The Melody Of Change: Akira Yamaoka At Grasshopper

By Brandon Sheffield

Akira Yamaoka's name has been synonymous with Konami's Silent Hill horror game series for years. Serving as the games' producer and composer, his creative stamp was all over the franchise -- unusually, even the Hollywood film adaptation made sure to use his compositions to retain the feel of the games which spawned it.

In recent years, development of the Silent Hill games shifted from Tokyo to Western studios, though Yamaoka was still reportedly involved in these projects. However, in the wake of this change Yamaoka recently left Konami and moved to iconoclastic No More Heroes developer Grasshopper Manufacture.

Though Yamaoka will begin as a composer on the Shinji Mikami and Goichi Suda horror action project currently in development for EA Partners, he hopes to expand his role into production at the studio.

Gamasutra recently had a chance to speak to Yamaoka about his thoughts on the shift and his plans for the future.

What made you decide to go to Grasshopper Manufacture?

Akira Yamaoka: Well, Grasshopper is one of those Japanese companies that make very original games, even by global standards -- games with a lot of originality.

Their games always have a very unique world view, and with the sort of toolset I had in the fields of music and audio, I thought I'd be able to contribute to what they're doing in a really constructive way. That was what inspired me.

Recently, a lot of notable Japanese sound designers have gone freelance, like Michiru Yamane and Masashi Hamazu. Yasunori Mitsuda and Norihiko Hibino are doing their own things. What do you think about this situation?

AY: Well, myself, I want to be more than just a musician -- not that freelancers can't be more than musicians, but they're a step removed from the development process. A client tells them to write a song for a space level, they do it, and that's it. I want to be more closely involved with game development, to use my audio skills as a tool to improve the whole project. That's what I'm after.

I guess there really aren't many studios in Japan anymore with that sort of global mindset, or that really can sell games overseas.

AY: Right, and that's something that makes me jibe well with Grasshopper, I think. They have the sort of projects going on that I want to be involved with, and that was a big aspect behind the decision.

How do you think your personal style will fit into the Grasshopper style? There's a lot of innovative sound work there -- will you be managing that as well, or will you only be composing?

AY: I think I could do it either way. Of course, when you're talking about "style," it's not like I'm going to demand this particular type of music or this kind of output in our games' audio. We think in terms of what the game requires; it's not a matter of me needlessly pushing my perspective into projects.

Grasshopper's sound effects team is already quite good; will you be making any changes there? Are you leading that team as well?

AY: Well, there's a lot in the field of audio that I want to accomplish. There's no way to be "perfect" in it, after all, but I do want to nurture my own originality, my own approach to solving problems.

I'm curious to know what you think of [No More Heroes composer] Masafumi Takada's work, and are you at all concerned that people will compare you to him?

AY: I haven't heard much of his stuff, really -- to be honest, I haven't had a chance to meet him yet, so I can't say a lot about him. As for whether we'll be compared, it's not that I'd mind it, but I doubt it would happen that much, would it? (laughs)

Well, you should definitely listen to his soundtracks, because they're quite good. Will you also wind up taking on a production or design role at Grasshopper as you had done at Konami in the past?

AY: Well, not immediately, but if the opportunity comes along later, I think it'd be nice if I had a chance to seize upon it.

At some point, if you have a chance to be involved in production, I think that'd be great.

AY: Certainly. Maybe I should! (laughs)

Now that you've left the company, I'm curious: What do you think of the new Silent Hill?

AY: The Wii one? Haven't played it! (laughs) I haven't touched it. How is it?

I didn't play it either, but I have heard it's good.

AY: Oh, really? Well, great to hear.

It seems like game creators these days don't play games all that much.

AY: Yeah. It's certainly the same case in Japan as well.

I think that's a shame. If you don't play games, then you wouldn't be able to understand them, perhaps.

AY: You wouldn't, yeah. You lose your creative edge that way.

So what style are you going for in your current composition work, perhaps compared to before?

AY: Hmm... Compared to before, I don't think I've changed that much. Some people say that my work is a fair bit more complex, featuring a lot more color than it used to, and I think I have noticed that myself as well.

In the past you did a lot of work involving calmer music in tense situations. Is that something you'll continue here, or will you go in a more abrasive musical direction?

AY: I do like the more abrasive styles as well, but in tense situatons, I tend to prefer music that doesn't play completely into what you're seeing.

With situations like that, while I naturally don't plan to stick slavishly to any one style, that type is what I personally like the best. So I have that to go with while I'm also simultaneously pursuing new styles in my work.

At Grasshopper they often do very interesting things with sound design, where there'll be a big, loud, or unexpected sound at certain places in the game. Have you studied this at all in Grasshopper's games, and do you think it'll continue; do you have something to add to it?

AY: Sound effects, right? Well, I'd like to do that sort of thing, yes. Like you put it, doing something unexpected or unanticipated. There's something very interesting about that from the gamer's perspective, after all. That's the way I like to think as I approach a sound package, so that's what I want to keep going with.

It seems like it could be a place for you to experiment more with the kind of thing you were talking about at GDC -- placing the footsteps ahead of what's actually there onscreen. It seems like Grasshopper is somewhere where you could push that even further.

AY: Certainly, I would like to pursue that sort of thing. And some of the things I didn't discuss, I'll be doing -- or I'd like to be doing -- within the next year.

Can you think of ways to push that further? Is there anything you're thinking about now?

AY: Oh, I can't have them get out yet! (laughs) Once we show off something it's involved in, I'll show it off; I'll say "this is it". It's easier explaining it that way, besides.

