His inexhaustible source of inspiration lies in the world of Western light music, from jazz to soul. He admires Danny Elfman, Hans Zimmer and Henry Mancini but never acts as a mere copycat, always searching for his own unique style. Jakub Riedel spoke with Marcin Przybylowski – a Polish composer, sound designer, Creative Valley grand prix winner and Panzer Flakes collaborator – about his earlier projects, his inspirations and favorite game soundtracks.


 

• Panzer Flakes (Jakub Riedel): Let’s start off with the usual introductions. Could you tell us something about yourself?
  

Marcin Przybyłowicz: My name is Marcin Przybyłowicz, I am a music composer and a sound designer, I create and arrange complete audio settings for computer games, and music for animation, advertisements, movies…

• PF: How did you get involved in the game music industry?
  

MP: Unexpectedly. Some time ago, while I was browsing the web, I’ve found a recruitment announcement for an indie roleplaying game project – I replied, and thus my first game project was born. It gained momentum after that.

• PF: What was the name of that game, remember the title? Did it ever get published?
  

MP: My first project, the one that started my adventures with gamedesign, was Afterfall… An independent, fan-based roleplaying project, with a post-apocalyptic setting, taking place in Central-Eastern Europe. My first paid game job was „The Witcher: Music Inspired by the Game”, a musical addon to the Collector’s Edition of „The Witcher”.

• PF: Afterfall is an almost legendary project in Poland, often referred to as the „Polish Fallout” game. How does one compose music for the apocalypse?
  

  MP: Actually, you could say that composing post-apocalyptic music is pretty much the same as composing any music – there are lots of ways to build the proper atmosphere. When you’re thinking about the world after the apocalypse, you want to emphasize the emptiness, the space, most probably with dips of sadness and sorrow… These are universal, common emotions, and they can be achieved by multiple means – which helps to make soundtracks different from one another, untrite, even if they are set in a very similar universe.

• PF: Where did you seek inspiration for those compositions? Mark Morgan’s score for Fallout? Other places?
  

  MP: I like Morgan’s music from both Fallout and Fallout 2, but I’m more into Inon Zur’s soundtrack for Fallout 3. It’s not about copying any ideas or sequences, it’s about those couple of characteristics that I’m keen on, that I support – the full, wide brass sound of the symphonic orchestration, the classical drama interweaved into the music… I really enjoy it when music in games has a strong movie-like feel.

• PF: There’s been a lot of rumors lately about whether or not Afterfall is still under development. Could you clarify them up for us, even if just a bit? Are we still going to see Afterfall in the end?

MP: Hard to say, really – job ethics and the fact that I try to approach my job very seriously, limits what I can and what I can’t say publicly, even if it’s flying around the internet from some time. Let’s say it this way: everyone who’s interested in this project and at least knows how to put „a” and „b” together knows for sure that Afterfall was and is the first project of Nicolas Games. Nicolas Games was a publisher only up to that point, and by acquiring Afterfall it jumped into a totally different pair of shoes, and one that they knew nothing about. It’s quite an undertaking, to create a huge, complicated, extensive roleplaying game, especially if you don’t really have any experience in that particular type of work. Some may even say that without proper experience, it’s a doomed venture. And let’s not forget that the very premise of Afterfall was that it was supposed to be as huge, complicated and extensive as possible.

• PF: Right, even an experienced team could stumble upon many problems with such an ambitious project…
  

  MP: Another blow was dealt when the development team started loosing its founding fathers, people who built this project from ground level. It’s really bad news when a project is being abandoned by the very same people who imagined it, wrote it, toyed with every little detail. They are being replaced by others who may be as well talented and imaginative as their predecessors – I don’t want to judge anyone – but this kind of thing just keeps spawning delays, people start crossing the deadlines, rewriting the scenario, changing gameplay and so on.

• PF: And how doeas it look from today’s perspective? Is Afterfall still breathing?
  

  MP: Currently, and I’m basing this on the official press releases, it seems that the developer is preparing a survival horror named „Afterfall: Insanity”, previously titled „Rascal”, which will be set in Afterfall’s universe – it’s going to be a smaller, less complex game with simper mechanics, that is supposed to pave the way, prepare the beachhead, a place on the market. On one hand, that’s a good idea – the producer is drawing conclusions from the whole ordeal and, instead of chasing another utopian dream, which is supposed to shine brighter than the sun, is focusing on a game that’s easier to produce and finish. On the other hand, this „Insanity” still remains that company’s first gamedesign project, so the same dangers that crippled the original Afterfall project should be taken into account. That’s why I think a lot of time will pass before we’ll be able to play a game with „Afterfall” in the title – though I’m not a clairvoyant, of course. For my part, I wasn’t fully satisfied with my cooperation with Nicolas Games and I’m really sorry that this project – which I dedicated myself to for a long time, from march 2006 to virtually the end of 2009 – has bad luck and is surrounded with such misfortune.

