A huge critical and public success, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom unleashes passions. And arouses the interest of researchers! A graduate in musicology from the University of Poitiers, Antoine Morisset studies the music of this flagship series of video games.
Ten million copies sold in just three days. This is the -historic- launch of the new Zelda game, released on May 12 on Nintendo Switch. Called Tears of the Kingdom, this new episode received a very good critical reception. Some praise its vast open world, others its mechanics which celebrate the creativity of the player… And Antoine Morisset, his music. “The composition work is once again very successful, I have already found things in it that have marked me deeply. »
A graduate in musicology from the University of Poitiers, the researcher has made video game music his subject of study. On the way it illustrates the narration, its representations, its growing notoriety (albums, concerts)… What is called “ludomusicology”. “Over the past ten years, there have been many English-language publications on the subject, but very few in France, explains Antoine Morisset, fan of Zelda. I thought it was an interesting part to discover. And this despite the reservations objected by some academics during his master’s degree.
A pioneer license
The researcher notably devoted a memoir to the music of Zelda games, from the first released on the NES (1986) to Majora’s Mask, on Nintendo 64 (2000). “On The Legend of Zelda Nintendo was the first studio to hire a composer (Koji Kondo) exclusively dedicated to composing music for the game.” An initiative that was quickly emulated. The following episodes brought their share of innovations, which continue to inspire the video game industry. “Ocarina of Time (1998) is the first game where you can create melodies on the -virtual- flute, with a whole logic of filiation of the music… For researchers, it’s a real gold mine! In Spirit Tracks, on Nintendo DS (2009), this can be done by blowing on the console’s built-in microphone. In recent iterations, the music is more discreet. Against the current of current production. “This could have been blamed on Breath of the Wild (2017), but when you look into it, you discover a work of goldsmithery from the composers. »
Teaching this year at the Parisian school Isart Digital, which trains future talents in video games and animation, Antoine Morisset assures us: “Each Zelda is representative of its time. And that of “chiptune” music (created by the audio chip of the consoles) should not be neglected. “I make students aware of the fact that technological limitations and their primitive sounds do not restrict creation. » Himself a composer in parallel with his research, Antoine Morisset would welcome « with great pleasure » the opportunity to sign the original soundtrack of a game. He would thus apply the fruit of his research. “Like Ubisoft, which uses historians and geographers for its games, more and more studios are looking for academics to make their creations more meaningful. »
#Zelda #legendary #score
