Rez Team Recalls the Techno That Almost Made the Cut
The session put the licensing work behind Rez on the record, naming the techno acts Hiroishi approached and confirming that an Underworld stage built around the track sharing the game's name existed at some point in production.
Reporting from 1 source: 4Gamer.net.
A 25th anniversary talk session for Rez was held on the first day of The Tenth Mosaic, a game culture event at the Institut Francais in Tokyo's Shinjuku ward on September 22 and 23. Tetsuya Mizuguchi described the project's origin in a 1997 Zurich Street Parade visit, and Jun Kobayashi, music producer Masakazu Hiroishi, and Ken Ishii joined the discussion of the game's development.
The panel did not stay on the finished game. Masakazu Hiroishi, who handled music production, joined after leaving Sony Music, where he had worked on releasing overseas techno and label material in Japan, and Rez became his first job after going independent. Through his contacts the team negotiated with acts including Underworld, Fatboy Slim, Aphex Twin, and The Future Sound of London. For Underworld specifically, a stage using the track "Rez" was actually built. The aim was never to license well-known songs for a soundtrack: because the music is the game experience, who made it and how it was made shaped the design.
- Underworld: a stage using the track "Rez" was actually produced
- Fatboy Slim
- Aphex Twin
- The Future Sound of London
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.