AI technologies grow. In October 2025, the official Sunborn Bilibili account was created. For the tenth anniversary of Sunborn on 25 October 2025, they introduced a new mascot, 爆爆 (Bàobào, using the character for “exploding”), which is a Dinergate in the shape of Sunborn's logo. The address sunborngame.com, previously used since 2018 for ad-hoc hosting of current Sunborn games and events projects, was converted to an official company website.

During the Chiral Redundancy preview stream on 10 March 2026, a collaboration project between the Japanese Trading Card Game company Weiß Schwarz and Girls' Frontline, Project Neural Cloud and Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium was announced, as well as between Girls' Frontline 2 and the Honor hardware company and Kabao Trading Cards (卡宝文创).

• 
  Original version of Smoke and Yuzhong's Live2D avatars in the Beilan Island Shelter Broadcast devlogs.
• 
  Sixi's Live2D avatar (debuted in Beilan Island Shelter Broadcast #17) and new version of Yuzhong's Live2D avatar (debuted #15).
• 
  Sunborn office in late 2021.
• 
• 
  Yuzhong presenting Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium at IGC 2023.
• 
  Baobao emotes.
• Franchise key art for the 2026 Chinese New Year fan-art compilation.
• 
  Franchise logos for 2026 CNY.
• 
• 
  Yuzhong with South Korean fans at the permanent Seoul Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Gallery.

Shooter games

Original Hecate Team logo from January 2025.

New Hecate Team logo from September 2025.

During the Girls' Frontline 10th Anniversary Music Gala on 2 April 2026, Sunborn announced two new shooters, Girls' Frontline: Blue Butterfly Contract and Reverse Collapse: F. Yuzhong specified in interviews that the games were built over the experience of the specialized team hired to form Hecate Team and the feedback from Girls' Frontline: Fire Control, which received only a limited release in Southeast Asia. The release strategy involved releasing Blue Butterfly Contract first to gather player interest around a more relaxed Girls' Frontline game before releasing the more complex Reverse Collapse : F two years later, which would take place in the less established Reverse Collapse IP. Yuzhong stated that Sunborn had reached a size and expertise sufficient to foray into the shooter genre while still offering strategy games, and that the decision to develop anime shooters was motivated by Sunborn's interest in the genre, in spite of what has been deemed lackluster performances from similar games.

• 
  Timeline of Sunborn at the 10th Anniversary concert.
• 

Staff lists

All officially credited names are pseudonyms. The name of some positions may not directly translate from Chinese to Western game development positions, such as Planner (策划) combining the responsibilities of game designer and project manager, Numbers Planner (数值策划/策) being a specialized system designer and copywriter (文案) being used as a euphemism for writer/scenarist.

