is a Japanese video game music composer and musician, who worked at Sega from 1989 to 1996 and contributed to games such as OutRunners and the Virtua Fighter series. After leaving in 1996, he joined Dream Factory and composed for Tobal 2 and Ehrgeiz. He founded the music production company Brainstorm Co. Ltd. in 1999, where he has most notably worked on the Lumines series and Rodea the Sky Soldier.
Biography Nakamura was raised in a household that actively listened to music. During elementary school, he recorded songs from the radio and make his own mix tapes. After becoming a middle school student, he started to play the guitar, being inspired by artists such as Toto and Van Halen. During his high school years he got into jazz artists such as Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea, and Sadao Watanabe. He started a T-Square cover band with friends at college; as he was studying business, he did not get any musical education, but still wanted to pursue a career in music. He worked part-time jobs to raise money for music equipment, purchasing a Roland MC-300 sequencer. This led to him applying as a composer for game companies.
Nakamura worked part-time at Sega in 1989 on the Sega Genesis version of Michael Jackson's Moonwalker. He recalls transcribing Michael Jackson's song "Bad" into MML and also composed a boss battle theme from scratch. He also composed for ESWAT: City Under Siege and Columns II along with senior composer Y. Takada. He joined as a full-time composer in 1990, and composed for games such as the Genesis version of Dick Tracy and the Master System version of Michael Jackson's Moonwalker. He also worked on sound programming for games such as Streets of Rage. Along with Takenobu Mitsuyoshi and Hiroshi Kawaguchi, Nakamura composed for OutRunners, which he found exciting due to it being a sequel to the popular OutRun, as well as being able to compose entirely using sampled instruments on the MultiPCM chip. Shortly after, he composed for Virtua Fighter. Although there was pressure at the company for the game to surpass Street Fighter II, he did not take much inspiration from its music, and found it challenging to output good sound from the cabinet speakers. This also led to him composing for Virtua Fighter 2 with Mitsuyoshi and Akiko Hashimoto.
Following his work on Virtua Fighter 3 with Mitsuyoshi and Fumio Ito, Nakamura left Sega in 1996 and joined Dream Factory. As he had been assigned to management roles at Sega, he felt that his work at Sega was no longer interesting due to having less time to compose music. This led to him composing the soundtrack for Tobal 2, which encompasses a variety of genres including funk, jazz fusion and rock. He also composed the music for Ehrgeiz, which features a harder sound than of Tobal 2; he found it challenging due to changing his musical approach, as well as working under time constraints. After leaving Dream Factory in 1999, he founded the music production company Brainstorm Co. Ltd. One of the first projects he worked on after becoming independent was Kengo: Master of Bushido. Other composers later joined the company too.
In 2004, Nakamura joined Lumines: Puzzle Fusion as the lead composer following the completion of a prototype. With programmer and additional composer Katsumi Yokota fearing that the soundtrack would lack variety beyond techno and dance music, Nakamura constructed a rich variety of songs based on his understanding of the game's design, and considers his work to resemble ambient music. Nakamura primarily used Reason and Ableton Live software to compose the songs, finding the latter particularly suited for its interactive music. He also composed for Lumines Live! and Lumines II, which received remix albums titled Lumines Remixes Winter and L.II Remixes respectively.
Nakamura composed for the game Rodea the Sky Soldier, which was developed between 2010 and 2011 by Yuji Naka's company Prope, but not released until 2015. Naka initially envisioned the soundtrack to have an orchestral sound, but after Nakamura played a prototype he felt that an acoustic guitar accompaniment would fit well with the concept of dashing in the sky. He split his compositional style for cutscenes and gameplay, as the game features a romantic story.
Notable works YearTitleNotes 1990Michael Jackson's MoonwalkerMega Drive version; music with Hiroshi KubotaESWAT: City Under SiegeMusic with Y. TakadaColumns IIMusic with Y. TakadaDick TracyMusic 1991F1 Exhaust NoteMusicAstérixMusic 1993OutRunnersMusic with Takenobu Mitsuyoshi and Hiroshi KawaguchiVirtua FighterMusic 1994Virtua Fighter 2Music with Takenobu Mitsuyoshi and Akiko Hashimoto 1995Daytona USASaturn version; sound director 1996Virtua Fighter KidsSaturn version; music with Takenobu Mitsuyoshi and Maki MorrowVirtua Fighter 3Music with Takenobu Mitsuyoshi and Fumio Ito 1997Tobal 2Music 1998EhrgeizMusic 2000Kengo: Master of BushidoMusic 2001Guilty Gear PetitMusicGuilty Gear Petit 2MusicKabuki WarriorsMusic 2002The King of Fighters EX: Neo BloodMusic with Shigeharu IsodaWWE RawMusicSword of the SamuraiMusicPinobeePlayStation version; music 2003Tube SliderSound director, music with Mitsuteru FurukawaPride FC: Fighting ChampionshipsMusic with Hiroshi Utsuyama and Hiroshi InukaiNaruto: Ninja CouncilMusicWWE Raw 2Music 2004Custom RoboMusicKengo 3MusicLuminesMusic with Katsumi Yokota 2005MeteosMusic with Kaori Takazoe and Seiji Momoi 2006Ninety-Nine NightsMusic with Pinar Toprak, Shingo Yasumoto and Yasuo KijimaLumines Live!Music with Keiichi Sugiyama and H. UedaCustom Robo ArenaMusic with Shingo Yasumoto, Kenzi Nagashima, and Tsubasa WagaGunpey DSMusic with Kaori Takazo and Mitsunori TakemotoJoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Phantom BloodMusic with Aki Ota, Tsubasa Waga, and Satoshi Ariga Lumines IIMusic 2007Lumines PlusMusic 2008Populous DSMusic with Keishi Yamamuro and Tsubasa WagaMeteos WarsMusicLumines SupernovaMusic with Keiichi Sugiyama 2009Legends of the Dark King: A Fist of the North Star StoryMusic with Tsubasa WagaPeggle: Dual ShotMusic with H. Ueda, Keishi Yamamuro, and Kie HaradaDisney Stitch JamMusic 2010Motto! Stitch! DS Rhythm de Rakugaki DaisakusenMusic with various others 2012Family Party: 30 Great Games Obstacle ArcadeMusic 2015Rodea the Sky SoldierMusic 2017Birthdays the BeginningMusicThe Lost ChildMusic 2018Lumines RemasteredMusic 2019Kotodama: The 7 Mysteries of FujisawaMusicShenmue IIISound director 2024Lollipop Chainsaw RePOPMusic with Shuichiro Fukuhiro, Kenta Kawamura, and Secheol Shin
References
External links Official website Official blog