The Most Emotional Video Game Music in the Unlikeliest of Places

From the rising triumph of Snake Eater to the emotional heft of Unshaken in Red Dead Redemption 2, video game music has progressed far beyond the wildest dreams of the bleep and bloop pioneers. But a rare few of those original composers have grown with the medium, demonstrating unquestionable talent throughout the console generations. 

David Wise is one of those composers. From humble music store beginnings to the man behind the legendary soundscape of Donkey Kong Country and a dozen other hits, his journey is like no other. 

But if you had to highlight just one composition from his incredible 36-year-long journey, it’d be Aquatic Ambience. An unexpected assault of melancholy that humbly started life as underwater-level music in a 90s platformer dreamt up on a bicycle ride, but eventually captured the world’s imagination.

30 years after its creation, Aquatic Ambience has taken on a life of its own. It’s been sampled by superstar artists like Childish Gambino, adored by Trent Reznor, performed in huge concerts around the world and, of course, remixed in every possible direction once the internet got its hands on it. 

But what is it about Aquatic Ambience that resonated with a worshipping fanbase? How did something so simple from something so quintessentially 90s end up being referred to as the Eleanor Rigby of video game music?

“I think Aquatic Ambiance obviously changed everything for me,” Wise says. “I wasn’t writing for an underwater level at the time, I was just trying to make it sound nice. It was one of those light bulb moments.”

Today David Wise performs his music live to thousands of fans worldwide, and Aquatic Ambience is always a stand out in the set. Despite the reflective and sombre tone of the tune, it consistently receives overwhelming adoration. “For me, it’s sad and uplifting at the same time.” shared Wise. “Although it’s quite dark, you feel as though things are going to get better.”

Originally composed in 1993, 30 years later fans still flock to watch David perform the emotional masterpiece. But the track was never considered a career-defining hit out of the gate. In fact, it was quite the opposite.

“Once you’ve worked on something for quite a long time, you get a bit bored of it really,” Wise shared. “I didn’t really have an idea of how well-received it was outside of Rare until somebody brought a CD in. Several years had passed at that point and I realized they’d put on an orchestral concert in Japan and they’d been playing it as part of that concert.”

Years had passed with David thinking he’d composed something that’d largely been forgotten, like most of the disposable video game soundtracks from the 90s. But as the internet blossomed the world became smaller, and its impact on an adoring generation started to become apparent.

Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails said he’d liked it and that was the first inkling that it had quite a big reach.

“I think it was Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails.” recalled Wise. “He was in an interview and he said he’d liked it and that was the first inkling that I’d got that it had quite a big reach.”

David continued. “I went over to Washington to guest in a band at a thing called MAG Fest (Music and Games Festival). I was in this hotel room slightly jet-lagged, and I kept waking up hearing lots of bands doing versions of my music and I thought “This is just bonkers!” It took until that point, probably 15 years later before I realized people liked it.”

Despite its cultural impact, Aquatic Ambience was never meant to happen. In fact, David Wise, the renowned video game composer, was never a career he’d even considered before he got his first big break.

“I was living in Leicester at the time and I’d applied to a music shop.” explained Wise. “ Some guys from Yamaha came in with a CX5 computer and wanted somebody to learn how to use it. I was completely disinterested, I loved playing drums. They came back a few months later and nobody had picked this thing up to learn how to use it. As a bribe to get people to learn how to use it, they’d offered an extra day off a week and that was it, I was sold.” recalls Wise. “Over the course of two or three months, I’d managed to get the MIDI working and I’d hooked it up to JUNO and Korg synth and I’d got things playing like ‘We Close Our Eyes’ by Go West and Duran Duran songs, anything from the 80s. I’d got that little CX5 playing those songs.”

Wise continues. “One day, two gentlemen came in for a demonstration and so, I’d played them all of the Duran Duran, Go West stuff and they asked if I’d got any more. Very apologetically, I said, “I’ve got some of the stuff I’ve written,” and played it to them and they basically offered me a job to go and work at Rare writing music for their video games.”

In the mid-80s, Rare wasn’t quite the juggernaut we see today – or that we even saw in the 90s. “My first day was looking around this new farmhouse that they’d purchased and realizing that there wasn’t an office to work in.” explained Wise. “All they had was a builder who was building walls and they said your first job is to paint your office. It took a few weeks to get the office into some kind of usable [state]. As soon as we’d done that I was given the first Mario [game] and I played that for three weeks.”

That’s when the reality of video game development landed on me.

After the crash course in Mario, Nintendo and DIY, the true purpose of his employment began to rear its alluring, but challenging head.

“I’d got a Roland sound module, I’d got a Korg sequencer and I was very happy for three weeks writing as much stuff as possible.” said Wise. “It was like a dream come true. Then they said, “You know that Mario game you’ve been listening to? You’ve got to get your songs onto that.” That’s when the reality of video game development landed on me.”