• Girl of the Bakehouse Credits (May 2009)
• Codename: Bakery Girl Credits (March 2013)
• The Art of Girls' Frontline Vol.1 (March 2017)
  • 制作人 羽中 (Producer Yuzhong)
  • 主程序 卡咩 (Head Programmer Kamie)
  • 主催 将军 (Organizer “General”)
  • 运营&团队管理 Phantania (Staff & Operations, also oversaw character design according to the interview)
  • 主策划 垂烟 (Head Planner Chuiyan, aka “Smoke” in later fan-translation)
  • 主数值策划 少年 (Head Numbers Planner Shaonian)
  • 执行运营 武斗少女NS. (Operations Executive Wudou Shaonu/“Fighting Girls” NS.)
  • 主测试 QAQ (Head Tester)
  • 美术设计总监 海猫络合物 (Art and Design Director Haimao, aka Lowlight, also contributed to UI and promotional illustration)
  • 概念设计总监 LIN+ (Concept Art Director)
  • PV设计&音效师 白龙 (PVs and Sound Designer Bailong/“White Dragon”)
  • 动画设计 苍月 (Animator Cangyue/“Dark Moon”)
  • 文案策划 热运动 (Planner-Copywriter Reyundong/“Thermal Motion”, better known as Jano)
  • UI设计师 闪闪 (UI Designer Shanshan)
  • 家具原画师 周周 (Furniture Artist Zhouzhou)
  • PR 非区 (Public Relations Manager Feiqu)
• The Art of Girls' Frontline Vol.2 (April 2019)
  • 制作人 羽中 (Producer Yuzhong)
  • 运营&团队管理 胖虎 (Staff & Operations Panghu/“Fat Tiger”)
  • 主催 将军 (Organizer “General”)
  • 概念设计总监 LIN+ (Concept Art Director)
  • 文案主笔 热运动 (Head Writer Reyundong/“Thermal Motion”, better known as Jano)
  • 运营负责人 Unknown-Item (Operations Manager)
  • 主程 卡咩 (Head Programmer Kamie)
  • 主策 少年 (Head Numbers Shaonian)
  • 原画 薯子Imoko (Concept Artist Imoko)
  • 首席原画 音符 (Head Concept Artist Infukun)
  • 敌方角色设计 节操 (Enemies Character Designer Jiecao/“Moral”)
  • Live 2D 动画设计师 团子 (Live2D Animator Tuanzi/“Dumpling”)
  • 主测 QAQ (Head Tester)
• Girls' Frontline Global Server 2nd Anniversary Devlog (May 2020)
  • CEO: Yuzhong
  • Concept Design Director: LIN+
  • Lead Designer: Shaonian
  • Character Designer: Imoko
• Beilan Island Shelter Broadcast participants
  • Since December 2020: 总制作人 羽中 (Main Producer Yuzhong)
  • December 2020 to November 2021: 执行制作人: 垂烟 (Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Executive Producer Chuiyan, aka “Smoke” in some fan-translation)
  • August 2023: Daniel 丹师傅
  • Since October 2024: 策划 四喜 (Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Planner Sixi)
  • February 2026 (Chinese New Year episode)
    • 平台组: 鱼儿 (Platform Team: Yuer/“Fish”)
    • 文案组: 夏夏 (Copywriting Team: Xiaxia)
    • 动作美术: 长林 (Animator: Changlin/“Big Forest”)
    • 视频美术: 八角 (Video Editing: Bajiao/“Star Anise”)
    • 3D美术: 宽面 (3D Artist: Kuanmian/“Wide Face”)
    • 场景美术: 艺霏 (Environment Artist: Yifei)
• Project Neural Cloud devlogs (March 2021 to January 2024)
  • 总制作人 羽中 (Main Producer Yuzhong)
  • 执行制作人 卡咩 (Project Neural Cloud Executive Producer Kamie, aka Baalia)
• Shadow Confrontation demo session participants (May 2023)
• Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Credits (July 2023)
• Reverse Collapse Credits (March 2024)
• Girls' Frontline Credits (December 2024 & October 2025)
• Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Big Lobby introduction video (July 2025)
  • 总发起人: 羽中 (Founder: Yuzhong)
  • 策划组: 四喜 (Planning Team: Sixi)
  • 文案组: 夏夏 (Copywriting Team: Xiaxia)
  • 场景美术: 艺霏 (Environment artist: Yifei)
  • 动作设计: 长林 (Animator: Changlin)
  • 客户端组: 小鱼儿 (Customer Relations: Xiaoyuer)
• Sunborn 10th Anniversary interviews 1, 2 (October 2025)
  • 《少女前线》妍君人: 妍君 (Girls' Frontline production Team: Yanjun/"Gorgeous Ruler")
  • 《少女前线》画师: Lin+ (Girls' Frontline artist: Lin+)
  • 《少女前线》画师: 团子 (Girls' Frontline artist: Tuanzi/“Dumpling”)
  • 《逆向坍塌：面包房行动》文案: Nirvana (Reverse Collapse: Codename Bakery writer)
  • 《少女前线2：追放》: 拉布拉多警长 (Girls' Frontline 2: Labuladuo Jingchang/"Sheriff Labrador", team lead?)
  • 《少女前线2：追放》: 甘蔗 (Girls' Frontline 2: Ganzhe/"Sugar Cane", lead developer?)
  • 《少女前线2：追放》场景美术: Ariietty (Girls' Frontline 2 environment artist)
  • 《少女前线2：追放》国内外市场的营销: 自由泳的鱼 (Girls' Frontline 2 regional and international marketing: Ziyouyongde Yu/"Freestyle-Swimming Fish")
  • 《少女前线2：追放》PM: 草莓 (Girls' Frontline 2 project manager: Caomei/"Strawberry")
  • 《少女前线2：追放》: 爪爪 (Girls' Frontline 2: Zhuazhua/"Claws", operations?)
  • 《少女前线2：追放》: 木又又 (Girls' Frontline 2: Muyouyou, Public Relations?)
  • 《云图计划》QA, PM: 小工 (Neural cloud Quality Assurance team then project manager: Xiaogong/"Short Work")
  • 《Girls' Frontline:Fire Control》关卡策划: 夜空 (Fire Control level designer: Yekong/"Night Sky")
  • 平面组组长: 豆巴 (Graphic Design Lead: Douba)
  • 人力资源部门: 梅梅 (Human Resources: Meimei/"Plum")
  • 财务部: 番茄酱 (Finance: Fanqiejiang/"Ketchup")
• 2026 Chinese New Year franchise fan-art compilation
  • 制作人 羽中 (Main Producer: Yuzhong)
  • 策划 四喜　(Planner: Sixi)
  • 主美 俊俊 (Art Director: Junjun)

