Q&A with Koji Ueno - Resonances of Gadget

Since the beginning of his career in 1978, Koji Ueno has been composing music that encompasses multiple styles and genres from pop to new age, from orchestral to electronic and dance oriented. Having achieved a reputation as one of Japan’s most promising musicians after joining the Guernica ensemble, he has worked with some of the best musicians in his country such as Ryuichi Sakamoto, with whom he authored the soundtracks for the major motion pictures Oneamise no Tsubasa and The Last Emperor.

In one of his most singular musical moments, Ueno participated with Haruhiko Shono and the Synergy studio for the creation of the music score for the best-selling CD-ROM experience GADGET: INVENTION, TRAVEL & ADVENTURE. As an addendum to the results of my research, already presented in last year's interview with Haruhiko Shono, I now publish a brief interview where this gifted and erudite musician discusses a few interesting subjects regarding his valuable contribution to the game - later resulting in that rare album entitled Resonances of Gadget: Quasisymphonic Movements and Noise Montages. I was also surprised to learn that some of his influences when composing this soundtrack were musical masterpieces of my own personal predilection.

CG: As a composer, you have a reputation of someone who is constantly looking for new challenges. In what circumstances did you enter the project of creating this soundtrack?

Ueno: I was the first composer choice of Mr. Shono and his office. They knew about my admiration for the art of the pre-war/war time, Russian avant-garde and machine age which were also of special reference to that locomotive he designed for the game.

When Mr. Shono was a university student he was a fan of my band Guernica, whose concept was the combination of pre-war avant-garde and pre-war popular music.

One of his university friends who was also a Guernica fan asked me to make music for his graduation art work and introduced him to me around 1983 or 1984.

CG: Some years after the original release of GADGET, Synergy produced a renewed version. Was the same soundtrack used or did you create new themes for "Past as Future"?

Ueno: I can’t remember exactly. During the production of that project I handed my works to Mr. Shono directly who later edited and overdubbed them – a process in which I had no participation. I do remember, however, that in "Gadget Trips/Mindscapes" I made a lot of new material.

CG: What did you base your music on - were you given game materials or simply Images, sketches, ideas?

Firstly I was asked to made music for the trailer of Gadget for its promotion. That trailer already had many designed materials such as the locomotive, some of the characters and locations. I selected suitable digital sampling data as several timbres of that trailer music and then I constructed music to fit into the timing of the scene changes of the video.

Eventually, that material became the theme "Overture: Invention, Travel and Adventure". Many materials later used in the game and the movie were reductions of that. The following variations were made using a method similar to film scoring techniques, based on scene images and the story itself. I remember that the tracks Overture, Tranquility, Contradictions and A Recollection of the Future, from the soundtrack album, were the first themes I composed.

CG: What motivated you to create the music? You focused heavily on the industrial and engineering part of that universe; but also on the deep psychological trance with eerie noise montages: what did you intend to make the players feel by listening to the music?

Ueno: I think "Gadget" has something like a feeling of oppression throughout the whole game.

And has what we may call industrial mysticism, as well as the feeling of destin sans issue. Maybe those themes were the most inspiring. Anyway Mr. Shono's designs were of great artistic beauty, so I was keeping those in mind when I was composing. I’ve also tried to make music that wouldn’t weary the player.

CG: What are your thoughts on GADGET and your interpretation of it?

Ueno: Nightmare of 20th Century? Do the retro-chic machines dream of autocratic brainwashing?

CG: The train theme is possibly the most emblematic of all: its beat pattern being so contagious. Tell me more about the conception of this theme in particular.

Ueno: When I saw the train sequences for the first time I felt that they required some like constant beat and that it needed to suit the tempo of the scene – while not evoking any memory of a dance music or techno beat! So I selected sampling material by classical percussion instruments bearing in mind that the time of the music should be cross rhythm, not just a simple 4/4 or 3/4.

Later, I tried to play some of samplings on keyboard. There, sampling material can be played slow to fast combining different rhythm (tempo) by playing more than a single note. This is how I found the exact material and tempo.

Anyway it's important to read the exact tempo of the scenes. Maybe that is also one of film music techniques.

CG: Finally: in terms of musical composition, what were your references to the creation of this soundtrack?

My greatest influences were: Edgard Varèse, Arthur Honegger’s Pacific 231, Sergei Prokofiev (Symphony No.2), Bernard Herrmann, Jerry Goldsmith’s The Planet of Apes, Béla Bartók, John Cage, Louis and Bebe Baron’s Forbidden Planet, Charles Ives, Leoš Janaček’s Glagolitic Mass, Frank Martin’s Petite Symphonie Concertante, Pauline Oliveros’ Deep Listening and Aaron Copland.

