The concept for
Space Channel 5 originated when
Tetsuya Mizuguchi—then known for his work on racing games—was contacted by
Sega to develop a game for the Dreamcast aimed at a female casual gaming demographic. Mizuguchi had no knowledge of such a demographic, so he personally interviewed several young girls to find their tastes in gaming. He discovered that, while male gamers trended towards games that allowed for ranking and high scores, women preferred straight puzzle games. Mizuguchi decided to create a game which would bring together both video game and music fans, using his personal experience with nightclub disco and music events such as
Street Parade. He also drew inspiration from the art of
Wassily Kandinsky, wanting to encourage a form of
synesthesia within players. Other sources of inspiration were the music of the 1950s and 60s, and the music videos of
Peter Gabriel and
Michael Jackson that were showing on
MTV during the 80s. This concept originated in 1993, with full production beginning in 1998 following extensive internal planning and approval by Sega senior staff. Production was handled by
Sega AM9, later known as United Game Artists. The team included many staff from
Team Andromeda (makers of
Panzer Dragoon) and the
Sonic the Hedgehog series, and others who were complete newcomers to game development. Development for the game lasted almost two years. Beginning with a small team of ten, it eventually expanded to 27 members as development progressed. Mizuguchi acted as the game's producer, with Takashi Yuda both directing and providing the voice for supporting character Fuze. The game was Mizuguchi's first time working on a game aimed exclusively at the home console market, as his earlier work had first been developed for
arcades. Speaking about the Dreamcast, Mizuguchi said that it allowed higher-quality music compared to graphics-focused racing games. He wanted to use the new technology to incorporate interactivity into the score. Production was challenging at times due to the balance of gameplay and scenario.
Design The earliest versions of the game were described by Mizuguchi as "very cool, but not so fun", as players simply pressed buttons in time to the music while a non-interactive video changed. To make the game more interesting, Mizuguchi drew inspiration from the rhythm troope
Stomp; a particular piece which inspired him was a segment where a performer would have the audience copy their clapping, with the rhythm becoming more complex over time. Mizuguchi wanted to incorporate this into the game, combining it with a narrative and distinctive music. The rest of the team found it difficult to understand Mizuguchi's vision as they were confused by his wish for comedy to be a part of the game's style, so he hired a pantomime artist to school the team in physical comedy. The production team also went to a comedy workshop to practise miming and physical comedy routines to further inform their understanding of the game. The name of the game's aliens "Morolians" was a derivation of the surname of artist Mayumi Moro; it came about as the team often used her last name around the office. Moro found its use in the game funny. A key aspect of the game was that while the gameplay involved shooting, Ulala never actually killed anyone, allowing the game to be approachable to a wider range of players. When pitching the gameplay in his design document, Mizuguchi distilled the basic cycle of effort and reward, then came up with a means of realising them in the game. To ensure the team fully understood the gameplay concept of matching button presses to music and character actions, all extraneous effects were stripped away, leaving a basic version the team could focus on. While some animations were created using motion capture, the rest were animated by hand. The vocalization "Chu" emerged during voice recording. The original word was "Shoot", but the actors had difficulty pronouncing it using the necessary single syllable, resulting in the word being contracted and altered into its current form. Ulala's motion capture actions were performed by Japanese dancer Nazu Nahoko. The Morolians' movements were scripted by the mime artist Mizuguchi hired to help the team during early production. The idea of streaming polygonal models over CGI movies was suggested by Yuta. They made use of
ADX technology to synch the movement of models over the movies. The game content filled just over 99% of the Dreamcast
GD-ROM disc. The space usage was attributed by Mizuguchi to the large amount of video and audio streaming used in the game. In hindsight, Mizuguchi cited the use of pre-rendered movies as a challenge to the team. Due to the amount of space used, some planned comedy segments had to be cut. An early tech demo was put together for the game; in this prototype version, the player character was a man, and only the most basic elements of its gameplay and theme were in place. A later version featured a prototype design for Ulala. The game's visual aesthetic of a "retro future" was present in that demo, and stayed throughout production. Influences on the characters and art design came from across the production team, with tastes ranging from
Star Wars to
Doraemon to
Monty Python. Mizuguchi was inspired by the contrasting styles of orchestral music and science fiction setting used in
Star Wars. The character of Ulala was a collaborative creation, though much of her design was attributed to the game's art director Yumiko Miyabe. Ulala's early actions were deemed too "cool and stylish", and her overall movement too stiff. Her design was also adjusted several times so she would appeal to male gamers (who favored looks) and female gamers (who preferred personality). Another notable artist on the project was Jake Kazdal, who worked as a concept and model artist. Kazdal said that one of Ulala's key design inspirations was the titular lead of the science fiction film
Barbarella (1968). The art style continued to evolve from there, with the staff often laughing at the "sheer ridiculousness" of some later characters. Her costume's orange colour was a reference to the Dreamcast logo and signified Sega's new direction.
