While a game's visuals and gameplay usually get the lion's share of attention, the music and the sounds are important as well. Just ask Akira Yamaoka, music composer for Konami's Silent Hill series. With Silent Hill 5 (PS3, Xbox 360) currently in development, Mr. Yamaoka shared his insights on what it was like to come up with the music for the Silent Hill movie and games.

Find out what Mr. Yamaoka had to say after the jump!

For the first time, a major entry to the Silent Hill series, Silent Hill 5 (Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3), is being made by an American team. Consequently, producer and composer Akira Yamaoka has to work with new people in a new environment. His thoughts? "Japan is in trouble."

Find out why at the full article.

Famed Japanese game music composer Akira Yamaoka of Konami's Silent Hill fame has announced that he is currently working on a new project. He has expanded his role to overall supervision and is now exercising a great deal of creative control on game design. He has also finished work on the anticipated thriller Silent Hill 5 for the Sony PlayStation 3 and the Microsoft Xbox 360, a game whose musical score he describes as Dolby-quality, but not quite revolutionary.

See the full article for details on Yamaoka's new project at the full article.

When it comes to survival horror video games, Silent Hill is definitely one of the many titles that have made its mark on the genre. With grotesque monsters, eerie backgrounds and spine-tingling music, the game has given us many not so fond nightmares after playing through the games many iterations through the past few years.

We owe many of our sleepless nights to Akira Yamaoka, the renowned musical composer for the Silent Hill series. The chilling soundtracks he's provided for the games definitely sets the mood for a good night of fear-induced gaming. In an interview conducted during the E for All Expo 2007, he talks about how his role in the series has evolved through the years and how game music for the survival horror genre has changed.

The long-time video game music composer stressed how he wanted his music to sound unique and not just like "regular video game music". He also mentioned that interactivity lends a big role in how it sets the proper mood for any game or even any entertainment medium like movies or DVDs.

After being involved with Silent Hill 3 as its producer, Yamaoka is looking to make the music for future video games which can give a total interactive experience for the player. He considers video games today as something that can be expressed in ways more than just visual means. He ended the interview saying that he aims to create music which evokes a lot of emotion for the gamer while playing.

Silent Hill 5 is the latest iteration to the franchise and is set to be released sometime next year for the PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. While Yamaoka mentioned the possibility of the game going live on the Wii platform, there haven't been any definite plans so far regarding the matter. In the meantime, you can take a look at the video interview of Akira Yamaoka below.

We came across some good news for horror/survival fans today. In a recent interview with GamePro, Akira Yamaoka revealed a few of their plans for the next installment in Konami's popular Silent Hill series. Yamaoka producer the PC version of Silent Hill 3 and also worked as a sound director on the series.

According to Yamaoka, Silent Hill 5 will more or less resemble Silent Hill 2 " in the terms of the way the player is directed and the characters' behavior." There's also a strong chance that the game will be losing the camera angle used in Silent Hill: Origins. "I like it and agree with the choice for the [PSP], but I don't think that's the camera angle we want on a home console," said Yamaoka. "That way you don't see enough of the surroundings that really mean a lot to the player in Silent Hill."

As for which console the game will be released on, Yamaoka said that while details have yet to be finalized, they are currently thinking of putting the next canon game on next gen consoles like the PS3 and Xbox 360. "We have had a good past experience with Playstation," said Yamaoka, "and we hope to continue that trend, but there are no definite plans as of yet."

You know how everything - even a cuddly, snow-white, red-eyed bunny -  looks scarier in the dark? That's why very few horror movies ever take place in the day time. In fact, we can't think of any except Mariah Carey's "Glitter" which is not really a horror movie but rather a horrific one.

Anyways, in an interview with Famitsu Mag, game music composer Akira Yamaoka revealed a very ambitious target for Konami's Silent Hill 5. According to Yamaoka, the Silent Hill 5 (rumored to be released on PS3 and Xbox 360) team is working on making it scary even when the scenes take place in broad daylight. Let's call it Daytime Fear Factor.

When pressed to elaborate on Daytime Fear Factor, Yamaoka says it's hard to explain. But he likened it to the Resident Evil 5 trailer where the scene takes play in the daytime but the fear still kicks in. "It will not be the same but that is an explanation of the idea of having fear in daylight. It is a concept that we are working on at the moment still." That means we need to wait a while to see this Daytime Fear Factor can give us the heevie jeevies even when not cloaked in darkness.