“On the NES, you’ve got those four sound chips.” explained Wise. “Noise, the triangle wave and two pulse waves and you’ve got to try and make something –that sounds like a doorbell at best– sounding like a piece of music. It was a big challenge.”

The simplicity of the NES sound chips created limitations, but that didn’t stop David from composing impressive pieces for dozens of NES games, including California Games, a Nightmare on Elm Street, and Battletoads. But fast approaching was a much-desired tech upgrade in the form of the Super Nintendo.

“I was always frustrated that everything I played sounded like a video game or a doorbell.” said Wise. ”When we went onto the Super NES, we got eight channels, but it was [still] only 64k of memory, which is tiny. By contrast, if you’ve got a CD playing, you’d be able to listen to it for less than half a second and all of your memory would be gone. [So] I had to learn how to emulate [sounds] using code because everything was typed out in hex and subroutines. 

I could hear something in my head and I’d be able to sit down and type it out [in hex code].

Wise continued “By the time I got to the Super NES, I knew all of the hex codes for the keyboard, I could think hex. A lot of musicians and composers can listen to a piece of music and can turn around and tell you what key it’s in, but I’d taken it one step further. I could tell you what the hex codes were and how to program it, and just without even playing anything on the keyboard, I could hear something in my head and I’d be able to sit down and type it.”

With a developed skillset and new technology in hand, David moved on to his biggest challenge yet. A soundscape for a Nintendo mascot character and what turned out to be the headliner of his discography for years to come. Donkey Kong Country.

“I wrote three demos and Tim, the artistic director at Rare said, ‘Can you just put them together and we send it out to Nintendo?’” shared Wise. “I always imagined that Koji Kondo would come in and disregard all the stuff I’d done. I was just doing stuff for a demo, that’s the impression I had. I thought, ‘Well, that’s fine. I’ll do the best I can and somebody will come in and make a much better job of it.’ It never changed, so I just carried on!”

The SNES sound upgrade, despite its own limitations, presented a wealth of new opportunities for David to tinker with. It was these possibilities that allowed his creative juices to flow.

It gave a movement and fluidity that I just didn’t have before and that opened doors.

“Suddenly I had all these possibilities, and so with that came a lot of experimentation.” explained Wise.” I was cycling from work home [and it was] that movement, it just gets my brain working. I figured one day that I might be able to do it and it took me five weeks to work out how to code it and get it working. I just [took] eight waveforms and it played them in sequence and that first experiment became the baseline for Aquatic Ambiance.”

Wise continued. “For the arpeggios at the beginning, I could use a vocal sample and add a harp to it and then change that harp sample subtly and it just gave a movement and the fluidity that I just didn’t have before and that opened doors.”

It could be argued that Aquatic Ambience didn’t just open doors for David but plotted a path for the industry. Video games were quickly moving away from just being toys to play with and then discard. The soundtrack for Donkey Kong Country, along with some of its peers, ushered in a new wave of art appreciation for the medium. But it’s important to note David was never trying to change what video game music could be with Aquatic Ambience. Did he even understand at the time what he’d created could be so important?

“No, not really,” answered Wise. “for me, it was a nerdy exercise and suddenly, I can make it sound nice. For me, that was enough. When I’m listening to a piece of music that I’ve done before, which I generally don’t like to do, I just hear all the things I haven’t quite finished.”

Even after sharing some audience sentiment with David, such as a YouTuber’s comment referring to it as ‘the Eleanor Rigby of videogame music’.  he still maintained that level of modesty. As if his creation was all just a happy accident that’s since caught fire.

“It’s very kind of people to say that, but I don’t think it happened immediately after the video game.” shared Wise. “I think it’s taken many years of galvanizing opinions for it to get to that almost cult status.

But it has reached cult status, transcended a medium, and become one of the first song titles on people’s lips when they talk about great video game music. So has he ever tried to recapture that magic?

“I’ll be a different person tomorrow than I am today and consequently, the type of tune I’d write tomorrow will be different from the one that I’d write today.” explains Wise. ”You’ve just got to get on with it when the inspiration comes. With Aquatic Ambiance, I was in the zone and in new ground. It was a world of exploration, so that’s where I went.”

By David’s admission, Aquatic Ambience could have only been created in 1993, and when the result has been consistently popular for 3 decades and likely beyond, it makes you appreciate how special that moment of magic was. It almost makes you wonder what other great art has been lost throughout the years due to all the moments that have been missed. But we can all be grateful that David didn’t miss his on that cycle home 30 years ago, even though he still to this day can’t pinpoint exactly why people love his masterpiece so much.

“I’ve got no idea,” said Wise. “no idea at all.”

Dale Driver is an Executive Producer of video for IGN and has a habit of becoming obsessed with video game sounds from the 90s. Be thoroughly bored by following him Twitter at @_daledriver.