JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Original Soundtrack (ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 オリジナル・サウンドトラック, JoJo no Kimyō na Bōken Orijinaru Saundotorakku) is the original soundtrack for the arcade game JoJo's Venture, and by extension itsrevisions. It was composed by Yuko Takehara and Setsuo Yamamoto.
This is Takehara, the one in charge of the BGM. This time, although I created a theme for each character, it was difficult because there were two aspects to each of them: the character's image and the Stand's image. That said, I'd like to comment on each song (and maybe talk about the challenges?).
Jotaro Kujo's Theme:
My image of Jotaro is that he's strong, cool, and blunt, but very kind. I half-wish I had a boyfriend like Jotaro... Putting that aside, Jotaro and Star Platinum have similar images, so they were easy to work with. Since he's the main character, I wanted the song to be easy to remember, and to have cool and strong image... but I also wanted to express Jotaro's kindness, so I changed keys in the latter half to a major key.
Noriaki Kakyoin's Theme:
Kakyoin was the one I struggled with to the very end for this project. Both the character and the Stand are Jotaro's polar opposites, so I really worried about how I'd bring out his subtlety. The project manager gave me a hint to "Start with only the piano..." and I expanded on that image from there. How did I do?
Muhammad Avdol's Theme:
When making this song, I had a hard time deciding whether to prioritize Avdol's adult, static image or the dynamic image of Magician's Red's flames. I think, somehow, I managed to find a good mix between the two.
Jean Pierre Polnareff's Theme:
This was the first song I worked on. The project manager requested that I make it sound "knight-like." I pondered that for a while, but one day I suddenly remembered The Three Musketeers, and the image quickly solidified in my mind. So I inserted phrases that evoked a knightly image in the beginning and chorus, and I added the sound of a sword stab when the drums come in at the beginning.
Joseph Joestar's Theme:
This song was difficult, too! Naturally, Hermit Purple didn't give me much of an image to work with, so I made it with the cheerful and shrewd Joseph's image in mind.
Iggy's Theme:
This song was composed at around the same time as Polnareff's theme. It came together relatively smoothly. I think it really captures Iggy's cuteness and feigned ignorance.
Alessi's Theme:
Alessi is sadistic, but I think he's also pretty playful. I wanted to express both sides of him, and this song was the result.
Chaka's Theme:
I had trouble with this song, too. Chaka's uses a sword stand, and he's possessed by the god Anubis and turned into his user... Because of that, I wanted to make sure it didn't sound too human, and after a lot of trial and error, I ended up with Arabian-style techno.
Devo the Cursed's Theme:
This is another song I made early on. I wanted to express both the feeling of the doll Stand constantly moving around and the... unpleasantness of Devo's joy at having his face sliced up, so I took a lot of liberties. I made a 5-6 rhythm pattern and a 2-bar bassline, and then I added whatever melodies came to me on top of that.
Midler's Theme:
She's got a really sexy outfit, so at first I thought I'd form the song around the image of a "femme fatale." But once it was finished, it ended up sounding more like a "little devil" than a "femme fatale." Hmm...?!
N'Doul's Theme:
This one was easy to make because he matched his Stand's image in my mind. I wrote it with the singular image of water.
Death Thirteen's Theme:
I didn't take this one too seriously, and I had a lot of fun making it. For some reason, I had the image of a rundown circus from the early Showa era (even though it's set in Arabia?). But it does give off the atmosphere of a mysterious dream world, right? Right?
Vanilla Ice's Theme:
I made this song with the images of both the character and his attack method in mind. By the way, I can hardly beat Vanilla Ice myself... (sobs).
DIO's Theme 1:
The request was to make it sound like music from a film, so at first, I tried to bring out DIO's mysterious and creepy side. I also wanted to create an Egyptian atmosphere, but did I pull it off?
DIO's Theme 2:
After that, I tried to create a sense of tension befitting the final match. I was thinking the whole time, "If I can just make this one song..." Did it feel like a final match to me, too?!
For this project, since the second half of the story is set in Arabia and Egypt, I used a lot of Arabic scales in the music. It's been a while since I last worked something with this kind of ethnic feel, so it was a lot of fun. I also enjoyed worrying about how to preserve the original work's image while making it.
I'm Kitamura (MOE.T), and I did the voice editing and sound effects. When you're really engrossed while watching a movie or playing a game, you hardly even notice the voices or sound effects. If they get too distracting, the audience or player won't be able to concentrate. Is it better for the sound to be inoffensive if it helps them focus?
