As more and more Gen-Xers (birthdates somewhere between 1969 and 1981) come of age, I have come across more colleague opera singers who harbor an interest in videogames.
As a teenager in Ecuador, having the ardent wish to become an opera singer immediately set me aside as one of the ‘weird ones’ – the kind of extremely diverse (and at times unsettling) subcultures you find in American high schools nowadays is a phenomenon you don’t visibly find back in Ecuador- in my particular high school there were no Goths, ‘Artsy’ kids, and since it was an all-male high school cheerleaders were definitely out of the question (the notion of male cheerleaders may still be something that will have to contend with the typical Latin American Machismo.) You essentially had three sub-divisions: The Sporty/Cool Kids (out of which you had a good number of Bullies), The ‘Smart’ or Intellectual kids, and the Weird ones.
My voracious love for reading might have placed me in the second category, but my near-terminal boredom with almost all of my subjects (except Philosophy and Literature) didn’t merit high enough grades to seriously classify me as such.
Being an aspirant musician meant that you didn’t have many (or any) peers in school: during ‘my time’ no school had a decent music program (that’s why you went to private Conservatories for a musical education and you avoided the State Conservatory, known crib of flagrant corruption and mediocre musicians, like the plague) and if any of my peers were interested in musical performance, it was often the kind of ‘Nueva Trova’ whiny-singing-whilst-strumming-the-guitar politicized (often socialist in tone) folk-progressive song trend that suffered (or inflicted) a rebirth in Latin America during the 90s.
I spent most of my recess time (we got two, one short one and a long one) either reading or listening to my Discman. I didn’t have much interest in the current bands at the time -my last favorite band had been Roxette during the last part of the 80s and they weren’t exactly ‘in’ by the 90s.
By this point I had also rediscovered and fallen in love with ABBA (in, I guess, a precocious premonition of the soon-to-come ABBAmania around the world which missed Ecuador completely), which were even less ‘in’ than Roxette. Aside from those, my playlist consisted exclusively of either classical music and opera, Nana Mouskouri (seriously un-cool for any teenager at the time, since Lisa Loeb wouldn’t make the parted-down-the-middle hairdo or the librarian glasses cool until the end of the 90s) or the French singers like Mireille Mathieu, Dalida and Edith Piaf (Edith Piaf, while definitely living and dying like a rock star, did not quite have the Gene Simmons image with my generation.) Definitely one of the ‘Weird’ kids: I liked (gasp) reading books, listened to strange sounds and wasn’t terribly interested in parties or surfing.
The other part of the ‘weirdness’ was that, unlike most of my peers, I didn’t have a console gaming system—no NES, SNES, SEGA Genesis, Gameboy or GameGear (how many of you still rememberthat little failed experiment?), I was definitely an early PC boy (making my start with a decrepit Atari 1040 ST.) I wasn’t too into the arcade gaming that seemed to comprise most of the console experience at the time, preferring instead the complex world of role-playing games (I was desperate to do some real role-playing games myself, being an avid lover of tabletop games, but the Dungeons and Dragons/White Wolf role-playing craze was yet another thing that never made its way to Ecuador during my childhood, so computer games were the next best thing) and my favorite among them were the Richard Garriott masterpieces: The Ultima series, specially Ultima VI, with its complex moral problems and intricate world detail.
I started hanging out, then, with the gamers at school. I knew two others who had the same interest in computer games, but eventually ended up hanging out with only one of them: Juan Francisco. Through him I got a gradual introduction to the world of console gaming and found out some very interesting things- I fell in love with quite a few games, but I also came across a unique experience, and a tremendously bizarre one, when two spheres of my interests that were completely unrelated collided: Opera and Video Games! Since it happened during the course of a role-playing game (or a subset of them known as JRPGs- Japanese Role Playing Games, which are console-driven and different from the PC genre) for the few minutes that the scene lasted, I realized, I was actually playing at being something I wanted to be. And most importantly of all: my career choice wasn’t being ridiculed!
Opera singers are often the target of jokes--- you’ve seen them all: the fat tenor stereotype and the temperamental diva stereotype seen in movies, Adam Sandler (the subpar comedian par excellence) and his OperaMan, and so on and so forth. The butt of the joke is always the assumption that nobody likes opera and everybody hates what opera voices sound like. Other singers know precisely what I mean, and truthfully it has always irked me that very few times my chosen profession has ever been portrayed by Hollywood or the TV industry with the passion and power that it actually possesses.
