Assassin's Creed III: Liberation brings the historical action-adventure stealth video game series to the handheld PlayStation Vita. The game released on Oct. 30, alongside the release of its console sibling, the blockbuster Assassin's Creed III.
The game stars Aveline de Grandpré, a female African-French Assassin, who is active around the end of the French and Indian War, in 18th century New Orleans. Like its console counterpart ACIII, the game features amazing music and the game's composer Winifred Philips recently spoke about her work on the game in an interview with GameSpot.
In the interview she discussed the differences between composing music for video games and movies. Philips says that composing music for film is in many ways simpler than the work that goes into creating music for games.
"In many ways, composing music for film is a much simpler process," Philips told GameSpot. "Game composition must take into account the unpredictability of the pacing and the order of events. The music must enhance the sense of excitement and add emotional depth to the experience, no matter how the action unfolds."
Philips says that Aveline's heritage influenced Liberation's musical score with each aspect of her personal background lending elements.
"Her French heritage from her father was expressed through many of the French Baroque musical influences," Phillips said. "Her African heritage from her mother lent the musical score a visceral energy from the complex rhythms and ancient instruments of that culture."
According to Phillips, Liberation's main score was also influenced by Aveline's dual heritage and is infused with elements of both cultures.
"The driving percussion is accented by African tribal voices to form a strong and assertive backbone for the musical piece," Phillips said. "At the same time, the full string orchestra infuses the piece with a European instrumental approach, and the female lead vocal represents Aveline's personality balanced between these cultural influences."
She also says that the main theme contains a lot of the fundamental elements found in the rest of the game's musical score.
"It expresses a lot of the fundamental elements found in the rest of the score including some important melodies and instrumental choices," Phillips said. "While I don't think it can fully sum up the entire game, it does serve as a good introduction to the musical style that informs the rest of the score."
In the interview she also says that the music for Liberation was composed entirely independent of Assassin's Creed III and that it would have made sense for Liberation's music to reference ACIII, because the two games are set in completely different environments and their protagonists are also very different.
"My work on AC III: Liberation was completely independent," Philips said. "I never heard the music from AC III while I was composing for Liberation. It wouldn't have made sense for the music of Liberation to reference the style of AC III, because the two games are set in very different environments, and their main characters share very little in common."
You can read the full interview with Philips on GameSpot here and read about AC3's composer Lorne Balfe here. Watch the game's story trailer and tell us what you think about the new portable game below...