The Game Audio Network Guild recently announced that instead of cancelling the 18th Annual Game Audio Network Guild Awards that were supposed to be held March 19th, they would be moving the show to a digital event at the end of April or May. While fans are waiting to see who takes home the coveted awards, we decided to speak with one of the nominees, composer Ian Chen. Ian is nominated for “Music of the Year” for his score to Blue Callisto’s Fantastic Creatures. In case you aren’t familiar with the game, the Synopsis reads: In the divine Chinese realm, Fantastic Creatures are awakening to a dire situation. The land is dying, resources are scarce and time is running out. Take control of Dragon, Turtle, Tiger or Fenghuang to unveil the ancient mysteries of Tian. In the below exclusive interview Ian talks about everything from the Chinese mythology of the game to what instruments were crucial to him while creating the game’s score. You can learn more about Ian here: https://www.ianchenmusic.com/.
How did you first get involved with Fantastic Creatures? What was the initial appeal of the project?
The head developer of Fantastic Creatures and I met on an online forum for indie game developers. When the game was pitched to me, I was immediately intrigued by the premise: a top-down strategy game, taking place in a world derived from ancient Chinese mythology.
I was born and raised in Taiwan until the age of 12, and many of the stories and characters that are featured in Fantastic Creatures were bedtime stories for me as a child. On top of that, strategy games were a huge part of my childhood, especially games like Empire Earth or Age of Mythology, where the stories are in a historical or mythological setting. The soundtrack for Age of Empire II (composed by Stephen Rippy) instantly transported me to the battlefields of medieval France and the deserts of Arabia, and it remains one of my favorite game soundtracks to this day.
How would you describe your music for the game?
The soundtrack for Fantastic Creatures is a synthesis of old Eastern melodies, rhythms, and textures with modern Western harmonies, instrumentation, and sound design. I took inspiration from some of the greatest modern composers from East Asia, including Tan Dun, Shigeru Umebayashi, Kitaro, and Joe Hisaishi. I was also inspired by Argentinean composer Gustavo Santaolalla, whose use of folk instruments to create a sense of nostalgia and belonging is something I hoped to achieve through my writing.
The music I wrote for Fantastic Creatures tells the many stories and characters that are featured in the game, including the genesis of the world by Pangu the Giant, the Goddess Nuwa who repaired the Pillar of Heaven, and the mythical mother of gods and goddesses, Queen Mother of the West. The song “Queen Mother of the West” adopts its lyrics from the Tang dynasty poem The Marble Pond 《瑤池》 by poet Li Shangyin, which depicts the scene at a lotus pond where Queen Mother waited for her love interest, the King Mu of Zhou.
The score features renowned Hollywood cellist Armen Ksakijian, as well as virtuosic traditional Chinese instrumentalists from the Zhonghua Chinese Orchestra USA located in El Monte, CA. Soloists include Yunhe Liang on the erhu (Chinese violin), Meiye Ma on the pipa (lute) and guzheng (Chinese zither), and Zhiming Shu on the dizi (Chinese flute) and sheng (mouth organ).
At what point were you brought on to Fantastic Creatures? Were the creators still in the story board phase or was it already completed?
Similar to a lot of video game projects, I was brought in fairly early in the development process. I wrote the main theme and one of the main battle tracks based on some early concept art by the talented graphic artist Lynden Jourdrey. I was originally only commissioned to write a few theme songs, but the developer loved my music so much that the commission was soon expanded to include the full soundtrack.
Did the creators at Blue Callisto have a very clear idea of what they wanted this score to sound like? Or did they let you experiment with the sounds?
From the very beginning, I was given a lot of freedom to explore and develop the musical identity for the game. The head developer and game creator is a Frenchman who had lived in China briefly, and he wanted to create a game that would reflect the Chinese aesthetic that he had fallen in love with during his time there. However, he didn’t have a clear idea how to achieve that from a sonic perspective, and that’s when he brought me in to help.
Before moving to Los Angeles and pursuing my career in film and TV scoring, I had spent a few years as music director of a traditional Chinese music ensemble. My expertise in Chinese folk instruments allowed me to come up with creative ways to combine traditional Eastern sonic textures with the harmonic depth of Western orchestral music, and in doing so create an emotional backbone to the stories conveyed in the game. They were very happy with the sound I created and ended up using every single track I wrote, which doesn’t happen very often in the media-composing world!
Fantastic Creatures incorporates ancient Chinese mythology. Were you familiar with this subject before starting work on the game or did you have to do research on this?
The ancient Chinese mythology is a vast encyclopedia of characters, ideologies, and complex relationships between man and man, man and god, and between the gods themselves. Even though I was familiar with many of the stories as a child, I still had to do some research, especially in relation to sounds and musical instruments. Through research I discovered that one of the goddesses, Goddess Nuwa, has been credited as the creator of a traditional Chinese mouth organ instrument called Sheng, which I then incorporated into her theme to symbolize her wisdom and vitality.
Congrats on your G.A.N.G. Award nomination! Why do you think the music resonated so well with gamers?
Thank you! I am delighted that people resonate with the score. Personally I think the soundtrack has a good balance of authenticity and innovation. It’s a sweeping, soaring score backed by authentic use of folk instruments. The melodies and orchestration are full and resounding at times, but light and elegant at others, true to the aesthetic of the historic and regional diversity of China.
Do you have a favorite track on the game?
It’s difficult to pick one favorite track, but there are certainly moments in the score that I hold a special place in my heart.
“Harmony or Destruction” reflects a key point in the game, where the player must choose to either use the newly acquired power from the Axe of Pangu to exterminate all the other Deities, or restore balance to the world using technological advancements and diplomatic approaches. The track starts with a foreboding horn line coupled with a Phrygian pentatonic guzheng solo that symbolizes fate and destiny. In the middle section, everything quiets down to pizzicato in the strings and a continuous woodblock rhythm. Soon, a wistful erhu melody comes in to indicate the possibility of hope for the future. The melody gets passed to solo cello and strings, and eventually the drums and horns rejoin the ensemble, pushing the player to make a final decision.
Another track that I really enjoyed writing is “Song of the People.” The beginning and end sections of this piece are composed of a few folk instruments taking turns, playing a simple melody on top of a light drumbeat. This is the kind of traditional writing that you can expect to hear in actual festivals around China and is not heard often in video game soundtracks.
What instruments did you find were crucial to the Fantastic Creatures score?
I think all of the Chinese folk instruments play an equally critical role in the soundtrack, and together they come to represent the many facets of Chinese culture. That being said, traditional Chinese instruments lack a fulfilling low-end sound, which is often achieved using modified traditional instruments or western celli and basses in a modern Chinese orchestra. For this score I was fortunate to work with the talented cellist Armen Ksakijian, who contributed to the beautiful and rich solo cello lines you hear across the album.
You not only score video games, but you also score films and tv. Your most recent series is Netflix’s Green Door. How different is scoring a game such as Fantastic Creatures in relation to Green Door?
In certain aspects, writing for TV and writing for video games are very similar. In both projects, I delved into the themes and characters in the stories, which in turn inspired new sounds and thematic materials that contribute to the emotional tone of each of the worlds. In other ways, the process can be quite different. With video games, I have more time to develop themes and can approach the score from a more symbolic, big-picture, ideological point of view. When writing for TV, while I needed to keep the overall themes and character arcs in mind, more importantly the music must elevate each emotional cue and interaction between characters on a scene-by-scene, more tangible basis.
Many thanks to Ian Chen for taking the time for this interview.
