SynaMax

SynaMax is a music composer and producer. He has been actively searching for the synth patches that were used by Kenji Yamamoto to create the soundtrack of the Metroid Prime games, allowing him to completely recreate some of the original tracks, as well as adapting a few tracks of the 2D games in the Prime style, and even create original music based on these synth patches!

SynaMax

My name is SynaMax and I’m an electronic music producer and composer.  I started writing music on the computer in 2004, back when I was 13.  Producing music and designing sound effects quickly became my favorite hobby and I’ve been doing it ever since.  Around the late 2000’s, I uploaded a few of my sound effects on freesound.org, where they have been listed as some of the most popular files downloaded on the site, such as my punch hits and anime sound effects library.  As a result, I’ve randomly heard my sound effects in all sorts of various media, from SCP: Containment Breach to The Eric Andre Show.

In 2017, I met several people who have a shared interest in finding the synth gear and sample libraries used by various video game composers.  They were doing this in order to recreate their favorite soundtracks that they felt were in need of a proper remastering.  I was fascinated by this and soon started looking for sounds from other game soundtracks that I enjoyed.  In 2018, one of the members of the group had found a random sample library called “Uncivilised G’rooves” that featured the percussion heard in VS. Parasite Queen; this was the genesis of my journey to recreating the music from Metroid Prime.

I knew that finding the synths used in the Prime trilogy wasn’t going to be easy.  My only clue was that Kenji Yamamoto used early 90s E-MU Proteus sound modules for some of the instruments used in Super Metroid.  It made me wonder if he also used E-MU products during the development of Metroid Prime (which turned out to be correct).  After countless hours of searching, I recognized the percussion used in “Crashed Ship Frigate Orpheon (Ventilation Shaft)” while I was using E-MU’s Emulator X3, the software version of the E-MU Proteus 2000 sound module.  With this discovery, I knew I was on the right path but there were still a lot of missing sounds that I couldn’t find on the P2K so the next step was to go through various synth demos on YouTube, trying to find possible leads.

In April 2019, I was listening to a YouTube demo of the rare E-MU Orbit-3 sound module and there I heard it…the “Noise Hits” patch that’s used in the main menu for Metroid Prime.  Immediately after that preset was “Aioon Pad” which is the ambient bell sound in Agon Wastes (one of my favorite sounds used in the trilogy).  As the months passed, I discovered more E-MU sound modules and Korg synths used for the soundtracks and soon amassed a large spreadsheet in which all the synth preset and sample findings were written down.  I was also very fortunate to acquire several of the synths used for the Prime OSTs; much of these items I was able to get thanks to lucky timing and/or borrowing money from my parents.

Through the synth finding spreadsheet, I was able to start working on recreations of tracks from the games, as well as write my own original music, in the style of Yamamoto-san’s music production.  The positive response to my work has been incredible.  Someone recently told me that one of the level designers for Metroid Prime 2 actually listened to my track “Metro Android” and he said it brought back to him a lot of nostalgia and memories of the game’s development.  Hearing and reading comments like that is amazing and I want to let everyone know just how grateful I am to receive them.

On top of all that, I recently had the opportunity to do something I’ve been wanting to do for a long time, which was to write music for a movie.  I produced the first 4 minutes of music for Charlie Rose aka MootroidXProductions’s latest animated short film, “The Sky Below”.  I was given this opportunity thanks to the work I did on one of my original Prime-inspired tracks.  Charlie had left a nice comment on a piece of music I uploaded called, “Cyclone Shrine” (inspired by the MP1 OST cue “Artifact Temple”).  I reached back out to him and we soon started discussing working together for his movie.  He too was inspired by the Prime games and wanted music that was similar in vibe but still unique, so I used the same gear from the soundtracks and wrote a brand new score instead.  After a year in production, the film was finally released early this month (May 2021); I must say that I’m really proud with how the whole project came out and I have a feeling this will be my gateway into a new composing career.

Lastly, I want to send a special thanks to everyone who has supported my channel via Bandcamp or left a nice comment on one of my videos. I feel honored that my music was able to reach you in this vast world; thank you.

Our Thoughts

Glaedrax

SynaMax is able to create music that sound like it literally comes from the Metroid Prime games, and that’s really amazing. I really like the original songs he made with those synth patches as well. It’s like getting the Metroid Prime 4 soundtrack early!