“Music, sound effects, audio in general makes up about 70% of a piece of work, including silence. […] Yes, silence is a sound.”
Kojima’s sound doctrine, given to Woodkid, states that music, sound effects and audio in general make up about 70% of a work — including silence, which he counts as a sound — and that this is true for both films and video games. He adds that sound has that level of importance when directing a scene, but that sound always loses out to graphics when hardware memory is allocated. Kojima admits a contradiction: he cannot allow his graphics to fall behind other games, so he has not been able to do as much with sound as he would like, though he says the project they are working on now has all the required memory reserved for audio. He also describes a practical trick of the trade: in a beach scene, adding seagull sounds makes the viewer imagine them without showing them, and in a city, the buzzing of flies makes the audience imagine garbage — which is also less work for the graphics.
“It's the same with movies and video games as well. […] That's how much importance sound has in directing a scene. However, sound always loses to graphics in terms of the hardware memory allocation. […] I can't let the graphics lose to other games, so I haven't been able to do as much as I want with sound. But don't worry, the one we're working on together right now has all the memory needs set aside. […] Or in the city, if you hear the sound of buzzing flies, you can kind of imagine the flies gathering around the trash.”