Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1546054
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S 89 you have to strap in and go where it takes you. Alex Previty MPSE (Mix Supervisor): As a craftsperson, you can get locked in to honing the same style you've always had when working on things. The style of this game is so very different in a lot of ways—gameplay, the tone of the game, and the storytelling like Justin mentioned. You have to reapproach everything and rethink how you create. That sort of work is a fresh jolt of energy. It's a very different experience. Not many people get to work on something so fresh and fun. It's very inspiring, for sure. Derrick Espino MPSE (Cinematic Sound Design Lead): For me, the early games were some of the most influential video game experiences. So I was super excited, because I didn't know what to expect so much narratively, but I knew what to expect design-wise, which was a lot of surprises and a lot of opportunities to use sound creatively. As soon as I saw Dollman and understood that he was a stop-motion puppet existing in a 3D game world, but he was at a different frame rate, I knew we had license to do pretty much anything we wanted. I was so excited. Andrew Buresh (Score Producer): I was lucky enough to work on the first DEATH STRANDING. Coming into that, I had the same feeling of being enamored with some of the team's previous work— those were the games I had played when I was growing up. It was always a dream of mine to get to work with that team. DEATH STRANDING stands alone amongst a broad catalog of many other games that have come out in recent years. They always have these very unique ideas that they're putting out, and any of the stories they're telling in these games, they're being told in a way that hasn't been done before, and you're just seeing all these creative ideas and approaches play out. They're PROJECT PARTICIPANTS: JOANNA FANG MPSE Senior Foley Artist JUSTIN SCOTT WILSON MPSE Dialogue Supervisor ALEX PREVITY MPSE Mix Supervisor DERRICK ESPINO Cinematic Sound Design Lead ANDREW BURESH Score Producer always pushing the envelope for what can be done and shown in games. It was exciting to be a part of that. EM: Andrew, what challenges came with this project that differed from the first DEATH STRANDING? AB: On the first DEATH STRANDING, Ludvig Forssell was the composer, but he was also the in-house audio director at KJP. So he was in a very unique position on that project. He was also the main creative point of contact for the SIE music team. Most of our conversations went directly through Ludvig. In the interim between the first title and this new game, Ludvig chose to focus on music composition and came back for DEATH STRANDING 2: ON THE BEACH solely as the composer on the project. That gave us a bit of a challenge at the start, to forge new relationships with a team of audio people we hadn't necessarily worked with directly on the first title. We had to rebuild this creative dialogue we were going to have about the game. Obviously it was all successful in the end—we had a great time making the game with the team, and I think the results speak for themselves. AP: I had an additional sound design credit on the first DEATH STRANDING, but I barely did anything on it other than a handful of sounds at the end of development. However, a lot of my colleagues did work on the first game, and many of them returned to work on the sequel as well. So we did have a common thread, which was very helpful, being able to collaborate with them on that. JF: A lot of those teammates were based in San Diego. During Foley production, a lot of these very specific sounds were reprised in DEATH STRANDING 2: ON THE BEACH. It was amazing to walk out of the Foley stage, knock on a