Based on that, I assume you can't talk about what project you're working on, right?

AY: Ahh, you overseas interviewers are always after secrets! (laughs) But, really, my current situation's about what you'd think it is -- the title that people have been talking about on the Internet is the one I'm working on.

I also noticed that you don't often use symphonies, or a lot of orchestration. Why is that? Do you think that'll change in the future? Or are you comfortable dealing with guitar and electronic instruments?

AY: I do think that a change of pace in that respect could be a good thing. I think that, but... going back to the first question for a moment, whether you're using a symphonic or heterophonic approach in Asian or Western music, first you have a rhythm -- beating out time in one way or another. To that you add harmonies, the chords that are played at set times to this rhythm. Melody is the thing that puts these chords together.

In heterophony, you think of each aspect as being on its own axis -- you come up with melodies, then you come up with the rhythm and harmonies to make them work. Western music often begins with the composer thinking about harmonies first, but within music, there are only a limited number of harmonies -- about a hundred or so -- that are suitable to use. It's a matter of combining those together.

I thought about this for a bit once, and I'm not saying that one is better than the other, but for example, the English alphabet has 26 letters, while there's a practically infinite number of kanji characters -- not infinite, but quite a lot. So in English, you take this small set of characters and form words like "god" and so on with them -- but playing with these same letters can give you very different results, like taking "god" and turning it into "dog".

The Eastern line of thought simply has a character, kami, for god, and then creates a completely different and unrelated character to signify dog. In much the same way, Western music often takes this given set of chords and comes up with new and novel ways to combine them together, while Japanese heterophony is more concentrated around melody. So thinking symphonically is actually pretty difficult for me -- it's not like I couldn't do it if I studied a bit, but it's tough. I am interested in symphonic composition, though, definitely.

Your compositions are very melodic. If there's harmony, it's in tune. Have you thought about experimenting with dissonant sound? Like when, instead of harmony that flows together, the melody clashes.

AY: That's actually one of the things I'm working with right now -- music that doesn't work by the book, so to speak. Since most of the world's music does work by the book, when something doesn't, that has the effect of making it stand out. It's something that goes off the beaten path, and that's why I like it.

In Western game soundtracks nowadays, composers are very afraid of using loops -- they'll try to hide loop points so you don't actually hear an original melody. It's all very flowing and in the background.

I feel that in Japan, people will still do a good job of introducing a real melody, so you can tell where a song's beginning, middle and end are located. I'm wondering what you feel about that. Western composers seem to be afraid of showing music structure and loop points, and in Japan it's not so.

AY: You're absolutely right there! And it's not just with music -- you could say that symbolizes the entire approach Japanese studios take with game development. Their games have a distinct beginning and a distinct end -- they draw a straight line from start to finish. They begin by coming up with field maps and so on, then figure out how to make a game out of it.

Western games, on the other hand, are getting more and more open in what they let you do. The same applies to music, too. Japanese composers string a bunch of melodies together, and that leads itself to a natural end at some point or another. If you think in terms of harmonies, though, suddenly it doesn't really matter where you are in the song at any given point. That's why you can't spot the loop point right off.

Vincent Diamante, who composed the music for Flower, feels that loop points aren't something to be afraid of and that melody should be embraced and used more; that there are ways you can use melody in a large field map. You can bring back in certain melodic themes that players can recognize, and it's a good thing to let players identify with melodies instead of just creating atmosphere. What do you think about that?

AY: Well, either way is fine, really, in the end. I divided these two types of music into melody and heterophony, but it's not a matter of fearing one method over another. This is something I'd like to work on myself, but since games are interactive entertainment, there's no set standard for when the player will begin and where it'll end, like there is with movies. As a result, you, the composer, have no idea when a player will decide to move from one section of the game to another, something that'd require a change in music.

That doesn't mean loop points should be avoided, but at the same time, you have to keep that fact in mind when you're composing. One way of dealing with that is to just fade out the music, but what I'd like to do is work on ways to always have the music come to a believable end whenever the game situation calls for it. That would be a much more interactive and game-like approach than simply fading out the volume.

It also may be possible to do it without fading to black if you fade it into another piece. You can tell that one piece is winding down as another ramps up, so there's no real gap in the music.

AY: True, but if the two pieces have a different rhythm, then it's going to sound off. I'd like to have the music come to a full and decent ending before the next piece begins, just like it would in other forms of media.

One thing I've been thinking about is that, in the Famicom era, some music was actually written with the Japanese scale -- you can play it on a shamisen -- but nowadays that's not done so much. Do you think there's any kind of opportunity to bring back that?

AY: Oh, I know what you mean! Of course, that may just be an age issue -- a lot of composers back then are pretty old now. (laughs) Maybe that way of thinking about it changed with the generations.

But sounds like that are pretty nostalgic, and there's an opportunity there for Japanese composers.

AY: Well, people in Western studios should contract with me to make that sound, then. (laughs) I'm not sure young people today would be able to understand the nuances of that sort of style -- it may be one of those things where you had to be composing on the Famicom at the time to get it.

You yourself like industrial music, but I have never heard you use it in games. Will you at some point?

AY: Well, I haven't created any straight industrial-genre music for games, but I have put in little pieces -- the essence of it, in other words -- in the past.

The clanging environmental sounds in Silent Hill, for example...

AY: Yeah. The essence.

Would you ever try to use it in a more melodic part as well?

AY: I would like to, yes.

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