What stage of the development was in the game in when you joined the production?

The game was nearly ready for its first trailer, so the first area (the garden) was recognisably similar to how it stands in the final release. I don't think much more had been completed, but there was a goose and a gardener to annoy. I think House House had been working on it for some time already.

What was your criteria when you were looking for music while making the launch trailer?

So the idea for using Debussy's Preludes came from Nico Disseldorp, who is one of the four at House House. From talking to him, he'd just been listening to the music idly, and noted that one of the Preludes had a kind of funny sound to it, that it was sort of amusing. I think he stored that away in his mind and when there was the need for a piece of music for the trailer, they realised that it fit the vibe of the game perfectly. That's when I came in - to create a performance of that Prelude that worked for the trailer.

“The hope was that players would feel like there was a pianist, sitting in the corner watching you play”

Dan Golding, March 30th, 2020

Was the work's public domain status a factor in its selection?

I don't think it was a defining factor. It wasn't like we went on the hunt for a piece of public domain music: I could've composed something original, for example, if that was the issue. That said, it certainly made things easier and I'm a believer in the role of the public domain system to give creatives and their families the right to exploit their creations for a reasonable period, but for that right to then expire and open up our shared culture to the world after that. Culture shouldn't be locked up forever.

What was your process when selecting the pieces of music you would record?

So the game has six Preludes in it in the end. One for each area, and one for the main menu. They're all from Debussy's two books of Preludes, and while we did consider going beyond that it was great that we could keep it all within those works in the end. It just feels neat. Debussy gave each Prelude quite florid and descriptive names, so some fit very clearly with their areas, while others are thematically more of a stretch. It was just about finding the right match, and arranging accordingly - one Prelude, named after Pickwick (of Dickens' Pickwick Papers) originally contained a long quotation of "Rule Britannia" which I took out of my arrangement because we thought it would prove to be too distracting otherwise.

“[Debussy’s] music has found a new context, a new life, and new audiences, almost a century after it was written.”

Dan Golding, March 30th 2020

How did you balance the chaos of the goose in the compositions ?

The game balances the chaos itself pretty well, I think. Our dynamic music system is, I think, quite elegant in its simplicity though it took some time to figure out (and no small part of that credit goes to Nico who was the one at House House doing the bulk of the audio programming). Basically, I split each Prelude into around 200-400 'stems', or musical phrases of around 1-3 seconds each. Then, I created two versions of each Prelude, one at a high energy, and one with low. The game plays through each Prelude from start to finish, but decides which version (high or low energy) of the cue to play depending on what you're doing in the game - or whether there should be silence. So it's really quite responsive and will fairly accurately comment on what you're doing with only a few seconds of buffer, which is great. If you're causing mischief and being chased, the music should be loud and chaotic. If you're quietly hiding in wait, the game should be silent, too.

What has surprised you the most about the compositions created during gameplay?

I'm totally thrilled whenever I see someone upload a moment of gameplay which has music that perfectly comments on the action. The hope was that players would feel like there was a pianist, sitting in the corner watching you play, and tinkering along, and quite a few of the videos I've seen have nailed that feeling. It's incredibly satisfying.

How do you think Debussy would react to his work in Untitled Goose Game?

That's a great question. Debussy was an experimenter and a pioneer, so I have no real reason to think that he'd be against this kind of use of his work. He disliked Wagner and the Germanic tradition of overly-illustrative music for the stage (i.e. character walks on stage, their theme plays), so I think he'd like that the music is used for mood rather than any kind of leitmotiv narrative instruction for the player. He was also really big on nature as an inspiration (probably his greatest work is still Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun), so I think he'd also see the affinity between the game and his music. As far as I know Debussy never wrote anything for film, though of course he lived through its early era, but one of his closest friends was the composer Eric Satie, who only a few years after Debussy's death wrote an original score for an experimental film called Entr'acte, so by association I have to assume that Debussy wouldn't be against the idea of music for the moving image, too. You never know, but I'd hope that he'd like it, and enjoy the fact that his music has found a new context, a new life, and new audiences, almost a century after it was written.

Interviewed by Benjamin Rait on March 30th, 2020