We store cookies, you can get more info from our privacy policy.
Wii

Takada Speaks on 'Translating Visuals into Music'

by Steven Rodriguez - February 21, 2008, 6:23 pm EST
Total comments: 1

One of Japan's most respected composers talks about the creative process in making soundtracks for games like Killer 7 and Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles. Also, a smashing surprise visit by Brawl.

Masafumi Takada of Grasshopper has had his hand in a number of unique video games over the past ten years. While working with names like Shinji Mikami and Goichi Suda, Takada's have become fairly well known. Today, during his Game Developers Conference session, Takada explained the processes and challenges associated with working on games, and what he does to translate the visual style of games into appropriate music.

Takada started with his work on the Wii's Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles. When he was approached by Capcom to do the music, his first thought was regarding the Resident Evil fans.

"I thought they must be very picky about the sound, and I didn't want to disappoint them," he said.

Creating the right music was a trial-and-error process, but Takada knew the up-tempo pace of the game was different from a more traditional, slower-paced Resident Evil title. To match the pace of the game with the RE feel, Takada came up rhythmic sections of music laid on top of a more traditional RE melody, adding proactive instruments like an electric guitar, which he thought worked out well.

During Takada's time developing Grasshopper's God Hand for PlayStation 2, there was a disconnect between him and producer Shinji Mikami, who were in different parts of the country while the game was in development. To rectify this, Takada went to Grasshopper's studio in Osaka to "breathe in the same atmosphere" as the development team. He also asked himself, "what kind of music would Mikami be if he were a piece of music?" After working in the same building as the developers, he quickly came up with many pieces of music that fit the game.

Takada likened memorable music to that of a memorable smell. You'll easily recall a place if you remember what it smells like. "When you hear a certain theme or music, you might remember something you experienced from that." When composing sound for his games, Takada tries to keep that in mind to make memorable experiences though music and sound effects.

Killer 7 for the GameCube presented Takada with an unusual challenge. Since there were so many different level styles and seven different main characters to deal with, he admits it was difficult to grasp the overall scope of the game in order to make the music fit.

"It was chaotic," he said. "In the beginning of the development cycle, it was hard to figure out what music to produce."

He started making music based around each character, but because the characters were constantly changing, it was complicated to juggle it all. To bring it all together, he took a common sound effect and used it throughout the game for consistency. In the video presentation he used to demonstrate this, the same effect persists throughout menu selections, enemy encounters, level navigation, and more. The radically different music from scene to scene still works well together because of the common sound effect the player hears throughout the game.

Another trick Takada used to heighten Killer 7's sound effects was to coordinate design elements like scene changes, loading screens and other motions with the starts, stops, and transitions of sound effects and background music tracks. The audience found these techniques impressive, and after a second video demonstration that pointed this out, Takada was met with appreciative applause.

The lessons Takada learned in Killer 7 were applied to Grasshopper's next Nintendo game, No More Heroes. What he figured out with game flow and the melody line in the GameCube game turned out to be "very useful" during the development of No More Heroes. He wanted to arrange phrases so people would remember the worlds Travis Touchdown ventured to, as well as translate the level boss's characteristics into music—something he learned while composing God Hand.

He revealed during his talk about No More Heroes that his first task was to create music for the game's debut E3 trailer last year. He said that he only had a short period of time—one day—to make something for it. He started messing around on the piano, trying to find the right fit for the game.

"All of a sudden, the phrase came up," he said. After the trailer's showing, Takada said, "the audience seemed to like it, so I used it as the main phrase in No More Heroes."

Currently, Takada is putting together an album of No More Heroes music, remixed by other composers. "In a sense, it's a retranslation," he said, referring to how he tries to translate a game's visuals to the music he creates.

Takada closed his speech commenting on some other games he's made music for. He said he likes working on Konami's Beatmania IIDX series because it allows him to make the style of music he has always wanted to create. He also commented on being able to work on Super Smash Bros. Brawl. "Because [Masahiro] Sakurai wanted it, there are a great number of musicians," he said. Takada helped rearrange some Yoshi's Story music tracks, which he said are available to download from his personal website.

That wouldn't be the last mention of Sakurai during Takada's session, however. In the Q&A portion of the event, Sakurai himself made a surprise appearance to ask Takada a question about music design. After briefly chatting back-and-forth like a couple of buddies, Sakurai asked Takada why he tends to use and reuse similar sounds from one game to the next instead of just making something completely new for each game.

Takada replied, "I just started making sounds when I was a child, and I liked those sounds so I just kept doing them over and over again." Because he likes what he does, he just keeps on doing it.

In the exchange between the two, Sakurai mentioned how much he liked jazz music, but doesn't like the fact that "he has to use his brain a lot" when trying to create it.

Overall Takada's presentation was insightful, honest, and well-received.

Talkback

DjunknownFebruary 22, 2008

Quote:

To match the pace of the game with the RE feel, Takada came up rhythmic sections of music laid on top of a more traditional RE melody, adding proactive instruments like an electric guitar, which he thought worked out well.

I felt that some of the songs should've been kept intact. The original theme for the Training Facility in RE 0 was haunting as it was, but they changed it to fit the 'frantic' pace, though in that particular section, it wasn't chaotic.

Quote:

In the video presentation he used to demonstrate this, the same effect persists throughout menu selections, enemy encounters, level navigation, and more.  The radically different music from scene to scene still works well together because of the common sound effect the player hears throughout the game.

But here, it worked out beautifully. Killer 7 was a bizzarre game, with equally bizzare sound.

Quote:

Takada replied, "I just started making sounds when I was a child, and I liked those sounds so I just kept doing them over and over again."  Because he likes what he does, he just keeps on doing it.

I think the common use of some sounds help link the particular brand. In this case, the save screen sounds in K7 and NMH. The sounds in Super Mario Bros, have been re-used and re-interpretated, but haven't been significantly altered throughout the ages.

Got a news tip? Send it in!
Advertisement
Advertisement