So who knew videogames would do what neither Hollywood nor TVLand could? What follows is a brief list of games that have used opera not as a detrimental caricature but as significant parts of their storyline or poignant plot—points. If at times the musical portrayals fall flat of actual thrilling opera, they can be forgiven. We’ll begin our list with that one JRPG I mentioned earlier, and which is considered by many to be one of the best games of all time…
I. FINAL FANTASY 6 (1994) [Super nintendo]
When we talk about the Final Fantasy series, we’re usually talking about one of the royal dynasties of the world of videogames. The brainchild of Hironobu Sakaguchi and Squaresoft , the first installment of the series premiered in Japan on December 18, 1987. Back then, the sinking Squaresoft’s initial games were not entirely successful. Sakaguchi was just about fed up with failure and was planning to quit the video game industry altogether (recently shaken by the infamous repercussions caused by the E-T game, but that’s another story…) and had decided, of all things, that he would become a fisherman. Wanting to at least go out with a bang as opposed to closing shop like he originally wanted, Hironobu Sakaguchi declared that his final game would be a fantasy RPG.
To Sakaguchi’s amazement, his Final Fantasy was a breakout hit becoming the second most popular RPG franchise in Japan afterDragon Quest (owned by Enix, and which by now has been completely eclipsed by Final Fantasy… with Squaresoft nowadays being known as Square Enix.) Final Fantasy was one of the most influential early console role-playing games, and played a major role in legitimizing and popularizing the genre.
That was then. Now, as of 2010, there have been 28 games published in the franchise for many different systems, with each new Final Fantasy being greatly anticipated and usually considered system savers (when Playstation 1 was floundering, it was Final Fantasy VII that gave the system a much-needed boost in sales during the console wars of its day.)
With every new installment seeking to outdo the ones before in terms of storytelling, graphics and mechanics, the series reached its narrative cusp with the middle installment of the numbered series, Final Fantasy VI, which features the famous Opera Scene: Aria Di Mezzo Carattere. Destructoid’s description of the game (and the scene) are perfect:
The Setup
Like most of the Final Fantasy games, Final Fantasy VI involves a huge cast of characters working together to thwart a world-threatening plot. But this Final Fantasy upped the stakes on all accounts, with, to this day, the biggest playable cast of characters yet, all interacting and battling in a huge, rich world.
In Final Fantasy VI you start off playing as Terra, a young woman and almost unwilling participant in the Imperial raid of a peaceful town by the evil Empire. In the game (acting as a central plotline), the Empire is a huge organization with one goal in mind: to capture and harness the power of the most magical creatures in the world, the Espers, and use their power to take over the world.
For much of the early part of the game Terra is the main character and most of the primary sequences revolve around her.
One thing about Final Fantasy VI that is so cool (and so different from other games in the series) is that the main characters frequently “pass the baton” to other characters, allowing for new stories and subplots to come into light.
Such a shifting of focus occurs about a quarter of the way through the game, when Terra discovers that she was actually born an Esper. Upon learning this news, horrified and confused, Terra flies away, leaving the game (until later) and displacing control to someone else in the group.
The remaining party, wanting to understand the connection between Terra, the Espers, and the Empire, makes plans to travel to the Magitek Research Facility in capital city Vector, a mysterious factory run by the Empire and home to many secrets (as well as a multitude of captured Espers).
Unfortunately, Vector is located on a southern continent with no access by way of the sea. With all other options unavailable, the party decides they have no choice but to recruit the help of Setzer, a notorious gambler and owner of the only airship in the world.
To make matters even more difficult, Setzer is known to be almost impossible to contact and very unhelpful (to say the least). The party realizes the only way they will be able to enlist the shady captain’s help is to trick him … somehow.
Through the magical world of perfectly timed video game coincidences, one of the members of your party, Celes, an ex-Imperial general, looks almost identical to a world famous opera singer by the name of Maria (an obvious reference and hommage to the legendary singer Maria Callas and, as Nobuo Uematsu hinted, also to the previous legend of her day, Maria Malibrán). And, of course, Setzer just so happens to be planning the kidnapping of Maria at the end of an upcoming opera performance.