Audio Music The music for
Space Channel 5 was composed by Naofumi Hataya and Kenichi Tokoi of Sega's music label WaveMaster. Hataya also acted as sound director. The musical style, inspired by big band jazz of the 1950s and 60s, was one of the earliest elements to be decided upon. Hataya attributed the game's musical direction to Mizuguchi's guidance throughout production. The musical style changed with each stage, with later sections incorporating
techno and
trance. The in-game soundtrack mixed CD-quality music with midi sound samples. According to Hataya, one of the hardest aspects of music development was the variety of genres and fitting all the score onto the game disc. Music production ran simultaneously with the game's production, with the sound team at first using concept art and in-production gameplay. Late in development, the story caused a lot of additional work for the team. The final total of in-game music was estimated at 70 minutes. The game's main theme was "Mexican Flyer", composed by
Ken Woodman in 1966. Mizuguchi approached Woodman about using the theme. Woodman was surprised that someone wanted to use the theme for a video game. The use of "Mexican Flyer" in the game's early presentation video informed the direction of the music. Getting the rights to the track proved difficult, as the track was extremely obscure and had not been used in any media since its release. The ending theme "Pala Paya" used vocals performed by WaveMaster staff. A soundtrack album for the game was published by
Marvelous Entertainment and distributed by
VAP on February 21, 2000. The album featured 22 tracks, including a remix of "Mexican Flyer". Tracks from
Space Channel 5 were included in the compilation album
Space Channel 5 20th Anniversary: Gyungyun Selection by UMA on December 18, 2019.
Voice cast Sega chose not to promote the game's voice cast. Most of the voice roles were performed by members of the game's staff. This was due to the team wanting full control of how characters were portrayed, and the need to do quick re-recording sessions. Ulala's Japanese voice actress was similarly pulled from Sega staff. According to Mizuguchi, the recording process was so strenuous, and his demands so exacting that the actress was brought to tears. Journalist James Mielke attributed Ulala's voice to Mineko Okamura. Okamura later confirmed her role, saying her demo voice was kept in the final game after positive feedback from the press. Professionals
Show Hayami and Kae Iida were hired for the roles of rival reporters Jaguar and Pudding respectively, with Iida originally being planned for the role of Ulala. Ulala was voiced in English by
Apollo Smile, then a notable television personality. A notable cameo was
Michael Jackson himself, featuring in the game as the character "Space Michael". A long-term collaborator with and fan of Sega, Jackson was shown a near-finished version of the game by Sega staff member Shuji Utsumi. Jackson loved the game and wanted to be featured in it. Mizuguchi initially wanted to refuse the request, as the game was only a month away from completion, but the team wanted to include Jackson, so they substituted a Morolian-controlled NPC character for a model based on Jackson and added moves based on the singer's famous dance moves. Initially thinking Jackson would dislike it, Mizuguchi was surprised when Jackson approved, realising the pressures the team were under, and provided voice lines for the character. ==Release==