Legendary digital artist, composer, photographer and graphic designer Osamu Sato is one of the more elusive and enigmatic artists that emerged from 20th Century Japan.

Born in 1960, Sato is the man behind the legendary PS1 game LSD: Dream Simulator that was only released in Japan in 1998, since Sony didn’t believe it would translate to the overseas market at the time. However, the game has received an immense cult following in latter years - especially in online circles.

The game is notorious in the world of video game deep divers, as well as the maestro’s first game Eastern Mind - The Lost Souls of Tong Nou that was released in 1994 for Mac and PC.

GATA Magazine managed to get an exclusive interview with the elusive creator as he works on his next album.

“During the Covid-19 disaster, I spent a lot of time in Kyoto, where I was born. I’ve lived in Tokyo longer than in Kyoto and this was my first extended stay there since setting up my home base in Tokyo more than 30 years ago,” Osamu says. “Living in Kyoto again caused me to ruminate on memories from as far back as I can remember, which led me to reflect on my own roots. In addition, my parents recently passed away, which also made me think about my roots,” Sato says.

As a young boy, Sato made multiple visits to the Expo World’s Fair in Osaka in 1970. Art and architecture movements such as constructivism, futurism and bauhaus have had a great impact on Sato’s work and those visits as an impressionable child formed a large part of his artistic foundation.

“My father was a photographer and he’d frequently go to the Expo to shoot pictures for his job at the newspaper, so I would often accompany him. I felt very excited every time I went there - it made the future seem expansive.”

Sato’s work is also heavily informed by buddhism but his father Asahi and his grandfather Tatsuzo both avidly photographed buddhist art. “My grandfather, my father and I are imaginary collaborators. They are the reason I’m here today. Those may be my original roots and I feel that one day I will be connected to the Buddha by tracing my ancestors who’ve been in my family for a long time.”

Osamu grew up on Western music such as classic rock, punk and new wave but the moment he discovered Kraftwerk’s The Man Machine was when he became fully immersed in the world of techno and electronic music - as well as design. “I just bought up all the techno music I could find and listened to all the Kraftwerk and Yellow Magic Orchestra-related music, for example. It was called contemporary electronic music at the time - tape music.”

“I didn’t receive any academic musical education, and in fact when I was a high school student, I bought an electric guitar once and quickly got frustrated. That’s why I thought I would never make or play music.”

The LSD: Dream Emulator game and soundtrack are freaky and transcendental works of art that still mystify and intrigue like nothing else. The game itself is based on a dream diary that a staff member of Osamu’s old video developing company, Outside Directors Co. Ltd., kept for over a decade.

“Dreams are really a bunch of absurdities. If you try to judge the dream, you can interpret it in any way. That’s why the game itself is full of absurdity,” he states.

At the time of the release, three CD’s were put out as well as an accompanying dream diary book. Sato and his crew would even hook up the PlayStation and project the game onto the walls of nightclubs, while techno music boomed through the speakers during club nights.

“I thought that these experiments, combined with the absurdity of the game, would spread through word of mouth. In fact, only a few people were amused by it at the time. The infrastructure of the internet hadn’t quite matured yet, had it?” Sato ponders.

“The expanse of the internet has exploded in the last ten years. Actually, Eastern Mind was released in the US at the time but LSD was never released. However, recently it has garnered a lot of interest. It was even remade as a playable demo without my permission and the original game is being traded at a premium price. Through this newfound interest, Sony received a lot of inquiries and it became accessible as a download on PSN in Japan.”

Osamu Sato continues to innovate as an artist and musician. He tells us that fans often ask him to collaborate, but “he has no desire to do so at the moment”.

“One person, one individual. I feel at home now, immersed in the creation of artwork that can be completed by one person and one person alone.”