Ghost of Tsushima's composer explains the differences in scoring a video game compared to a movie or TV series?

Music is a massive part of video games, not just in the form of a memorable score or soundtrack that defines the experience, but also in how music is weaved into the experience and changes depending on the situation that the player finds themselves in. With this being the case, I recently sat down with Ghost of Tsushima's composer Ilan Eshkeri to hear his thoughts on how different composing a video game soundtrack and score is when compared to working on films and on TV series.

Eshkeri explained to me the full challenges that come with video games, but also the many, many creative avenues that they open, even going as far as to note that we have probably only just scratched the surface with how music is utilised in video games.

"There is one element that is the same and there's another element that's very different," Eshkeri begins. "The pure creativity, the fundamental, which is the most important, but the fundamental creative process, whether you're doing film, television, video games, a ballet, an opera, like anything that you can imagine, theatre, you are telling a story, an emotional story through the use of music that that's the job. And so you have to write a melody that's going to describe the emotional situation. The job of doing that is going to be the same whatever format you're in.

"Then, you know, to take a practical example, if you think about, you know, if you're if you're writing Luke Skywalker's theme, whether Luke Skywalker, whether Star Wars was being presented as a stage play or a video game or a film or a TV show, Luke Skywalker's theme is always going to work because it captures the emotional core, right? So that is the job, that bit of the job is the same.

"The bit that changes is the medium, you know, and the medium is interesting because I can't remember who said "there's no art without resistance from the medium." You know that if you have a small canvas, well, you know... that changes the kind of painting you're going to make than if you have a giant canvas. And, and so that's true, right? Budget affects your creativity. Sometimes limited budget makes you be more creative. If you're working in theatre, maybe you can only fit a certain amount of musicians in the pit, right? If you're writing a dance, then the dancers can only dance at a certain pace for a certain period of time before they physically can't do it anymore. So you're limited by that. There's always a limitation and also an opportunity to expand.

"And what's really different in video games is that you get to write for this engine and the engine plays back the music depending on what the player does with the character. And so we're still, in my opinion... These playback engines are still developing, becoming more complex, and we're still learning exactly how to write in the most effective way for them.
And... and I think that's a really exciting creative area to be in."

How else do you think music can be utilised in video games? For more about composing, working on Ghost of Tsushima, and the upcoming PlayStation The Concert, check out the full interview with Eshkeri below.