Goichi Suda, better known as Suda51, has told Famitsu that Travis Touchdown will definitely be back, and that he wants to mark No More Heroes' 20th anniversary next year together with the series' publisher, Marvelous. What that something is, he didn't say.
The remarks come from a long Japanese-language interview Famitsu published on 2 November, in which Famitsu Group's Katsuhiko Hayashi talks to Suda about the newly independent Grasshopper Manufacture and what the studio might make next.
What Suda said
Famitsu's interview notes that No More Heroes, released in 2007 and published by Marvelous, reaches its 20th anniversary in 2027. Asked about it, Suda says Marvelous is aware of the anniversary and that he would like to do something together with the publisher at that point. He then adds that Travis Touchdown will definitely be back.
Video Games Chronicle, which reported the interview using a machine translation, quotes him as saying: "Marvelous is well aware of this, so we'd definitely like to do something together to mark the 20th anniversary." In VGC's translation he also says: "We're planning to deliver something special, so please look forward to it."
That is the whole of it. As VGC points out, Suda gave no detail on the form the anniversary project will take, so it could be a new game, a remaster, a remake or something else entirely. Nothing has been announced by Marvelous or Grasshopper, and there is no platform or date.
Why a return wasn't expected
Travis had been billed as finished. VGC recalls that ahead of No More Heroes 3 in 2022, Suda described that game as "Travis's last battle", while leaving the door open: "If there's a big fan outcry, Travis might be back." The original game came out in Japan on 6 December 2007 and in the West in 2008, according to VGC.
A studio on its own again
The timing matters because of where Grasshopper now stands. Famitsu reports that Grasshopper Manufacture announced its independence from NetEase Games effective 1 October 2026; the interview places the announcement late on 30 September.
The studio's most recent game, Romeo is a Dead Man, came out on 11 February 2026 and was Grasshopper's first self-published title, Famitsu says. Suda tells Famitsu that many people told him they hadn't even known the game was out, and that it didn't reach players as well as it should have. Famitsu adds that about 87% of Steam users recommended it as of late October.
The No More Heroes comments aren't the only wish on Suda's list. In the same interview he tells Famitsu he wants to return to the darker, serious adventure style of his early work, going back to Moonlight Syndrome, which he made while at Human before Grasshopper existed, and says that for a new project in that vein he expects he would have to write it himself, though it is still at an early stage. He also jokes that it may be time for him to make a Gundam game, says he would like to make a game based on Marvel's Deadpool, and mentions that Grasshopper turns 30 in about two years, when he hopes to have something big to announce.
Mason's take: Read this as intent, not an announcement. "We'd like to do something together" is the kind of sentence that can end up as a full sequel or a soundtrack vinyl. What makes it worth watching, in my view, is the business picture underneath: an independent Grasshopper that has just seen how hard self-publishing can be would have good reason to lean on its best-known character and on the publisher whose series it is. A Travis anniversary project looks like the safest bet the studio could make, and that may be one reason to talk about it a year early.
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