Sunborn and the fan community

A Ferrari SF90 model car was included in the knickknacks section of Back to the Source, with the ominous message “玩家会一直看着你的。。。永远” (“Players are watching... forever”).

• Due to the quite long lifetime of Girls' Frontline despite less impressive commercial performances compared to well-known gacha games, Sunborn has acquired the reputation of a studio that doesn't close its live-service games. The fact stands in defiance of CN players regularly calling Sunborn games “pills” (药丸, 丸, or simply 💊, a wordplay on 完, “to end”) when the games face issues, or calling the studio “YMFM” (originally 云母飞妈), an insult to the mothers of Mica Team's devs later reinterpreted to be less offensive. As of 2025, the only Sunborn live game to have gone offline has been the Mainland Chinese server of Girls' Frontline, which was launched in May 2016 and went offline in the first half of 2025 due to legal constraints.
  • Sunborn considered and later implemented a weapon accessory in the form of a medicine pill in the second game as a reference.
• Yuzhong (also nicknamed 帝国の董事长, “Imperial Chairman”, from a July 2020 interview in Griffin Daily, and “King Chong” in English) is often the focal point of community in-jokes. The sole Doll of his own design, ^AR 6P626P626P62, is considered his “daughter”. One of her costumes makes reference to a rumor, evolved into a joke, that appeared after the 2019 annual company meeting, claiming that Yuzhong bought a Ferrari car while leaving Sunborn employees without bonus pay.
  • The preview version of the damaged art contained one more reference that was not kept in the in-game version, containing a photograph of Yuzhong on a sickbed, cropped from a 2020 photograph shared on Weibo after he suffered from food poisoning at the time of the Girls' Frontline 4th Anniversary festival. Artist:山药 also referenced this picture in one of FlorenceFlorence 's costumes.
  • Yuzhong is not the only Chinese gacha games personality to be “accused” of having expensive tastes: Dawei (大伟) from Mihoyo also has a reputation of building a villa with the players' money, though it's regularly broken down every time the company gives freebies. This came into play during the Hitoribocchi collab.
  • Yuzhong infamously loves the game Escape from Tarkov. As the full release of Polarized Light kept being pushed back, Yuzhong's public praise of the game on Weibo drew the ire of the players, yet the game kept creeping back in the background: Boundary Push, teased back in May 2022, has been nicknamed "Tarkov mode" by players; Yuzhong has been seen wearing Tarkov shirts during livestreams (among other shirts from other military games); and the crowd cheered when he mentioned cutting back on the game during the 2026 concert.
• In the controversy-hungry Chinese video gaming community, Sunborn as been the subject of a number of so-called “dramas” fueled by social medias such as the NGA forums and Weibo microblog. The most high-profile occurrences involved slander by former employees/contractors Suisai and BSL白龙, and misrepresentation of a partial datamined version of the story of Exotic Cadence. These topics are not expanded upon on IOP Wiki.
• Sunborn games release first for Mainland China before releasing in other regions, which has some consequences:
  • The order in which content is released on these servers doesn't always match the order used on the original CN server. This was particularly noticeable in Project Neural Cloud and Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium. The Global community explains these changes by claiming that Sunborn decides release orders based on dartboard throws.
  • For Girls' Frontline in particular, Global (EN) players often rely on guides made by CN and KR players to complete event missions. These dedicated and knowledgeable players are called “dalao” (from Chinese 大佬, a Mandarin neologism for an expert in a subculture, derived from the same Cantonese word designating a mentor or influential figure). Confusion over the application of dalao strategies has led to the saying that “EN can't read”.
• In Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium, after photo mode was added to the Crew Deck, a certain emote can be used by the Commander called "Praise the Sunborn" (赞美日光, "Praise the Sunlight" in CN).
• Other topics influenced by the fan community such as nicknames can be found in the trivia sections of ^AR M4A1M4A1M4A1, ^AR FNCFNCFNC, ^HG Five-seveNFive-seveNFive-seveN, ^HG M950AM950AM950A, ^AR G11G11G11, ^MG RPK-16RPK-16RPK-16, ^RF Carcano M91∕38Carcano M91∕38Carcano M91∕38, ^RF Carcano M1891Carcano M1891Carcano M1891, ^SMG TMPTMPTMP and ^RF M14M14M14.
• Chinese New Year marks a concentration of CN fan activity around the franchise. In 2020, Sunborn hosted a fan-art contest. In 2021, they officially sanctioned the Burning Griffin fan-animations compilation video, hosted by long-standing fan account Girls' Frontline Logistics Department (少女前线后勤组). Similar projects ran in 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025, organized by content creator 命运の乐章 (aka FatalChapter or Hycdes Mactavish). The 2026 version of the project was hosted on the official Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium channel and promoted on a Bilibili landing page.

