Opera soundtrack for e-sports

As a prominent traditional art form, Qinqiang Opera, known as the "oldest rock on the Loess Plateau", has been loved by people in northwestern China for generations.

Recently, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive released a new song titled Hualian (painted face), highlighting the art of Qinqiang Opera, to celebrate the fifth anniversary of its launch in China. It's the first Chinese music work presented in the multiplayer first-person shooter game since 2012. CS: GO aims to showcase the Chinese spirit with this song.

The creative team included three experts on Qinqiang Opera, an intangible cultural heritage of China, and a young composer.

Poet and cultural scholar Xue Baoqin wrote the lyrics while Zhao Yangwu, who once won China's most influential drama honor — the Chinese Drama Plum Blossom Award, played the role of the lead singer. Finally, Luo Xinchang, the Qinqiang Opera performer and artistic director of the youth troupe of the Shaanxi Opera Research Institute, composed the music for the song along with young composer Zhu Hongliang.

The process of creating the song took four months.

Hualian is an alternative name for the jing character in Qinqiang Opera, which symbolizes dramatic images with different personalities and rich emotions.

The lyrics of the Qinqiang Opera piece "depict weird expressions in black and white, and a life of pain and happiness, with exaggeration", setting the main tone of the game song.

"Hualian portrays each of us: whether it is a colorful face on the stage or a player in the game, regardless of age, gender or nationality, we are all striving to pursue our own existence value in the world," Luo says.

For the composition and arrangement, the creative team used drums and other percussion instruments to portray the rhythm of the fierce battle. The rousing suona, a traditional woodwind instrument, symbolizes the bravery and fearlessness of the warrior, while the high-pitched spoken words express the players' unrestrained attitude perfectly. They have added some name phrases from the game into the lyrics as little surprises for players to discover.

"The resounding Qinqiang Opera is exciting and spontaneous, which fits the atmosphere of fighting, battling, siege and winning during the game. The modern, innovative Qinqiang Opera and the game perfectly match," says Luo.

"In Hualian, we integrate traditional culture and youth trends, extract the 'universal spirit' that all people can understand, and transform the spirit into a musical work that young people can easily enjoy," he adds.

CS: GO is one of the most internationalized e-sports games with a large user base and wide distribution, covering more than 100 countries and regions, with more than 40 million monthly active users. The company aims to promote the "spirit of fairness and cooperation" and encourages game players to challenge themselves.

The service in China is exclusively operated by Perfect World Esports, a leading Chinese e-sports and gaming platform. Since the game's launch in the country in September 2017, it has charged players with "positive energy".

Sam Gu, senior vice-president of Perfect World Investment & Holding Group, says most players of CS: GO are from Generation Z, born between mid-to-late 1990s to early 2010s.

He says young Chinese have a strong sense of belonging to their traditional culture, and are willing to take the initiative to understand that.

The launch of Hualian in the game has generated an enthusiastic response among players, says Gu. "We received many comments, advice and rearrangements from young players on various platforms."

The song has also brought younger and older people closer. Some players have left comments on social media saying that when they are playing CS: GO at home and when the music comes out, their grandparents also show up to enjoy the music together.

"My grandfather always asks me to play the song," one player says.

"Traditional culture will never grow old. Listening to Qinqiang Opera is not only a favorite entertainment for the elders, but it is also becoming a daily routine and hobby for young players," Luo says.

Gu says the cooperation is just the start.

Relying on the country's intangible cultural heritage, CS: GO China has explored projects related to players, and carried out cross-border cooperation with relevant cultural institutions, obtaining surprising results.

For example, the company worked with the Longquan Sword Factory in Zhejiang province to create a claw knife and a skeleton dagger in the game through traditional forging methods. The Longquan sword, a heritage unit of intangible culture, and traditional craftsmanship, is explained in a documentary that lasts 4.5 minutes.

Gu says with advantages in digital technology, creativity and innovation, Perfect World Esports will continue to explore the treasures of intangible cultural heritage, find the connecting points between traditional culture and modern life, and fulfill its mission of promoting Chinese culture.

"CS: GO is inclusive and we have a diverse user base that embraces different cultures and spirits. We will continue to explore China's intangible cultural heritage, and integrate it into events and forms for young people to appreciate," Gu says.