So, with a masterful plan to disguise Celes as Maria and let her get kidnapped, gaining access to Setzer and, most importantly, the airship, the party heads to the Opera House, leading to one of the most surprising and wondrous video game moments of all time.
The Moment
After changing clothes to look exactly like Maria, Celes heads backstage to prepare for her debut performance.
Almost more nervous about performing opera in front of a sold-out crowd of people than actually being kidnapped, Celes carefully reads through the lyrics of the songs she must sing. Once she is finished perusing the entire script, her moment in the spotlight finally arrives.
At this point in the game, control leaves the player and an extended cut-scene begins.
The orchestra in the pit below begins playing as Celes steps onto the stage. Using a primitive (but still remarkably beautiful for the time) synthesized voice sound effect, Celes actually “sings” the opera (although unintelligibly) as the music swells in the background.
nstead of just sitting back and watching the entire sequence unfold, however, the player is actually asked to provide the next set of lyrics at several predetermined spots in the aria. Any players who by chance hadn’t memorized the lyrics earlier in the game are unfortunately left to just guess what the next part of the song will be (although the choices are, luckily, fairly obvious).
The extended sequence continues, as Celes flawlessly performs the challenging and dramatic aria.
Even though Celes’s singing is the most memorable part of the entire Opera House sequence, many other great moments occur as well.
Once Celes is finished with her section, the opera continues to a new scene and the control switches back to the other characters in your party. While watching the drama unfold onstage, the party comes into information that not only is Setzer planning on kidnapping “Maria,” but another shady character is actually set to execute her as well (by dropping a giant 4-ton weight on her head during the opera, of course).
Suddenly, a countdown timer begins and it is up to the party to race to the rafters above the stage and stop the baddie from killing Celes.
Right before the assassin goes through with his evil plot, the party manages to intervene, resulting in everyone toppling off the catwalk above and onto the opera stage. This part is particularly clever because once the characters fall onto the stage the theater’s audience immediately starts whispering to themselves as the orchestra comes to a sudden halt. A boss battle then begins between your party and the assassin, visually framed by the stage’s curtain, with the audience watching intently in the background. Once the battle is complete, the audience cheers as if all of the chaos was part of the show.
Once the audience applause dies down, a spotlight falls on Maria/Celes. From out of nowhere Setzer enters, grabs “Maria,” and leaps away into the darkness above (luckily for Celes the rest of the party stows away on the awaiting airship, saving her and recruiting Setzer to join the mission).
After all of this, the orchestra plays one last time as the curtain closes, ending one of the greatest video game moments of all time.
The rest of Destructoid’s article is good to peruse, specially since it talks about the use of narrative power to overcome the lack of advanced graphics. He argues that the superior quality and power of this 16-Bit game over many of today’s realistic, high-detail contemporaries rests in the fact that, having a limited palette to paint with, Squaresoft’s team had to make sure they used everything in their power to create truly memorable and innovative moments as opposed to today’s videogame industry which relies heavily on glitz over substance.
He may have a point. Let’s look at the opera scene:
Interestingly enough Draco, the hero of the opera, is a basso, whilst Ralse, the villain, is a tenor, and Maria –the heroine- is not a soprano but instead a Mezzo-soprano.
Definitely one of the most memorable moments in my gaming experience as an opera singer. Critically, the music isn’t anything special when you compare it with the likes of Verdi or Bizet- but as far as it goes, one can consider Nobuo Uematsu’s very nice score as a loving tribute to the art form.
Interestingly enough, although the text is seen in English and Japanese, Uematsu wrote an italian text to use mainly for the music, all other versions merely being translations or new versions of the original italian text, which we reproduce here:
Amor mio, caro bene
Perché vai lontan da me?
Giurasti un amor, che mai non dovea
Aver fine per noiNei momenti di tristezza
Nei momenti di dolor
A te, mia stella, penso
Con infinito ardoreUn legame senza speme
Perché mai dovrei aver?
