Akumajo Dracula Gallery of Labyrinth OST :: Liner Notes Translated by PQTN

	Album Title:	Akumajo Dracula Gallery of Labyrinth Original Soundtrack
	Record Label:	Konami Style
	Catalog No.:	LC-1541/2
	Release Date:	March 23, 2007
	Purchase:	Buy at CDJapan

Commentary

Koji Igarashi - Producer

I'm IGA, the producer. Normally it is more difficult to release a soundtrack for a handheld console, but we made it. This is a release for a single soundtrack. Thanks for the effort of all those involved. This time, we finally made the cherished collaboration of Michiru Yamane and Yuzo Koshiro an actuality. The plan came for a collaboration came about in a drinking session with Yamane in the United States about two years ago. We got in contact with Koshiro in time. Miyazawa, thank you. This is the 20th anniversary work of Castlevania. Both the soundtrack and game are wonderful creations. I'd love you to devour them right to the bone. Enjoy them for yourself.

Satoshi Kushibushi - Director

Plenty of new tracks are created with the conception of each new Castlevania game. For the convenience of the developers, there were many times when we could only tell composers about the image of the levels in the meetings, yet asked them to go ahead and compose tracks before we could offer the actual game screens. The design staff worked by listening to the delivered tracks and imagining the visuals. Without their music, it would have taken longer to develop the game. I take this opportunity to sincerely thank them. Thanks for so many wonderful pieces.

Michiru Yamane - Composer

In 2006, we reach the 20th anniversary of the Castlevania series and this year the series turns 21. I'm really happy that I could celebrate this by participating in Akumajo Dracula: Gallery of Labyrinth — a highly acclaimed work among all games. My first involvement of the Castlevania series was the Genesis version of Vampire Killer. I was solely responsible for everything except for sound programming, such as composition, sound effects, conversion, the editing of console samples, etc. As a result, I became so tired and fatigued that, after the end of the development, I couldn't eat anything...

How many years have passed since them... I encountered with IGA, who seems to have been born to be the producer of Castlevania, as well as all the designers, who draw illustrations that are always the source of my music, and all the programmers, who are core Castlevania gamers that also tell me useful pieces of advice from the players' perspectives. Supported and encouraged by them, I'm deeply moved that today I can deliver yet another Castlevania score in CD form.

This time we have Yuzo Koshiro as a guest composer — a gentle and lovely creator who has a connection with us and a great knowledge about the series. I remember when he said "handle the controller and then the music". Of course, all of his pre-converted sound is included here. Enjoy!

Tetsushi Takahashi - Sound Director

As is the honored trait of Castlevania team, we don't compromise, even on soundtracks, at all. What do long-time fans of the series want? Can we satisfy the new players? Does the music fit the game? What is the "Castlevania" sound? We've thought over these questions desperately and argued about them into midnight. Anyway, as this production had a miraculous collaboration of two big name composers — Yuzo Koshiro and Michiru Yamane — who spent much time and enthusiasm on the project, we got many tracks beyond the scale of a normal handheld game. I hope more and more people listen to this awesome work.

Norikazu Miura - Music Converter

My responsibility was the conversion of the music into sequenced material. In short, my mission was to play the music composed by Yuzo Koshiro and Michiru Yamane on to the DS — in a fascinating manner without damaging the original values — and then set the sample library and create the MIDI data. Modern video game soundtracks for main consoles are dominated by disc streaming playback, but we also have 'internally sequenced' music in such an era. Neat. (Nintendo DS has sequencing as its main function, though). Sequenced soundtracks of Konami traditionally feature a commitment to details. The development team, as well as the producer IGA, had a big passion (or rather, love) for the soundtrack. You know, I was fully aware of this everyday and it was a big pressure.

Though this has already been noticed by those playing the game, it's notable that the music of this installment has the sound design of Konami game sound of the 80s' glory days. The is due to the specifications of the Nintendo DS (the limited usable channels) and the approach to sequencing music. This might be the quintessence of the Konami Sound (laugh). By the way, this soundtrack is gorgeous. Since it includes pre-converted music from Michiru Yamane and Yuzo Koshiro, it's a very reasonable album for even those who did not play the game.

Yuzo Koshiro - Composer

Castlevania music is one of my important roots and I have been influenced by it a great amount until now. Since I absolutely adored Konami's outstanding musicality and technology from the games of NES, MSX, and Arcades above all others, the Castlevania series of the era impressed me a lot. As such, this game allowed me to return to my origins. I faced the pressure of the tradition and history of Castlevania, but at the same time, I enjoyed writing music as a Castlevania fan. During the development, I endlessly played Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, which was the latest installment at that time, and was moderately influenced by the modern Castlevania sound represented by Yamane. The game was also stunningly fun — I completed all gears and archived the record of 1:48 on the boss rush. I realized the Castlevania series is as immortal as vampires are.