• PF: Well, we can only hope that it ends well for the players. You were the music composer and sound designer behind Duke Nukem Trilogy: Critical Mass developed by Frontline Studios for the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP. How different is music composition for handheld consoles?
  

  MP: You must take the console’s capabilities and limitations into the account. For example, when composing something for the Nintendo DS, you’re always struggling with not enough space on the cartridge and you must rely on your wits to make the music, make it sound good and preserve as much space as possible in the same time. It’s a bit like trying to mix water with fire… Usually, it all comes down to knowing your limitations and trying to push the boundaries as far as possible. Having said that, DS enables you to do some things that are a lot harder to do on other hardware (doesn’t matter whether handhelds or stationary consoles). For example: you can play with tempo and tone range of your music on runtime, which gives you an easy way to organize music in such a way, that it dynamically responds to what happens on the screen.

• PF: Any favorite Nintendo DS games? Of course, music-wise?
  

  MP: There are two titles on the Nintendo DS that made a serious impression on me: New Super Mario Bros, which managed to stuff lots and lots of great music and – perhaps even greater – sound on a small cartridge, and Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings, which has a beautiful soundtrack, brilliant, if you consider the DS’s capabilities. I don’t want to compare my own compositions to these two examples, it’s just not cool to measure yourself to the classics, but I think that the soundtrack from Duke Nukem Trilogy: Criticall Mass – both for the PSP and the DS - sounds pretty damn well and the players really enjoy it.

• PF: Was Duke Nukem 3D’s original score a major inspiration for you when working on that title?
  

  MP: Of course. Where would Duke be without his characteristic „Duke Theme”, well known by all the impassioned players everywhere! It would be just as bad as if they tried to strip him of his „I’ve got balls of steel” and other fan favorite one-liners – it wouldn’t be the same! Both the soundtrack and myself had a guardian angel, Terry Nagy, who gave out some really cool ideas on how to approach the soundtrack for the new Duke game… Ideas that, as I like to think, I managed to expand and merge with my own ones. We both had a similar point of view on how the music for this entry in the series should sound – it was supposed to be dynamic, full of energy, with a solid rock drive, fortified with a symphonic foundation. Thanks to that, the music remained „dukey”, showing off – when needed – with its own characteristics. Its massive in one places, progressive in others, sometimes heavier, sometimes calmer.

• PF: Talking about classic games, classic soundtracks, classic themes… What are your top three game scores? And who’s your favorite game composer?
  

  MP: I remember and I always will remember the soundtrack from the Baldur’s Gate series – it was my first own game soundtrack and the first game that I really delved into, I have fond memories for it. As for the composers… I really don’t like the stiff border between those composing for games, those composing for movies, those composing for something else… All these art forms resemble a melting pot nowadays – Hans Zimmer had a hand in the Modern Warfare 2 soundtrack, Harry Gregson-Williams has been composing for both movies and games for some time, the same goes for Michael Giacchino, who has honored with an oscar this year… There are a lot of composers who really have fun with creating music tracks for games, but they don’t want to limit themselves to a single art form – and I’m one of those people. Anyway, getting back to your question… I really like what Jesper Kyd did in both Assassin’s Creed and its sequel. It’s a very dextrous combination of „localized” music, created with the geographical location and the time period in mind – Jerusalem and the Crusades in the first game, the Italian Renaissance in the other – with modern contemporary music. It really sounds well together.

• PF: As a follow-up, do you feel game music receives the attention and credit that it deserves?
  

  MP: Hard to say – depends how you look at it. I can say one thing for sure: the more we talk about it, the better.

• PF: By the way, I don’t know if you’re a Lostie, as I am, but I swear to God that I’ve heard a short piece of Michael Giacchino’s „U-boat” theme from Medal of Honor playing in the background during one of Lost’s episodes, when Sawyer, one of the characters, gets on a submarine.
  