Given its extreme rarity, I converted the soundtrack to a suitable MP3 quality that is now available for download.

A digital Carpe Diem

Tale of Tale's new iPhone and iPod touch application was officially released today and while the Apple platforms are surely not to my personal liking I couldn't miss the opportunity to mention this strange new form of interaction that they have prepared. As tiresome as the last year might have been for the studio, Michaël Samyn and Auriea Harvey keep working with determination in search for new grounds. VANITAS was commissioned by John Sharp and Ian Bogost as a part of the Art History of Games symposium taking place in Atlanta, which includes games from other known independent authors such as Jason Rohrer.

Priced at one single dollar, VANITAS evokes the concept of mortality by arranging loose objects inside a wooden box, not unlike the use of deliberate symbols and icons in pre-modern Flemish art. Inspired by the famous biblical passage vanitas vanitatum omnia vanitas (vanity of vanities, all is vanity, from the book of Ecclesiastes) Tale of Tales has conceived a meditative space without rules or concise objectives - highly reminiscent of the same philosophy which is present, although in an entirely different format, in Japanese garden models. The deep soul-searching experience about the futility of materialism is enhanced by the cello moods of this project's invited artist, none other than the talented Zoe Keating.

More information can be found at the official website.

Takayoshi Sato's character design master class

Last month's issue of Game Developer magazine contains a highly informative piece by Takayoshi Sato regarding his approach to videogame character design. A recommended read to anyone interested in becoming acquainted with the details behind Sato's work, as well as valuable advice and essential details: in short, a must read.

The pages included in the document above are scanned reproductions from the magazine. You may find this and many other issues in high quality downloads available at GDM's website.

CoreGamers presents: The Making of FATALE

FATALE was one the most surprising releases of this year that now nears its end. Like an encore to the same brilliant approach to the discipline of interactive arts as essayed before in THE PATH, it was a unique portrayal of the biblical icon Salome as seen from the perspective of Oscar Wilde's play of the same name. If its irreverence has caused much doubt among the videogame playing community, its value has already been underlined by popular videogame critics from all over the world. Not only was it completed in a record-breaking time, it also provided a fascinating series of challenges to the Tale of Tales studio and invited colaborators.

This Making Of FATALE article I now present contains detailed information concerning the origins of the project, the development stage, as well as the ever enlightening perspective from both Auriea Harvey and Michaël Samyn concerning their work.

Portrait of videogames as a young industry: Q&A with Leonard Herman

And so a new industry was born. It has had its ups and downs but it has mostly kept on roaring ahead in step with technology. It has done its share of contributing to great technical advancements in the art of displaying complex graphics on a display. Most importantly, it has put imaginative, interactive gaming within reach of everybody.

Ralph H. Baer ( in the Preface to Phoenix)

Upon confirming the indefinite delay of a fourth edition whose creation is still in progress, Leonard Herman has decided to reprint the third edition of his milestone Phoenix The Fall & Rise of Videogames, previously released in 2001. While a decade has passed since its original publication, this last existing edition of his original 1994 book continues to be one of the most valuable resources on the subject of videogame history, covering the events of a time line that starts in 1970 (with a comprehensive introduction on computer history starting in the early days of Pascal) up until 2001 and the emerging 128-Bit console systems.

Phoenix has warranted strong reactions in what relates to its particular style of writing: whereas some are very keen and enthusiastic on its impassive chronicle, others have discredited the book for being an unpleasant and far from compelling read. As soon as I got my hands on the book I immediately began to understand how Herman’s scientific and largely unbiased writing method may be perceived as expressionless. Notwithstanding, this is a book regarding the History of videogames: and one so impartial and scientific in the way it addresses the subject at hand that one can't help but recommend it and vouch for it.

Not unlike other popular publications that succeeded it, in Phoenix should only expect to find the history of how videogames became a leading form of entertainment in North-America – the cradle of the early industry models – but also the critical stage for Japan’s rush for global home console market domination. In truth, the composition of a book concerning the global history of the videogame business could not happen without the active collaboration of several experts around the world performing a cooperative research. Ambitions of an ideal and all-encompassing volume on the history of videogames apart, there is no denying that Herman’s solo research has gathered enough data to make any of his book editions a complete guide to help the reader build an accurate mental picture of the home console chronology (computer games not being an actual priority to this work); or to simply be used as a reference in studies or mere fact checking.

The origins of this compilation of the videogame reality date back to several years before its actual release. I first understood the difficulties implied in the publication of a book of this kind so early in the 1990’s decade after contacting the author about that matter. I was surprised to learn that while the videogame industry had risen from its complete inexistence to one of the most profitable businesses on a global scale in a matter of a few decades, no book publisher was willing to risk the sponsoring of Herman’s book. Even today, Phoenix Fall and Rise and its publisher, Rolenta Press, remain an epitome of independent book publishing - its presentation simple and humble unlike that of most game-related books. And hardly ever has the expression do not judge a book by its cover been so appropriate: Phoenix is unquestionably one of the most important studies ever made on the subject of videogame History.

