I’m liking Silicon Era more and more. They have just put up an excellent interview with Ippo Yamada (IPPO) of Inti Creates, developer of MegaMan 9. He discusses the inspirations and challenges of making the soundtrack for a new game sound like it should be over 15 years old.

Siliconera: There were aspects of even the late NES titles that were not allowed in Mega Man 9. In terms of gameplay, there is no sliding and no charging of the mega buster. What kind of restrictions were enforced on the soundtrack?

Ippo Yamada: Taking away sliding and charging was a way of returning to the framework of Mega Man 2. The game’s sound effects reflect the same approach. The sound of charging the mega buster blocks out other square waves, so by eliminating charging from the game we could introduce a lot of other sound effects that would have been obscured, such as the enemy laser shots. This one choice opened the way for a lot of freedom in composing the music, which would have been curtailed by charge-related restrictions.

Check out the rest of the interview, and play this game if you haven’t already!