• 
  Results of the first official fanarts contest in 2020.

Links

• Chinese
  • Official website
  • Official Bilibili
  • Official online shop
  • IOP Special Goods Department (Official merchandising Weibo account)
• English
  • Official online shop
  • IOP Gear Division (Official merchandising Twitter account)

References

Games Released: Girl of the Bakehouse · Codename: Bakery Girl · Girls' Frontline · Project Neural Cloud · Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium · Reverse Collapse: Code Name Bakery · Girls' Frontline: Fire Control In development: Fingertips Breakout · Reverse Collapse: F · Girls' Frontline: Blue Butterfly Contract Canceled: Girls' Frontline: Glitch Land Anime Girls' Frontline (anime) · Healing Chapter & Madness Chapter Books Guns&Girls · The Art of Girls' Frontline Vol.1 · The Art of Girls' Frontline Vol.2 · The Art of Girls' Frontline Vol.3 · Confidential Files · Frankfurt Battle Report · Girls' Frontline: Doll's Song · Others Music Withered · Codename: Bakery Girl Original Soundtrack · Girls' Frontline Original Soundtrack · Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Original Soundtrack · Project Neural Cloud Original Soundtrack · Reverse Collapse: Code Name Bakery Soundtrack · Girls' Frontline ECHOES · Mankind Is No longer Solitary · Girls' Frontline Concerts Companies Big Firebird and Liverless · Sunborn (Mica Team) · Vanguard Sound · Game publishers Community Community Resources · Community Events Betas Girls' Frontline · Project Neural Cloud · Girls' Frontline 2: Exilium Misc. April Fools · Arknights · Back to the Source · Content Ratings · Figures · GFL2 Website · List of cultural references · Minigames · Shadow Confrontation · Tale of Intersecting Dimensional Interstice