Brave Wave: bridging the gap between Japan's video game music composers and the world

Music has always been an integral part of video games. Without music, the games we have played and loved would not have been nearly as great or memorable. Music is what makes an action scene more tense, a sad scene more heart breaking, and a horror scene more terrifying.

Some famous video game music composers now even have their own fan bases. Just look at names like Nobuo Uematsu, Yasunori Mitsuda, Miki Higashino, and Yoko Shimomura. Fans clamor to hear more from these composers, be it in the form of video game soundtracks, original works, or even remixes.

(See: Watch Super Mario Brothers music being played on an ancient Chinese instrument)

One fan, however, had a bigger desire than just more video game soundtracks from his favorite composers.

Alexander Aniel, CEO and the business-half of Brave Wave, is an American-Filipino who has been living in Japan for several years. At our interview, conducted during Aniel’s trip to Jakarta to speak with game industry professionals there, he said that he had first met his Kuwaiti partner and creative-half Mohammad Taher online.

Alexander Aniel (left) with Touchten CEO Anton Soeharyo (right).

At that time, Taher, a video game music enthusiast, was working alone on an endeavor called Koopa Soundworks. He contacted Aniel, who worked in the localization division of a Japanese game company, to ask for his help in translating emails in Japanese. The translations increased to a point where Aniel thought that his service could become a great business with huge potential.

Aniel then asked Taher if he wanted to take these works to a more professional level. Taher agreed, their creative efforts giving birth to a video game music label based in Japan called Brave Wave Productions.

(See: The top 10 best video game themes of all time)

Brave Wave works to facilitate the relationship between Japanese composers and game developers from outside Japan. According to Aniel, there are a lot of non-Japanese developers who are interested in working with Japanese composers, but who often find the language barrier an immovable obstacle.

To date, Brave Wave’s most notable contribution to bridging this gap is when they helped composer Manami Matsumae to contribute music to a Kickstarter game called Heart Forth, Alicia. Hopefully we can see more of such collaborations in the future, with Brave Wave actively leading the way.

Brave Wave Productions also produces its own music albums, composing of video game music.