Che cosa tu vuoi ch'io faccia oramai
Mi devi dire tuTi ringrazio, caro bene
Amor mio, vita mia
Al grave doler, al buio timor
Che il cuore mi turbóDolcemente, con amore
Hai risposto al mio gridare
Per sempre ognor, per sempre ognor
Qui a me, t'attenderò
Now let’s move to the next feature on the list, another game that came only a year after Final Fantasy and which incorporated an even longer operatic scene:
II. GABRIEL KNIGHT 2: THE BEAST WITHIN (1995) [computer]
The history of adventure games begins with text adventures. A long time ago, when graphics were monochrome and 64K RAM was enough for everybody, the first adventure games appeared. Although graphics existed at that time, they weren't initially employed for creating adventures. Both input and the output were text only. But most of the basic features of an adventure were already there: You could "look" at things to get their description, take objects and use them with other characters, talk to those characters, and solve puzzles in order to progress in the game.
Most popular text adventures of that time were developed and produced by "Infocom", the most famous examples being the "Zork" games. Later, text adventures with graphics were created, but the graphics only served to illustrate your location in the game world; input was still text-only.
Then came 1984, a year that was significant in many ways, but none of which had anything to do with Orwell.
"Darling, what do you think about making a graphic adventure?" - A young Californian couple, Ken and Roberta Williams, had probably no idea what an impact this question will have on then world of computer games. They founded "Sierra-On-Line", a company that soon became the biggest power in developing and producing adventure games.
Roberta Williams' idea opened new horizons to both developers and players: from now on, you could MOVE your character in a virtual graphic world! The 3rd person perspective adventure was born. It is customary to name "King's Quest" the first graphic adventure.
The Classic Era of the adventure will be forever associated with Sierra's "Quest" games. Among the most well-known examples of those games are the first four "King's Quests", the first three "Space Quests", and the first three "Leisure Suit Larry" games. All of those games were still using a text parser input as interface and color graphics to display the game world and protagonist.
Nobody was able to compete with "Sierra" at that time, but a programmer named Ron Gilbert who worked for the company "Lucasfilm Games" (today "LucasArts", too busy milking the Star Wars cow dry to bother with things such as Original Intellectual Properties) developed what seemed to be the most innovative concept of the time: the SCUMM system, the point-and-click interface. Instead of typing the desired action, you had a choice of several small textual icons; clicking on them with the mouse allowed you to choose the action and thus to interact with objects and characters. It was this system that later brought the Golden Age to the adventure games.
Gilbert's first attempts, "Maniac Mansion" and "Zak McKracken", were still in 16-color EGA and had certain restrictions concerning the new, revolutionary interface. It was not until "The Secret Of Monkey Island" when the point-and-click genre reached its utmost perfection. In this game (which was originally made in 16 colors, but is most known for its fabulous 256 color VGA version), the interface, the dialogue system with optional answers, the inventory-based puzzles, the graphics, the music and the humor, so typical for adventures yet to come, were combined into a whole. The story was the core of the adventure; dialogue and inventory were pillars supporting it.
Everything was integrated to perfection, and this scheme became the standard for many future adventures. "The Secret Of Monkey Island" started the glorious line of LucasArts adventures. In 1993, "Day Of The Tentacle" was released, a game that started the tradition of the "cartoon adventure".
The developers at Sierra, seeing that a new power had conquered the throne, answered with their counter-weapon. Imitating the icon-based interface of LucasArts, they created many games which were in the eyes of many the most serious rivals of LucasArts' masterpieces. "Sierra" wasn't the only rival. Many other companies ("Westwood", "Microprose", "Adventure Soft") also produced very good games in classic style. The adventure flourished. Games that are now considered legendary or classic appeared in the scene, such as the haunting LOOM (a game that integrated music into its mechanics, and classical music at that) and the Monkey Island Series. It is in the Golden Age of Adventure Games that our next entrant was created: Gabriel Knight.
Gabriel, a creation of Phillip K. Dick award-winning writer Jane Jensen, is a New Orleans author and bookstore owner who finds that his destiny is to become a Schattenjäger, or "Shadow Hunter"- a hunter of all things supernatural and evil. Gabriel's assistant, sidekick, and sometime romantic interest Grace Nakimura is a major supporting character.