But whenever kids play anime heroes, they tend to imitate their unique lines and sound effects. Even when they're that focused, they still hear those distinct lines and sounds. Truly great sound design is when sounds that sound natural have distinct characteristics at key moments.
Why not take another look at the movies and games you've been engrossed in from the perspective of a sound man?
I'm Endo Masayuki, and I worked on the sound effects.
What I wanted to be careful about was adding cool sounds that weren't in the manga without destroying the world of the original JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. If people playing the game happen to think that using a certain technique feels good or stylish, that's probably the result of both the images and sound combined. While working on the game, I thought that if I could make that phenomenon happen with my own sound, I would be creating something really satisfying, and the game ended up being really convincing and fun to play.
If someone were to hear a sound behind them when walking down the street and think to themselves, "Oh! That's so JoJo!", I would be a very happy man... But that's really unlikely, isn't it? Well, anyway, I'd like to continue making sounds that'll leave an impression on a lot of people.
Hello, I'm OBT, the planning director. I've been a fan of JoJo ever since I was in school, so I never thought I'd be involved in it professionally in the future. (You never know what life has in store.) That's precisely why I had to put so much effort into it, and I think I was able to create something great.
So I was wondering whether to write about the game or the sound on this page, but for now I'll just talk about my bio... (Kidding!)
When I was thinking about JoJo's sound, I had the following four goals in mind:
1. JoJo-like onomatopoeia (like "Dogyaaan!")
2. Sound effects (like the punching sounds)
3. JoJo-like theme music
4. Voice actors
I had a vague image of each of them.
I was able to decide on goal number four, the voice actors, after consulting with a knowledgeable staff member. But as for the others, even though I said I wanted them to be "JoJo-like," when I was asked, "Like what, exactly?" I could only go, "Hmm..." We proceeded by trial and error, and it was thanks to the sound team's incredible efforts that we were able to get everything finished so nicely.
Even Mr. Araki praised our work on goal number two, the sound effects. "The sounds when you hit something are really refreshing! The sounds are really good!!"[a] I wish I could've told the staff what Araki said in person.
The sound system in JoJo is also quite elaborate compared to other fighting games: there are separate sounds for a user hitting a user, a user hitting a Stand, a Stand hitting a user, and a Stand hitting a Stand. In some cases, the music even changes from the second round onward. Please check it out in an arcade near you!
Next, let's talk about the character voices. There were so many lines that, at times, even we thought we were being too greedy. We tried to add so many that we kept running out of space, and then we'd say, "Oh well, let's just make more!" We mostly just went with the flow from the middle of development right through to the end.
With the time to start recording with the voice actors coming up, I was thinking about what voice lines to use, so I spent all day reading the manga. I had a lot of fun (or perhaps trouble?) worrying to myself, "Aside from the obvious things like 'ora-ora,' what else should I get them to say?" During the recording session, the sound engineer was also okay with ad-lib requests like, "How about this line?" and we recorded with an emphasis on the mood.
Between you and me, at one point, there was a terrible plot to secretly use my voice for Iggy's lines. In any case, I shut that one down easily... (They seemed serious about it, though!) The game system was also very complex, so we had a lot of problems like, "Is the 'ora-ora' Jotaro's voice, or the Stand's?" But thanks to the work everyone put in, Jotaro can taunt and say "gimme a break" while the Stand is going "ora-ora." Remember to thank the programmers! (Oh, I'm flattering everyone...)
The final challenge was Joseph's "Your next line is..." taunt. To put it simply, it was impossible. We thought, "We'd need a line for absolutely everyone!" so we ended up making the taunt a normal line in the end... But one day! I will make! My dream! Come true! With that character!![b]
Satoru Ishii (Sony Music Communications), Yoshiaki Hosoda (Sony Music Communications)
A&R
Hidenori Shinohara (CAPCOM)
Promoter
Yuka Fujiwara (CAPCOM)
Special Thanks
JoJo's Venture Research And Development Staff, All Capcom Staff, Naoko Ishizaka (CAPCOM)
Gallery
Front
Inside
Back
Booklet
Booklet Pages 1&2
Booklet Pages 3&4
Booklet Pages 5&6
Booklet Pages 7&8
Booklet Pages 9&10
Full Audio
Trivia
Tracks 8 and 28 would later be remixed on the GioGio's Bizarre Adventure OST as tracks 30 and 31, playing in-game during Chapter 11-1 and in some cutscenes respectively.
Track 52 is an audio drama. While unused in the arcade version, this track would later be used as background music in the Gallery Mode within the game's PlayStation port.