Ultima VIII: Pagan Soundtrack

Ultima VIII: Pagan Soundtrack, Nenad Vugrinec, 1994

In case the cover art, with its flame-engulfed pentagram, did not make it clear enough, Ultima VIII: Pagan was a far darker game than any of its predecessors. From Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar onwards, series creator Richard Garriott had turned the Ultima games into explorations of morality. These pioneering titles did not reward players for the usual monster-killing and treasure-hunting that govern most RPGs. Instead, Garriott asked them to act virtuously while pondering ethical dilemmas with no easy answer. Pagan followed the same design philosophy, but added a grim twist. The game’s antagonist, the Guardian, transports the Avatar to his own realm, Pagan: a blasted wasteland seemingly beyond redemption or hope.

Worse still, winning the game, in the sense of defeating its enemies, inevitably brings suffering to the people of Pagan. As Garriott put it: “The challenge was that you had to stay true to your core personal beliefs without totally ransacking the place to achieve your ends and work with the system that was there.” He coupled this change of tone with a style of play previously unseen in an Ultima title. Pagan was an isometric hack-and-slash, not far removed from Diablo, released two years later. Unfortunately, all of these ambitions were undermined by publisher Electronic Arts, which once again imposed a punishing deadline on developer Origin. As a result, the released version of Pagan was effectively incomplete. Consequently, it has long remained one of the Ultima series’ black sheep, even if it is often admired for the daring way it reinvents the franchise’s universe.

Scoring duties for Pagan fell to Origin composer Nenad Vugrinec. Since contributing to Wing Commander II: Vengeance of the Kilrathi in 1991, Vugrinec had worked on several Origin titles in various capacities, including Ultima VI: The False Prophet and Ultima VII: The Black Gate. His most significant assignment before Pagan had been the flight music for Strike Commander. It is worth noting that by 1994, the Ultima series, despite its immense historical significance and general quality, had not produced much truly great music, with spin-off Ultima: Worlds of Adventure 2 – Martian Dreams being the major exception. The Black Gate had featured a more substantial soundtrack than previous mainline PC entries, but the result was pleasant rather than genuinely striking.

With the Ultima VIII: Pagan soundtrack, Vugrinec produced the first score for a mainline Ultima game that comes close to matching the franchise’s lofty reputation, if only partially. In keeping with the game’s narrative, his music is far darker and more sepulchral than anything previously written for the series. It is not difficult to hear the score as a stylistic precursor to Matt Uelmen’s Diablo, though that later work is less traditionally orchestral than Pagan. At times, Vugrinec even edges into horror territory, although the effect is eerie rather than frightening. Unsurprisingly, the soundtrack maintains a heavy, suffocating atmosphere that rarely allows even a brief shaft of light through the gloom. What is intriguing is that the obviously artificial quality of Vugrinec’s MIDI samples strengthens the score’s uncanniness rather than detracting from it, making the music sound as though it were emanating from some alien and deeply unsettling realm.

That description does not necessarily promise the most engaging listening experience. Arguably, parts of the Ultima VIII: Pagan soundtrack can become a rather dreary slog, with drifting compositions moving from one downcast idea to the next without much connective tissue. Yet when Vugrinec takes a more melody-driven approach, he creates a tangibly Gothic sorrow that makes the world of Pagan, and the suffering bound up with it, feel emotionally legible. He lays out his intentions on “Pagan Theme”, whose morbid string melodies, backed by pounding timpani and wordless choir, establish the setting with real effectiveness. There is a palpable sense of foreboding and hopelessness poisoning the air. Still, Vugrinec does not surrender the music entirely to despair, allowing solo vocals to lend it a little humanity and distant warmth.

“Pagan Theme” lays the groundwork not only for the score’s mood, but also for its thematic basis. Its principal theme for the world of Pagan is a pained, ponderous string melody that progresses in even steps while circling the same group of notes: constantly moving, yet never truly advancing, unable to escape the rut in which it is trapped. The theme returns several times throughout the score, and bookends it on the closing track “Endgame”, though usually in much the same heavy-hearted form as on the opener. Vugrinec’s goal, in the end, is not elaborate thematic transformation so much as the creation of a potent and pervasive atmosphere.

And that atmosphere he sustains beautifully across much of the soundtrack. Vugrinec writes a commendable amount of melodic material that varies meaningfully from track to track while keeping the score’s emotional climate consistently anguished. “The Docks” and “Reef” carefully balance dread with melodies steeped in sombre melodrama, while the bass-heavy orchestrations drag the music ever deeper into the pits of despair. “Cemetery” and “Catacombs” introduce subtler shifts in emphasis. The former’s twisted ecclesiastical character, created through its reliance on choral voices, is entirely apt, while the latter uses a starker palette to heighten the score’s natural creepiness. Other cues lighten the mood without surrendering the soundtrack’s prevailing pessimism. There are the empowering double-bass rhythms and heraldic brass calls of “Shrine of the Ancient Ones”, and the surprisingly well-developed piano writing of “Ethereal Plane”, which communicates the new setting with welcome freshness.

A handful of other tracks bring further variety and depth to what might otherwise have become a rather drab score in the hands of a lesser composer. “Tenebrae” surprises with lithe flute melodies and tambourine accompaniment. At first it suggests a reprise of the medievalisms found on earlier Ultima scores. Yet once Vugrinec places these apparently carefree rhythms inside the score’s habitual ghoulish atmosphere, what might once have sounded like a light-hearted dance begins to resemble an almost satanic ritual. “Combat” is the soundtrack’s only genuinely fast-paced cue. It flows surprisingly well despite its fragmented material, hurtling from one frantic section to the next, held together less by melodic development than by sheer breathless momentum.

Finally, “The Path of Water” evokes awe and mystery rather than dread through its unusually treble-heavy orchestration, which contrasts beautifully with the soundtrack’s otherwise brooding demeanour. Woodwind melodies flare up like beacons in the darkness against ruminative deep strings, while glacial tempi suggest a world suspended in frozen time. Like the game it accompanies, the Ultima VIII: Pagan soundtrack does not always land its ideas. But when it does, the results are genuinely captivating.