Mr. Herman was kind enough to answer a few of my questions regarding this object of his pursuit, a dynamic and sporadically revised information resource that continues to renew itself with every new inprint.

CoreGaming : Phoenix is often presented as the first true account of the videogame history. Please tell me a little more about its origins and the difficulties implied in the publication of this sort of book given th the year of its original release.

Leonard Herman : In 1982 I began writing a book called ABC To The VCS, which was a directory of all of the games that were available for the Atari 2600. After the crash, I realized that there would be very little demand for such a book so I scrapped it. Around 1986, I thought about writing a similar book about the NES, but I really didn’t relish the thought of doing it, especially since at the time I wasn’t a fan of Nintendo and didn’t even own an NES! However I didn’t want to give up the idea about writing a book about videogames.

For a while I began writing a book about each of the videogame companies, such as Atari, and Mattel. But a lot of the information overlapped. So that was when I got the idea of writing a chronological history of videogames, since such a book didn’t exist.

I spent the four years writing the book, using my large collection of magazines and press kits as source (since the Internet as we know it didn’t exist yet). My goal was to get the book published in 1992, which was the 20th anniversary of the release of the Odyssey and Pong. Unfortunately, No publishers were interested. Prima, which eventually published Steve Kent’s book in 2001, wrote to me in an August 1993 letter: “…we believe there is not enough interest in the general history of video games at this time.”

In 1994 I learned about self-publishing so I founded Rolenta Press and published Phoenix that way.

CoreGaming : Sometime ago you presented the fourth edition of Phoenix as a book containing information about the last years in the industry of videogames. However you decided not to move forward with the fourth edition for now and publish the 3rd once again. What originated that decision and how actual (or up-to-date) do you think this book today?

Leonard Herman : Well I am moving forward with the fourth edition, however the work is not progressing as quickly as I would like. In addition to adding new chapters, I have also decided to update the entire book, and fix any errors that have been in there that I’m aware of. I’m also including Japanese system prior to the Famicom so that is additional research that has to be done. And sometimes I get held up for stupid little reasons.

For example, in 1989 View-Master released the Interactive Vision. I found information from several places citing that this system was awarded “Game of the Year”. The only problem was I couldn’t find who gave it that award! I contacted the Toy Industry of America, but they’re records only went back to 2001. I even contacted one of the designers of the console, and while he remembered the system getting the prize, he couldn’t remember who it got the prize from. I spent over a month looking for this information and finally had to give up on it.

CoreGaming : Since you first decided to research the subject of videogame history, many other authors and researchers have been publishing their own books regarding the history of videogames: either focusing on specific contents, like David Sheff and his Game Over History of Nintendo; or more broad and wide-randing like Kent's Ultimate History of Videogames and Russel deMaria's High Score. What do you think that Phoenix offers to readers today that none of these books does?

Leonard Herman : Actually, the first edition of David Sheff’s book came out before mine. Anyway, one of my best supporters is Steve Kent, who tells everyone that our books complement each other. While his book tells the story of videogames through the words of the actual participants, mine is an encyclopedia of all the little details that aren’t covered anywhere else.

One of the main criticisms of the book is that the writing is dry and not entertaining. This was done by design. The book was written to educate, not to entertain.

CoreGamer : As a researcher, you must have spent thousands of hours going through different sources of information regarding videogames. Of all the interesting episodes in the history of videogames, which one do you think is the most enticing?

Leonard Herman : One of my favorite stories is the story of Tetris. In fact, for the 4th edition I’m removing it from the main body of the book and inserting it into a Focus On section where it stands out by itself.

CoreGaming : Finally, as someone who has been particularly close to videogame issues and debates since their dawn, how do you see the industry today? Were there such dramatic changes or are things closely the same as to what they were two or three decades ago, in spite of the drastic popularity increase?

Leonard Herman : Well three decades ago everything was new, so any change was a dramatic one! But we are still seeing new things today. The Wii changed forever how humans interact with videogames (although Nintendo wasn’t the first to do it). The only difference between now and 30 years ago was that the dramatic changes took place a lot more often back then.

Amusement magazine, issue 6: BUG!

There was a time, long before the arrival of the Internet, when videogame players celebrated the inclusion of game-related topics in the smallest of columns of everyday newspapers. In time, the small footnotes became single and double-page features about fresh game releases, hints, pokes and cheats. As a consequence of the sudden growth of the computer and console business, a few dedicated publications appeared in the United States of America, the epicenter of the videogame industry revolution; yet firstly in the United Kingdom. Countless magazines were edited during the 1980's and 90's throughout the globe; some of them vanished in a matter of months; others were successful for a short while; only a few kept alive until this day.

