shmuplation: Koji Kondo interview (2001)

Koji Kondo is definitely one of the most famous video game composers of all times, known and beloved by many generations of players. He has composed so many tracks for various Nintendo games across the generations, and not just for Mario and The Legend of Zelda games. He’s not as active as he was before (he’s mostly supervising and providing guidance to other composers), but he remains a key figure at Nintendo.

If you’re interested in learning more about him, and more precisely his music history, his influences, what it was like for him to compose music back in the days, and more, then you will love the latest shmuplation translation. It’s from 2001, and originally appeared in game maestro vol. 3.

Here’s an excerpt:

It was a huge shift in sound from what we had been doing on the Famicom. The FDS really only added that one extra channel. The SFC, on the other hand, was a decisive split from the game music of the past. It truly was a new sound. I spent a lot of time then thinking about what direction game music should go from here. The cheap square wave sound of the Famicom had come to define “game music” for most people, but the SFC could play a much wider variety of tones and sounds. That being the case, should I try and imitate “regular” music that we hear all around us? Or should I try and use these sounds to create a new style and lexicon of game music? I had to really pause and think here.

 

Kondo: For Super Mario World, I decided that for now, at least, I would try and use sounds that resembled the normal instruments you hear in the real world. However, my idea was to arrange the individual instruments in a way that you don’t normally hear. Like putting banjo and steel drum together, for instance.

Click here to check out the full interview!