As the Beast Within opens, Gabriel has moved to his ancestral home in Bavaria, Germany to write his new novel. The population of Rittersberg, the seat of the Schattenjägers, are well aware of his family's reputation and when word reaches them of what is reported to be a werewolf attack in Munich, they compel Gabriel to go and investigate.
Gabriel is joined in Germany by Grace, once she learns that he has begun a new case and hasn't asked her to join him. Whilst Gabriel follows a trail from missing zoo wolves to a mysterious men's hunting club in Munich, Grace conducts research back in Rittersberg and around Bavaria.
Her investigations lead her to the history of King Ludwig II, the composer Richard Wagner and a shadowy figure known as the Black Wolf. Eventually the links between the cases become clear, and Grace discovers that the person in the greatest danger has become Gabriel himself. Their travels take them to Munich, King Ludwig II's famous Neuschwanstein Castle, Altötting and Bavaria's forested countryside.
Their efforts lead them to uncover the truth about King Ludwig's mysterious death (he was a were-wolf!) and discover a lost Richard Wagner opera: “The Curse Of Engelhart.”
The opera here deserves a special mention: Despite its high quality (for the time), a huge majority of the game is played in silence, with only sound effects and character voices. It says much to Sierra’s credit, then, that they put significant resources towards the ‘opera’ scene. The music, composed by Jensen’s husband Robert Holmes, tries very hard at sounding like authentic Wagner. Holmes, unfortunately, falls severely short of the mark and the vocalists engaged in the production are, of course, not top-notch… but your average gamer will hardly notice this. In 1994, way before our days when video games make more revenue than Hollywood blockbusters, no game company anywhere could have afforded to pay a prestigious composer for a ‘Wagner snippet’, a cast of Wagnerian specialist singers, a top-notch orchestra, sets… etcetera.
Rather, the effort with which it was all put together with what they could afford can be seen from miles away and by video game standards of the time, it was stunning. That it takes place at one of the climaxes of the plot is highly significant as well. It was impressive to see the lengths that Sierra went to make this feel authentic. The Williams and Jensen always had a high regard for the art form, and it is shown in how much care went into the final product. Let’s take a look at the scene:
Now let’s grab our antibacterial soup and scrub ourselves well, because our next entry in this list is…
Parasite Eve (1998) [Playstation 1]
Opera singers would have to wait for three more years before they could strut on the digital stage again in yet another Squaresoft game. If Final Fantasy and Gabriel Knight used operas significantly in their plots, then Parasite Eve took it one step further by making the opera singer the main villainess in the story!
The game, interestingly enough, is based on a Japanese novel of the same game. The novel's plot supposes that mitochondria, which are inherited through the female line of descent, form the dispersed body of an intelligent conscious life-form, dubbed Eve, which has been waiting throughout history and evolution for the right conditions when mitochondrial life can achieve its true potential and take over from eukaryotic life-forms (i.e. humans and similar life) by causing a child to be born that can control its own genetic code.
The game begins with Aya Brea, an NYPD rookie, attending an opera with an unnamed date. During the opera, as the diva sings the aria “Se il mio amore sta vincino” (composed by Yoshihisha Suzuki) everyone in the building spontaneously combusts, except for Aya, her date, and the diva on stage named Melissa Pearce. Aya confronts Melissa backstage, and Melissa says that Aya’s mitochondria needs more time to develop. Melissa then mutates into a beast and flees into the sewers, declaring that her name is now Eve.
The fact that Melissa –or Eve- is an opera singer isn’t completely relevant to the rest of the plot, but it remains a part of her character nevertheless- and the introduction is unforgettable, with the Diva essentially “bringing down the house” and setting the house on fire to boot.
The original version of the intro simply had soprano Judith Siirila’s voice sampled into a synthesizer and simply ‘oooing’ to the music composed for the game, Siirila eventually recorded a sung version of it (which is used in this video) along with the intended italian text:
Se lo sono quello che mi dicono
quanto crudele e Dio
Che mi ha dato la vitaCredimi
lo somo una provera donna
Desiderando il mio amoreNo
Anche se nessuno mi crede
Se il mio amore sta vincino a me
Volentieri riceverro qualsiasi punizione
Per Favore, Dio
Senti le preghiere di questa provera donna
Again, it falls short of an actual operatic experience but it still feels like an hommage of sorts. While it would have been nice to use, say, a scene from “Tosca”, I imagine no game composer would want to admit they couldn’t create at least something of their own to match it.