But just as the format of the printer paper slowly capitulated to the emerging HTML format, so did the videogame magazines become a secondary choice to game players who needn't wait for the end of the month to read the latest news, now updated every second in the windows of their internet browsers. In order to oppose the costless information supply of game sites, magazines were forced to improve and to become more exclusive than ever in order to survive. AMUSEMENT magazine, a fairly recent French trimestral publication, addresses some of the larger problems of the games journalism sphere, providing the sort of educated reading that is still light-years away from the common videogame website.

A first look at any of the existing issues of AMUSEMENT is sure to cause shock and awe: apparently, even after a quick browsing through the pages, this magazine is hard to identify as being related to the subject of games. Its discerning design easily evokes the flair and elegance seen in the visual presentation of a Vogue or Vanity Fair magazines. There are no game previews, reviews or even news articles proper; each piece has an identity of its own. This radical perspective has made this magazine a new and inspiring reference in the treatment of videogame subjects, something which is clear not only in its daring imagery, but also in the selection of themes.

The latest issue of the magazine, entitled BUG, is dedicated to concept of game program bug or glitch. Through different articles, the authors provide unique assessments on how these program errors have characterized videogames for long and will continue to do so in the future. The following are some of the highlights of this sixth edition (please click the images for larger views).

Not a Game, Just a Digital Amusement is a joint venture between the magazine and the artist Pierre Vanni on the subject of game bugs. Scheduled for release on the iPhone on the 25th of December, this non-game will make use of elemental volumes and shapes. Theplayer must use the touch screen to create visual motives which can only be interpreted at a distance in an exercise that relates to the true nature of digital images - the pixels -, very much like a new aged version of Plato's cavern.

A fine example of this magazine's focus on subjects of interest to videogame players that are not directly related to the industry; this is an interview article with Xavier Veilhan, a vanguardist French artist whose recent work consists of presenting flat polygon sculptures near historical locations. This contrast between old and new architectural and scultpural techniques is well illustrated by the image above, where a purple geometric chariot being pulled by horses is placed on front of the Versailles Palace.

The celebrated creator of Konami's DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION, Naoki, is briefly enquired about his vision of the music games industry where his title played a central role in the last years.

One of the best photo shoots of this volume, Overheating depicts several objects being thrown through a wall, namely the red DS Lite, in a visually pleasing manner.

Another great visual feature, Dérapages, blends models with polygonal compositions to suggest everyday life accidents: on the picture, the suspended waiter accidentally drops the digital serving dish.

Glitchography is a small but very interesting piece on the important role of the bug hunters and game testers in the development of each new game.

Bugs come in different forms and shapes. Léo Bourdin assumes the role of Bug Hunter and catalogues them in different classes from the Fatalist to the Pathologic according to their level of threat to the game experience.

Bugs are a unique property of hardware and software systems. In Cinema, however, the absence of these errors is compensated by different occasions where fictional computers display abnormal behaviors that play an important role. Listed movies include famous computer gremlins from 2001 A Space Odyssey, Electric Dreams or Alphaville.

Reminiscent of the film District 9, this visual article combines the chaos of technology on the foreground with the superimposed CGI insects alluding to the original circumstances in which the computer term bug came to be.

A one-page mention to the game MACHINARIUM, by Brice Roy, underlines the exquisite aesthetics of Jakub Dvorský's game.

Possibly the most important article of this edition: a multi-paged interview with Tetsuya Mizuguchi in which he speaks openly about his early days at SEGA and the several experiences that motivated him to seek new grounds in game design when founding UGA or his recent studio Q? Entertainment.

Like many other Japanese game designers often credited as being artists because of their exquisite work - including Ueda or Kojima - Mizuguchi speaks honestly about his definition of what videogames are. The page highlight reads: To me videogames aren't art, they're entertainment.

In his career, Mizuguchi has developed a mastery in blending audio and video. The inclusion of the concept of synaesthesia in his games, particularly REZ, originated in Paris when visited the Kandinsky painting gallery. The highlight reads: Everything will merge in the future: Videogames, Music, Cinema.

The author speaks openly about his ambitions: I see myself as still being young. And that which interests me is what comes next, the next day, the next project.

Surprisingly, the final pages are printed in a different kind of paper. One of them shows a very amusing article about an inevitable ludic reference, given this specific issue's main theme: BUG, the Sega Saturn game, is recognized here as one of the most important chapters in the history of 3D games.

More information about this issue at the Amusement mag official site.