As one of the most highly-regarded indie game composers, Rich Vreeland aka Disasterpeace has made his name on the soundtracks to Fez , Hyper Light Drifter , Solar Ash , and many more. And as it turns out, that work was partly inspired by Square Enix’s classic Chrono Cross . Below, as part of Polygon FM — our week-long look at the intersection of gaming and music — he talks about being inspired by Chrono Cross , how he composed the track “Ford the River”, and how we put together the sound for Hyper Light Drifter .
(If you want to go deep on his work, Vreeland has also written extensively about his process on his personal site .) Was there a game soundtrack or song that inspired you to pursue creating game music? One example that comes to mind is the soundtrack of Chrono Cross . My foray into game music was heavily motivated by my rediscovery of the music of the games I played growing up.
There was something unique about Yasunori Mitsuda’s music — the way he combines contemporary influences with world styles...
just in that one game I can hear Celtic sounds and melodies, folk influences, patterns that remind me of the minimalist Steve Reich , and complex time signatures like you might hear in Fusion or Prog Rock. It’s a pretty rich tapestry of things, and I found the music extremely unique and memorable at the time I first played the game back when I was about 13 or 14 years old. It still stands out and has some of the most unusual and beautiful chord progressions you will ever hear in a game.
Have you composed a track that feels like the result of your many influences? This track is called “Ford the River”, and is one of three tracks I’ve made for the Soundodger series of games. I wrote this song back in 2022. I think I had just finished playing Alba , which was a really beautiful game, and was inspired to make something that had a laid back, quirky, optimistic island feel.
Another island game, Mutazione was also a touchstone for the sound of this, as well as the music of Antônio Carlos Jobim, who is probably my favorite Bossa Nova artist. Doubling whistle and piano for the melody is something that was very much inspired by Jobim, who likes to use piano for melodies, but then tends to double it with other instruments in unison, or with effects. The sound palette features lots of earthy and quirky sounds — sort of a combo of boom bap drums, fretless bass, bossa nova elements like nylon guitar, piano, whistling, guiro, shakers, and then a few quirky things here and there to pad everything out.
Let’s talk about Hyper Light Drifter — how did you find the sound for the game? Which instruments did you use? The score for Hyper Light is largely comprised of synth patches I made from scratch. I really tried to sculpt sounds that I thought fit the feeling of the world — lots of warm, textured, warbly sounds with organic components, things like the pitch dives of a dove, or the fluttering sounds of a reptile. I really tried to mimic nature and broken-down technology with the sounds, since the game [has] this post-apocalyptic overgrowth feel to it.
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