How does procedural music work in Death Stranding 2?

In Death Stranding 2, procedural music is part of how the world breathes. From the very first reveal to behind-the-scenes moments shared by the team, it’s clear that it is pushing things beyond the first game. Instead of simply layering pre-written songs over scenes, Hideo Kojima and his team have built a system where music grows, shifts, and reacts to what you're doing, moment to moment.

For a bit of comparison, games like No Man’s Sky also used procedural music, with the band 65daysofstatic building a dynamic system that changed tone depending on which planet or biome you were exploring.

Let's take a look at what procedural music is in Death Stranding 2.

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Understanding procedural music in Death Stranding 2

Rebuilding tracks using musical theory

Geoff Keighley, along with the team of DS 2 (Image via PlayStation)

During the DS2 premiere event at the Orpheum Theatre, hosted by Geoff Keighley, Woodkid (Yoann Lemoine), who worked on over a dozen tracks for Death Stranding 2, including To the Wilder, explained how the procedural music system took a more “nerdy” route, in the best way possible.

Instead of placing full songs in scenes, they reverse-engineered music to function in layers. These were rebuilt into samplers, allowing the game engine to piece together melodies and harmonies live, based on what’s happening in the title.

A cool detail is that Rainy’s theme, also composed by Yoann, wasn’t just added later in post-production. It was played live on set during a rain scene to help actress Shioli Kutsuna sync her emotions with the mood of the moment.

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To the Wilder was built from the script

Woodkid in conversation with Geoff (Image via PlayStation)

The track To the Wilder wasn’t written randomly. Kojima walked into the office with a script and asked for a song that could carry the game's tone. After going through the script, Woodkid focused on the idea of “wilderness” – not just as a setting, but as something internal.

The title came from some early humming sessions, and the lyrics flowed naturally. Everything else was then built around that one theme – isolation, growth, survival – and it all ties into the wider story of Death Stranding 2.

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Actors became part of the music, too

Troy Baker (Higgs) didn’t just voice his lines. Kojima noticed his musical talents during the COVID lockdown after watching him sing on YouTube with a guitar. He was so impressed that he asked Yoji to design a custom guitar for Higgs in the game and made Troy sing in more scenes.

According to Kojima, there’s a lot of Troy Baker singing in Death Stranding 2.

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Sam's journey shapes the tone of the music

In the first game, Sam was alone most of the time. But in Death Stranding 2, once you reconnect the Chiral Network, you get access to a form of mental space where characters like Tomorrow and Rainy join him. As you form stronger connections with them, the music therein changes too.

It’s meant to reflect the emotional progression. These characters are fragile and lonely at first, but as your bond grows, so does the warmth in the soundtrack. It's not forced or announced – it’s just part of the experience.

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