Akira Yamaoka, the composer for the Silent Hill games, has taken up a new posting at Grasshopper Manufacture – the team behind No More Heroes and Killer 7.

Yamaoka’s impressive résumé includes seminal games from Silent Hill, Contra, Rumble Roses and an old favourite of mine, Rocket Knight Adventures. He left Konami after 17 years but may still return to composing music for future Silent Hill games. Goichi Suda (otherwise called Suda51) has known Yamaoka for ages and says the new working relationship came naturally to them. Speaking to Famitsu magazine Suda stated “I really love Yamaoka… Ever since I saw a video of Silent Hill 2 at the Tokyo Game Show nine years ago, I’ve always dreamed of working alongside him.”

Yamaoka himself is just as excited with his new job – “It was a case of really good timing… I knew about Suda long before I met him; I saw Grasshopper as one of those few Japanese outfits whose games can appeal to an overseas audience. I had a chance to meet him in Los Angeles and we talked about this and that, and once we started discussing how we wanted to do something creative for a world audience, I was hooked on the company.”

The really awesome news? Yamaoka has produced a little bit of music for the upcoming No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle, a game that features a collaborative soundtrack. Not only that, but he will be composing the score for the yet-to-be-unveiled collaboration between Suda51 and Shinji Mikami, the father of Resident Evil.

Source: Famitsu via 1up.com