ULTRAMUSIC review: prelude


By A badly drawn wobbler | Published 28 Feb 2024 | Updated 02 Mar 2024

ULTRAKILL is a game of all time. It also has my favourite OST of all time. I will shill it to you and you cannot stop me.

On todays episode of UltraMusicShilling, I’ll just do the prelude so you don’t have to stay for that long. Don’t expect the same luxuries on the next couple of posts because then I’m going act-by-act.

Menu Music: The fire is gone

This is such a calming song for what is otherwise an insanely violent game. Sounds about right for menu music though. It just has that cozy vibe you get from them. The name is also downbeat for a game which has an all-caps bolded industrial looking title of ULTRAKILL (This is what is known in the industry as “foreshadowing”).

Layer 0: OVERTURE: MOUTH OF HELL

Theres a small intro tutorial that you never play again and doesn’t actually have music so moving on.

PRELUDE /// FIRST: INTO THE FIRE (and more)

Oh look the fire is back

Now this is more like it! While it starts mostly ambient, with the ambient hum of machinery and random things hitting against eachother in the distance, that hum starts to get louder, until you find

le title drop

Now the music just GOES. Unlike most ultraviolent FPS games, the beginning isn’t a metal or heavy soundtrack, but just straight up breakcore, and that amen break is putting in some WORK. It’s not that complex and is fairly easy to listen to like most of this games soundtrack (there is that one exception however. You’ll see that next time).

The only sad part about this song is that it’s reused in 0-2 and 0-3. It is the only case of this in the whole game though, so it isnt that bad. On the bright side, it means theres less for you to endure in this blog post before you’re let free.

5 cerberi / 7 maurices

PRELUDE /// FOURTH: A ONE-MACHINE ARMY

More break per core.

This is a remix of Into the fire, and sounds like what would be V1s theme song. It doesn’t sound distinct enough that I have any other new thoughts compared to Into the fire.

5 maurices / 7 cerberi

PRELUDE /// CLIMAX: CERBERUS

Wait this ain’t no dog-

I don’t know how to describe this song other than heavy. It’s bass-only-filtered drum samples, the crunchy ear-piercing synth (if you can even call it a a synth), the dark grungy drone noises, it just sounds like it will beat you to death.

6 three-headed-dogs / 9 YOUHAVEUNOITCOMESFREEWITHYOURXBOX-

FREEDOM! (temporarily)

And thats all the music from the prelude. Yeah, not much, but hey it’s a taste for the chaos that is about to come. So prepare yourself to be kept in for longer because the next post is going to contain 19 pieces!