Fear (Rez Area 5 Version)
Adam Freeland
REZ [Playstation 2 (2001) / Sega Dreamcast (2000)]
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So the War, ahem, I mean the Futebol Game is over. And so, it's time that Senator JT give back the emergency power granted to him for our previous communication.
When I'm not listening to music, or making music - I can often be found playing videogames. Videogames may very well be a reason for my main love of electronic music. Tracks from the original NES Megaman games would always get stuck in my head. The first time that I actually heard a "techno" song (which was 'Let's Get High" by Lords of Acid) was the time that my ears finally made that migration from listening to the output of my Atari 2600 to listening to all of the electronic tunes that I could get my ears on. It took a while to find an abundance of electronic beats sold locally - as Sam Goody's selection might as well have been non-existent. My available selection was not nearly as much as what was available where JT was raised. In retrospect, I feel that the
Videogame soundtracks and the genre of electronic music have paralleled the evolution of one another. We've heard a series if blips, beeps and beats evolve into a respected form of musical accomplishment. Some game soundtracks were made only for the purpose of games and some DJ productions were made only with the performance itself in mind. But it did not take long for someone to notice that these forms of entertainment might be interchangeable. It is now very likely that fans will attend full concerts of nothing but videogame music such as Nobuo Uematsu's arrangements for the Final Fantasy series. It's not unusual for game soundtracks to feature custom arranged mixes created by real-world artists such as Amon Tobin, The Crystal Method or Sasha rather than simply a game designer with a Casio SK-1. The first game to really take it to the next step and use electronic beats by established artists was Wipeout XL for the Sony Playstation. Reigning electronic artists and DJs such as The Chemicals Brothers, Prodigy, Fluke & Underworld all contributed to the soundtrack to create an immersive experience of light and sound that has proved to be my favorite racing game despite that fact that it was made almost a decade ago.
The whole point that I'm getting at is that music and videogames or more generally - site & sound - really go hand in hand. But, this isn't a new idea. Enter Russian Professor of Law & Economics as well as accomplished pianist turned influential painter & theorist: Vasily Vasilyevich Kandinsky. The aspect of Kandinsky's work that I would like to make note of is that he expressed an inextricable connection between sight & sound within his paintings. He would say that he could hear music, literally, in coordination with the colors and shapes that he would paint because of a link between color and musical harmony. He utilized color so that the hue was the counterpart of musical pitch and saturation of color had an equal relationship with the volume of sound. He called this unity Synaesthesia.
Where is this going? These points that I make come together with a videogame called REZ. REZ is an accomplishment in the sense that it's more than a game; it's an interactive piece of art where the player's actions will effect what he or she will see and hear (and in some cases feel). REZ is the brainchild of Tetsuya Mizuguchi of Space Channel 5, Shenmue and, most recently, Lumines fame. He was with Sega's United Game Artists development team before departing in 2003 to form Q Entertainment. Mizuguchi set out to create a different kind of game, the game's original name was 'The K Project', the K stood for Kandinsky, and Kandinsky's theories of synaesthesia are the basis for REZ. The game is an on rails shooter with a simple story - An all-intelligent digital being is held captive by a hostile computer system. The player, as the hacker, must float through these systems, in a fashion not too far off from the graphic hacking interface used in the movie Hackers, and take down the enemy forces (digital security) in order to reach the source and free the being - which just happens to be a glowing, bald chick. The player is represented by one of many avatars; each avatar indicates the amount of hits that can be sustained until the inevitable Game Over. These avatars contain the likes of a flying humanoid, a glowing orb, the Buddha and the Space Baby ripped right out of Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. The player is set out with a pre-determined path, with limited freedom on said path to move about in order to shoot down enemies. Each level has its own music track, created by an established artist such as Ken Ishi, Keiichi Sugiyama & Adam Freeland. Each shot that the player takes at an enemy will have an impact on what is seen (the enemy explodes which will in turn effect the on-screen environment as well as what is heard in the music). An enemy that has been hit will create an extra beat or sound that will resonate within the song and add to its intensity. The player can 'chain' enemy kills together in groups of 8 by locking onto any number of enemies up to 8 and then firing all at once, this will create a different effect on the music depending on the amount of enemies destroyed. Once a certain amount of enemies are tallied up, the player is led to the next 'layer' of the given level where another layer of the music track is played on top of the previous one. Whereby only a base line and a simple beat had previously resided will now host those in addition to a high hat, extra treble and more music effects that IDM aficionados will appreciate. Each level is made up of nine layers, so the more digital security ships shot down will lead to additional layers of music on top of the individual musical effects of each enemy kill. It's an involving and extremely enjoyable experience. There is an optional accessory known as the Trance Vibrator which plugs into the PS2's USB port. This vibrator will thump to the music with about 10 times the intensity as the rumble pack in the PS2 controller. I won't go into the sexual implications of this toy, but if placed under the players seat cushion, it will shake the entire chair!
So when I'm not found listening to music or making music, you might find me playing videogames. But every so often you can find me doing all three by playing Mizuguchi's masterpiece: REZ. I hope that this review motivates you to check out the game or the soundtrack in its entirety. Each provide an awe inspiring experience that few games or songs have been able to provide. Enjoy.
[A few notes: REZ was first released on the Sega Dreamcast, but only in