Although we’ve seen divas in their full bloom in games so far, the respectful portrayal of aging divas has found its way into the video game platform as well with…
Benoit Sokal’s Syberia (2002)[Computer]
Syberia is ‘one of those games’: when enthusiasts of the Adventure Genre reminisce about the Golden Age of Adventure, Syberia is one of the games they often talk about when looking for a worthy descendant to the line (after, of course, talking about the crown jewel of the genre, The Longest Journey.)
Syberia was released around the same time as The Longest Journey and has the distinction of featuring the second notable heroine (the first being TLJ’s April Ryan) in a new trend of adventure games featuring, for the first time, strong independent women in adventure games, a genre previously dominated by male protagonists (with the solitary exception of 1993’s The Legend of Kyrandia: Hand of Fate.)
The game’s heroine, Kate Walker, is a high-powered lawyer sent to the remote French village of Valadilène in order to finalize the take-over of a toy factory there.
Once at the village, Kate learns that the woman who owned the factory has just died, and that she has a brother who must be contacted in order for the takeover to proceed. Her mission takes her across Central and Eastern Europe, gradually leading her to question her own life. The titular Syberia is a mythical island on which mammoths are said to live.
During her travels Kate stops in Komkolzgrad: The place is run by the eccentric and somewhat crazy Serguei Borodine, who intends to construct the biggest stage possible for Helena Romanski, a retired and reclusive pera singer with whom he is obsessed. Kate has little choice but to fetch her from a nearby spa in Aralbad on his behalf.
After many tribulations Kate meets up with the now retired Diva. Helena believes she is too old to sing, having lost her legendary voice which at one point was the toast of Europe. Nevertheless, Kate convinces her to sing for Serguei. The aging diva decides to sing the Russian folk song “Ochi Tchorniye”, accompanied by an automaton:
The performance in Komkolzgrad does not go quite as planned: Helena’s voice, though obviously worn, still retains some beauty, and that is enough for Serguei to act on his obsession and imprisons her! He wants to keep Helena at his side so that he may hear her voice forever.
Kate, using her mind and resourcefulness, is able to free Helena and take her back to Aralbad.
Helena’s portrayal is very respectful, if sad: even the most beautiful voice will one day grow too old to sing, that is the reality all singers live with and which is ever present at the back of their minds. Helena is a sympathetic character and it is very easy to commiserate with her.
Finally down our list… what if you want to play at being an opera singer?
Opera Slinger (2007)[Computer]
Well, not quite. Opera Slinger is a Student Showcase winner at the 9th annual Independent Games Festival was written by a group of 10 students, who called themselves the Treblemakers, from the Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy. As such, it only has one level.
You're the protagonist, Forte — long blonde locks and a red coat with epaulets and tails secured by a medallion on your chest — riding in on a "motorbike" that's a treble clef on its side.
The premise of the game is very simple: The evil diva Aria, Queen Of All Opera, has totaled the opera house and set the audience against you. There is only one way to claim back your opera crown: It’s a singing duel!
You jump around the ruins of the opera house and race for the spotlight (literally a moving spotlight) against Aria. When in the spotlight, you duke it out vocally with her in a series of ‘opera’ songs—only two of the selections actually having music from an opera whatsoever (the Anvil chorus from Verdi’s “Il Trovatore” and “La Donna E Mobile” from Verdi’s “Rigoletto”)- you won’t be singing in Italian or German, however, as the text has been changed in order for you to sing taunts at your enemy.
Everybody who has played it remaks on how fun the game is—I wouldn’t be able to tell you because, unfortunately, the game isn’t compatible with Windows Vista or Windows 7, Microsoft being the putrescent spawn from hell that it is, but it is compatible with Windows XP, so if you have a copy of that old platform download the game and have some fun—it’s tongue-in-cheek, but from what I hear it is very entertaining. Unfortunately the Trebblemakers aren’t interested in making a full (and updated) game out of this concept.
Well, that’s pretty much the end of our list. The next time opera graces the virtual stage of videogames, however, I will release an updated list. Until then, sing well and sing healthily!
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