Uncharted Waters (Series, Multi-Platform)
Music by Yoko Kanno (b. 1963) and Others
Uncharted Waters (Daikoukai Jidai[1]) primarily functions as a Strategy/Turn-Based Role-Playing Game (RPG) series. The series has existed since 1990 and has garnered sequels in Japan and other areas in Asia. The first few games concern fictitious European and British explorers, pirates, and merchants who must gather enough money, resources, and a ship crew to travel to the “New World” within a set time limit scenario (denoted by a finite number of "years" to complete the main objective, which would also cause the playable characters to age). Each scenario differs depending on the given character, who also can often have their own distinct musical theme, like in the sequel Uncharted Waters: New Horizons.
Later installments in the Uncharted Waters series would change video game mechanics and genres by eliminating the character aging and incorporating the Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG) structure and “Pay to Play” mobile gaming for computers and smartphones via Uncharted Waters Online (2004) and Uncharted Waters Origin (2022). These specific attempts at updating the series have produced mixed results. The games depend on having a stable Internet connection, a strong Internet server to manage the game through timed seasonal events, a large player base with humans who interact with each other online, and the willingness from the players to spend real money on in-game purchases to keep playing online and mobile games to unlock more content.
I must add as a disclaimer that the video games in the Uncharted Water series do not aim for historical accuracy. They focus instead on exploration and adventure, albeit through a romanticized lens. They additionally serve as a Japanese cultural reinterpretation of European colonialism through Strategy and RPG genres. Historians and researchers who specialize in colonialism, African Studies, and Latin American Studies should take note about the romanticized colonialism that permeates the Uncharted Waters games and approach the series with caution. The games feature glaring historiographical omissions: most notably, the absence of Transatlantic Enslavement and its impact on Africans in Europe and the Americas in the “New World.”
The soundtracks to the Uncharted Waters series include music that openly reflects genres associated with geographical regions from Iberia,[2] Latin America, and the Caribbean: from Spanish flamenco to reggae from the Anglophone Caribbean, to bossa nova from Brazil. Yoko Kanno also incorporates instruments from within these music cultures, either through synthesized interpretations or through orchestral arrangements. Audiences can clearly hear the etic cultural influences from outside Japan through the Spanish and Portuguese guitars, castanets and other percussion, accordion, and the application of modal scales. However, these same soundtracks also tend to rely on musical exoticism and deviations from historical accuracy by incorporating jazz and popular music. In some instances, such musical elements can combine to produce cultural confusion within the time periods that the Uncharted Waters games attempt to represent (such as the bossa nova: a musical genre from Brazil that did not come into existence until the late twentieth century, especially through its global popularity in the 1960s).
About the Playlist
I present a selection of tracks from the Uncharted Waters games that musically depict Iberia, Latin American, and the Caribbean. The playlist can be found on my YouTube channel at ZEKE SPILLED INK MUSIC under “Playlists” via Iberian, Latin American, and Caribbean Elements in VGM, Part 1: Uncharted Waters. It should be interpreted as part of an expansive listening guide in multiple sections and not something “complete” or “definitive.” Uncharted Waters features other sequels besides New Horizons. The series continued with the following in Japan and in different regions in Asia:
Daikoukai Jidai III: Costa del Sol (1996)
Daikoukai Jidai Gaiden (1997)
Daikoukai Jidai IV: Porto Estado (1999)
Daikoukai Jidai IV: Rota Nova (2006)
Daikoukai Jidai V: Road to Zipang (2014)
Daikoukai Jidai IV (2019)
Uncharted Waters (1990)
Uncharted Waters: New Horizons (1993)
Uncharted Waters Online (2004)
Uncharted Waters Origin (2022)
Uncharted Waters II: Special Edition (1994)[6]
[1] Age of Exploration
[2] I use “Iberia” within this context to refer to Spain and Portugal.”
[3] The title to this track often uses the spelling “Joan.” It also deserves mention that the melody to the “A” section of this theme bears a striking similarity to the main melody to the verses in the song “Allentown” by Billy Joel (b. 1949) from his 1982 album The Nylon Curtain. The main difference between the two tracks lies in the meter, with “Allentown” in duple meter and “Caprice for Lute” in triple meter. Whether Yoko Kanno drew inspiration from “Allentown” or composed the melody subconsciously remains unclear.
[4] Uncharted Waters Origin lifts some tracks for the video game from other recordings. This track derives from an album with orchestral arrangements of tracks from the first Uncharted Waters game.
[5] This track is another synthesized instrumenetal arrangement of “Empty Eyes” from Uncharted Waters: New Horizons.