  MP: I’m not a fan of the series, but your observation may be right – this can be an effect of how the game and movie businesses look in the USA right now. It’s not uncommon to hire a composer for a specific project, because the producer really wants to have a soundtrack very similar to that one, from Project XYZ, written by Mr ZXY. A known example for this from the movie industry is Thomas Newman, who – after the great success of his score for American Beauty – admitted in a few interviews that he is often asked to compose something similar to what he did in American Beauty. I’m guessing that in the gaming world Jeremy Soule could have had a similar situation, as his Morrowind and Oblivion soundtracks are not only coherent, but similar as well, but that’s just my speculations.

• PF: Or it could be a result that Oblivion is really Morrowind’s successor, another entry in the Elder Scrolls series. Speaking of Bethesda… You have vast experience in gamedesign music, working alongside such companies as Bethesda Softworks, Nicolas Games, Frontline Studios, Apogee Software and CD Projekt. What advice could you give to younger music-lovers, composer-wannabees, people who have dream  of becoming game composers one day?
  

  MP: Don’t ignore music theory – in these times anyone can create mediocre music, all you need is a computer, some software and a set of loops. If you want, you can go along that path and then try to do something with the effect you achieve. But it usually turns out in the end that it wasn’t enough, all of this comes into the daylight and you have to go the extra mile to return to the drawing board, and that’s a lot tougher. In my opinion the market sooner or later verifies everyone and it usually turns out whether or not you know what to do and whether or not you’re a good composer. And this is an important difference – everyone can string together boorish melodies, but not everyone knows how to compose decent, professional and – first and foremost – good sounding music. It’s a set of skills you have to learn, as is programming, graphics, or any other specialistic domain of science or art.

• PF: Has there ever been a game experience for you that was ruined because of its music?
  

  MP: Can’t really remember such an instance – maybe I’m not playing enough games nowadays… I remember such problems with promotional game trailers, in which the background music wasn’t even a slightest bit coherent with what was happening on screen.

• PF: Some composers say that they can’t compose music for anything if they don’t see that project just in front of them. Is royalty-free music composition a lot harder than creating soundtracks for specific games?
  

  MP: A matter of opinion, really… I could say its a lot easier, as you don’t have any scenario restrictions, you don’t have to comply with a project manager’s vision – you can do what you like, as long as you don’t go outside of the theme and style you impose on yourself. I guess it’s a pretty individual thing.

• PF: Where did you get your inspirations from, when composing such brilliant and epic music, as in the „Conquer the Universe” Music Pack, currently available in our royalty-free store? 
  

  MP: When I was preparing to work on that pack I knew that it would have to be as universal as possible, all-around, so that it could be used in different projects and situations. The Science-Fiction theme can be interpreted in many ways and I wanted my music to be appliable to diverse projects and still go well with what’s happening on the screen, be it a computer’s screen or a console’s TV. That’s why my pack echoes the Space Opera setting, you can find many modern, dirty synthetic tones, or even heavy rocking electric guitars, which – in my opinion – really work well with the theme.

• PF: Any specific inspirations?
  

  MP: I had many movies and other works in my mind during the creation process: from the classics, like „Buck Rodgers in the 25th Century” and the „Star Wars” series, to – for example – „Battlestar Galactica” and the „Matrix” trilogy, which was full of great „cosmic” tracks. It’s a difficult question, really, it’s difficult to give a straightforward answer, since music is a complicated medium, not easily definable, and everyone can find and appreciate different things in the same soundtrack – it’s reception is pretty much dependent on your previous musical experiences, from what you like, what you don’t like, and so on.

• PF: Do you already have any plans for your next multimedia packs?
  

  MP: I’ve got some, but I don’t want to show down yet.

• PF: Thanks for the interview! Any shout outs, wise quotes or shameless self promotion you want to add at the end?
  

  MP: A bit of self promotion can’t hurt. I encourage you all to visit my website, at MarcinPrzybylowicz.com, where you can listen to some of my music compositions. You can also visit my profile at Vimeo. as for the catchy quote to close things up… Nobody expects the Spanish inquistion!

• PF: Neither do they expect the prancing panzers! Anyways, thanks for the interview, and we really hope to see more of your music at our store soon! See you!

 
Marcin Przybylowicz is a Panzer Flakes collaborator, he created a set of different multimedia packs available at our Store, with the Music PackConquer the Universe, and Sound Packs Interface Sounds Vol 1 and Household & Office Essentials amongst others.