Fallout 4 - Building the Acoustic World

Vice interviews Inon Zur on creating the acoustic world of Fallout 4, as well as his technique and work on earlier titles like Dragon's Dogma.

Thanks, Couch.

Fallout 4 features the kind of compelling landscape that could just as accurately be called a wonderland as it could a wasteland. It's a post-nuclear environment crawling with monsters and home to an arsenal of potential adventures; but the game's story wouldn't be nearly as compelling without its accompanying soundscape.

In addition to the delightfully sinister soundtrack of the in-game radio – check out "Atom Bomb Baby" for a flavour – Fallout 4 features a score that shifts with the player's actions, transforming the act of virtual exploration into an all-encompassing experience.

To find out how this music came to be, I spoke to the game's composer, the California-based Inon Zur, who's previously worked on titles including Crysis and Dragon's Dogma, as well as prior Fallouts. We discuss his source of inspiration, "alternate reality" instrumental techniques and the challenge of writing cinematic music only indirectly linked with on-screen action.

VICE: How do you begin the process of creating the score for a game like Fallout 4?
Inon Zur: I started by looking for the thematic material that would be the basis of the soundscape. My job is to build an organic, acoustic world. The Fallout story is reminiscent of the past, but it's also a world that has evolved and developed in ways that are really hard to imagine. So, the music needs to help sort of by describing what's going on there. At the same time, it has to be organic. It has to grow from the background noises and enhance them as well.

...

There are certainly similarities to Fallout 3 in terms of how the game feels and sounds. How tied in are you with branding, and connecting the two stories?
The situation is not the same, but there are a lot of connecting lines between Fallout 3 and Fallout 4. Basically, where we're coming from and where we're going are very different things in each game, but the reality is that we're still struggling though the huge aftermath of a global holocaust. That's the connection, so even though it's a different hero, he or she is struggling with familiar problems in different ways. The music has to make some kind of connection, not only because of the brand, but also because of the situation in the game and the way it is evolving. Fallout 3's score was colder, more mechanical, and it enhanced more of the raw sort of elements. Fallout 4 is cultivating more of a human aspect. It's got much warmer sounds, more humane sounds, more intimate sounds. So, in some ways, it is a totally different approach.

More information.