Koji Kondo is Not Actively Composing for Zelda U

We’ve all fallen in love with Koji Kondo’s work on the Zelda series over the years, but we won’t have his handy work to look forward to in Zelda U. In a recent interview with GameSpot, he explains how he won’t be composing any of the music in Zelda U but will instead be supervising, suggesting he could be the overall sound director. While he has done this role many times over the years, he’s almost always had his hand in at least one piece of music in each game, but that won’t be the case this time around, as he’ll let all the other talent create the music. Here is what he said when asked about his work on the next Zelda title:

“GameSpot: Are you working on the next Zelda theme as well, or is that coming from a separate team?

Koji Kondo: I’ll be supervising and looking over that, but I’m not actively composing for the game.

My final question, when you’re working as a supervisor on something like that, when do you know when it’s ready for the game? When do you let it go?

Kondo: We look at whether the music has achieved its goal. Whether the music’s designed to emphasize a certain action on screen or if it’s designed to entice vocal songs or something like that. We just have to look at what the music is designed to do within the game.

Sometimes the creator has a tough time doing that. Because they’re so close, they’re so deep into the music themselves, they’re unable to look at it from the player’s point of view. So as someone who’s supervising the direction of the music, I try to put myself into the player’s shoes and I ask myself, “Does this music fit with what’s happening? Does it do what the game wants it to do?” But the composer is still concerned with the music itself. So I try to look at it and give advice from that viewpoint. Whether or not it’s achieving the goal, and whether or not that’s clear from the player’s viewpoint”

I’m just glad to know he is involved, but I’ll miss his unique compositions. Art by warningyou.

Source: GameSpot