Short answers, pulled from the story.
Rika Muranaka studied jazz piano with Alan Swain in Chicago after leaving her native Tokyo as a teenager. She graduated from Maine East High School in Park Ridge in 1979 and attended Northeastern Illinois University.
Columbia Records offered Rika Muranaka a deal in 1992 that resulted in four album releases. Her debut CD Slice of Life came out that same year featuring vocalists Dwight Dukes, Cynthia Harrell, and Stephanie B.
Rika Muranaka maintained an almost twenty-year working relationship with Hideo Kojima on the Metal Gear Solid game series while employed by Konami. The team creating the game consisted of only about 20 people when they began the project.
Rika Muranaka composed the song I Am the Wind for Castlevania: Symphony of the Night during her time at Konami. She collaborated with Akira Yamaoka to create music for this title and the classic horror game Silent Hill.
In games the music has to fit within a game meaning you have to make a transition every 30 seconds and it has to be loopable. For film you actually have a trailer or something to work with so you can use a time code to fit the music perfectly within a scene.