[6] This is a musical album with orchestral arrangements of tracks from Uncharted Waters: New Horizons.
Later installments in the Uncharted Waters series would change video game mechanics and genres by eliminating the character aging and incorporating the Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG) structure and “Pay to Play” mobile gaming for computers and smartphones via Uncharted Waters Online (2004) and Uncharted Waters Origin (2022). These specific attempts at updating the series have produced mixed results. The games depend on having a stable Internet connection, a strong Internet server to manage the game through timed seasonal events, a large player base with humans who interact with each other online, and the willingness from the players to spend real money on in-game purchases to keep playing online and mobile games to unlock more content.
I must add as a disclaimer that the video games in the Uncharted Water series do not aim for historical accuracy. They focus instead on exploration and adventure, albeit through a romanticized lens. They additionally serve as a Japanese cultural reinterpretation of European colonialism through Strategy and RPG genres. Historians and researchers who specialize in colonialism, African Studies, and Latin American Studies should take note about the romanticized colonialism that permeates the Uncharted Waters games and approach the series with caution. The games feature glaring historiographical omissions: most notably, the absence of Transatlantic Enslavement and its impact on Africans in Europe and the Americas in the “New World.”
The soundtracks to the Uncharted Waters series include music that openly reflects genres associated with geographical regions from Iberia,[2] Latin America, and the Caribbean: from Spanish flamenco to reggae from the Anglophone Caribbean, to bossa nova from Brazil. Yoko Kanno also incorporates instruments from within these music cultures, either through synthesized interpretations or through orchestral arrangements. Audiences can clearly hear the etic cultural influences from outside Japan through the Spanish and Portuguese guitars, castanets and other percussion, accordion, and the application of modal scales. However, these same soundtracks also tend to rely on musical exoticism and deviations from historical accuracy by incorporating jazz and popular music. In some instances, such musical elements can combine to produce cultural confusion within the time periods that the Uncharted Waters games attempt to represent (such as the bossa nova: a musical genre from Brazil that did not come into existence until the late twentieth century, especially through its global popularity in the 1960s).
About the Playlist
I present a selection of tracks from the Uncharted Waters games that musically depict Iberia, Latin American, and the Caribbean. The playlist can be found on my YouTube channel at ZEKE SPILLED INK MUSIC under “Playlists” via Iberian, Latin American, and Caribbean Elements in VGM, Part 1: Uncharted Waters. It should be interpreted as part of an expansive listening guide in multiple sections and not something “complete” or “definitive.” Uncharted Waters features other sequels besides New Horizons. The series continued with the following in Japan and in different regions in Asia:
Daikoukai Jidai III: Costa del Sol (1996)
Daikoukai Jidai Gaiden (1997)
Daikoukai Jidai IV: Porto Estado (1999)
Daikoukai Jidai IV: Rota Nova (2006)
Daikoukai Jidai V: Road to Zipang (2014)
Daikoukai Jidai IV (2019)
Uncharted Waters (1990)
- “In Lisbom” (“Portugal”)
- “Southern Harbor”
Uncharted Waters: New Horizons (1993)
- “Catalina”
- “Caprice for Lute” (Theme of João”)[3]
- “Empty Eyes”
Uncharted Waters Online (2004)
- “Port”
- “Lisbon”
- “Seville”
- “Credits”
Uncharted Waters Origin (2022)
- “Town New World”
- “Town Seville”
- “Town Lisbon”
- “KY Town Lisbon”[4]
- “KY Town New World”[5]
- “KY Event Ending 1”
Uncharted Waters II: Special Edition (1994)[6]
- “Caprice for Lute”
- “Catalina”
- “Empty Eyes”
[1] Age of Exploration
[2] I use “Iberia” within this context to refer to Spain and Portugal.”
[3] The title to this track often uses the spelling “Joan.” It also deserves mention that the melody to the “A” section of this theme bears a striking similarity to the main melody to the verses in the song “Allentown” by Billy Joel (b. 1949) from his 1982 album The Nylon Curtain. The main difference between the two tracks lies in the meter, with “Allentown” in duple meter and “Caprice for Lute” in triple meter. Whether Yoko Kanno drew inspiration from “Allentown” or composed the melody subconsciously remains unclear.
[4] Uncharted Waters Origin lifts some tracks for the video game from other recordings. This track derives from an album with orchestral arrangements of tracks from the first Uncharted Waters game.
[5] This track is another synthesized instrumenetal arrangement of “Empty Eyes” from Uncharted Waters: New Horizons.
[6] This is a musical album with orchestral arrangements of tracks from Uncharted Waters: New Horizons.
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