Hi, for a good while I've wanted to write a little letter of appreciation on my long-time collaborator, composer of Voltage High Society, Jesse “the_simian” Harlin and his work, as I feel that for the amount of trouble and effort he puts into anything we do needs more recognition. And I figured this might be a interesting read for followers of our game, too. Now, since this is just my idea and unsolicited, I'm not going to dig deep into our lives or history. Just, you know, I figure a small token of appreciation and a peak behind our development. This is a bit unstructured flow of mind, maybe even unprofessional, so bare with me.
So! Me and Jesse, we’ve known each other since maybe around 2008 - I was in my twenties and Jesse a tad older, both really wanting to work on games or mods and such. I'm from Finland, he's from the states, and we mostly talk and meet up so that its late or super early for one of us. For however brutal the timezone difference and daily activities are, we've always got along super effortless.
Our earliest project I think, is when we started collaborating on a horror mod for Half-Life 2, called Flesh. I designed the rest of the game, Jesse did the soundtrack (and a website that isn't available anymore).
What struck me about Jesse from early on, is his absolute dedication to the concepts - not only does the man bring great music, but he really sinks his teeth into a game’s story, environment, the lore of it all, bringing so many ideas and layers to things. He really does get immersed into a world and brings in lengthy, rich conversations on the designs and ideas. Which of course, is super motivating and helpful for me as a designer, too. And the tracks! Even with Flesh, a semi-simple horror mod made in our spare time, Jesse delivered intricate songs that were instantly recognizable, with such clear texture, motifs, and dynamics, and they usually went on for a good while, anything from 3 to 10 minutes, no filler. Having something like that for a freebie for a mod was crazy cool back then, and really made the project sing.
After Flesh we did collaborate a few times or tried things, but things winded down on the game development front for a while. Life took over, and we chatted less, too. That is, until I got back into making games, this time commercially.
It was in the early stages of Voltage High Society that I got into a conversation with Jesse again - I probably shared some videos or work-in-progress screenshots or something. He’s always wanted an actual commercial game with his name on it, and even if our compensation is crap, he wanted to do this and I really wanted to work with Jesse again, after a long time. I'm pretty sure we had a multiple year gap when we weren’t much in contact (as there’s childbirth and work and whatever in our lives), but yeah we continued like nothing had changed. Same Jesse, fun to talk with, relentless passion. This intense dude who delivers intricate, rich tracks full of interesting flow and dynamics.
And oh boy Jesse’s dynamics are worth talking of. His body of work is full of these long tracks that don't simply repeat or loop… nah they evolve and shift in complex ways. There's so much going on - layers of engineering, motifs, details, and texture - that you can’t catch it all on one or two listens. His tracks are super fun to take apart and listen repeatedly which, hey, is also great for a game soundtrack. Players might mess around or get stuck in a area for a while so its nice that the music lives on, bringing life into the moment. Jesse's output is so stellar that, I really feel like its a big shame he hasn't had a proper chance at working on commercial games, as he could bring hell of a lot into anything. (Funny little tidbit though, there also exists another composer Jesse Harlin in the games industry, who's worked on such things as Mafia, Star Wars, and Monkey Island remasters. That's why I - and Jesse himself, refer to him by his artist name the_simian.)
Maybe sometimes this level of work gets the better of our man - he has a day job, a family, and his obligations and struggles of everyday life. So when it comes to this side activity, he might struggle with a concept for a while, or have a hard time finding the time to put in all the labor he wants, to get all the transitions and layers working right - and I know he's stressed out or feels bad about it sometimes. But I wholeheartedly support and try to help him in every way and let him work with all the time he needs.
I don't know what the perception of our development is to the outside world, with this project. The unfortunate reality of indie game development is, that just like everyone else, we mostly work on this after our actual obligations, be it commercial projects with actual monthly income, our lives, children, family, health, and so forth. When you’re younger and got less things going on - back with mods and such - this kind of low-budget development is still manageable.. but age and responsibilities definitely take their toll.
With Voltage High Society, we work on the game “when we can”. For me and the team at Platonic its mostly fine, as this is our responsibility and my idea anyhow. I can personally work for little compensation and juggle with "legit" projects where there's steady income, and then the game development happens in drops whenever possible. But Jesse's in too. Willingly, relentless, never ever missing the mark or compromising from his output.
For an example, in the Haunted Update, Jesse pulled some all-nighters between his day job and activities. Sometimes he worked up until sunrise. And we're not young men. He did it just to get the boss fight theme in there, without compromises to his ideas. Yet again, it ties perfectly into the story and happenings of the game.
Its quite frankly still beyond my comprehension that he’s gone along with my stuff for nearly two decades, always with the same dedication, heart, and long-ass crazy tracks. All in all, what else can I say but I appreciate you so much man. Thank you.
Leave some positive comments for our soundtrack and composer, and do check out Jesse's work at https://soundcloud.com/harlinjesse
And for sure Jesse will put out Voltage High Society's soundtrack as well, once the time comes. Just don't spam us about it beforehand.
(PS. next update, one of the last, is coming relatively soon. But we'll write about that another time.)
-Henri