Far Cry Primal's Gritty and Natural Soundtrack

Set in the 10,000 BCE in central Europe, you control hunter Takkar of the Wenja tribe. As Takkar you must help your tribe survive in Ordos from rival tribes like the Udam and the Izila and from the animal because humans were not at the top of the food chain. The gameplay is FPS like the other games in the series, but there isn't any modern weapons in the game only weapons that can be crafted from things found in the environment like clubs, spears, bows, and rocks shaped into knives. Far Cry Primal was released by Ubisoft on February 23 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One and on March 1 on PC.

The game designers of Primal really wanted the entire experience of the game to be authentic to a time so they hired composer Jason Graves to make them a soundtrack. In an interview by Ubiblog with Jason he was quoted as saying that Primal was a different experience in every way for all of the other games that he has composed for. Graves has worked on all of the Dead Space series, Tomb Raider (2013), Until Dawn and many more. 

To truly capture the feeling of the setting of the game, all of the instruments that Graves used on the soundtrack were out of materials that existed at the time period of the game. Some of the instruments that he used were bamboo, clay pots, dirt, gravel, plants, stones of various sizes, stone flutes, horns made out of horns and a special instrument called the Aztec Death Whistle. Graves wanted to make sure that none of the instruments was non-metal and natural. 

I will talking about three songs that show the variance in the music that Grave created for the game. The song are "Heart of Ordos", "Survival of the Udam", and "Wadijam Izila." 

The "Heart of Ordos" is the main theme for your Wenja village. This song doesn't have as much percussion as the other song and has some stone flute and horn sounds which adds a feeling a of comfort because it is your base of operation in the game. Graves was quoted as saying about the song that its supposed to remind the tribe the idea of ancestry and those who have passed. 

The next song, "Survival Of The Udam," is based on the tribe of the same name Udam. The Udam tribe is the game as very large fierce fighters that are painted with red war paint. The song goes along with the description of the tribe. The music is very guttural, slow and very brooding. There are also some simple male grunting sounds. The song is also very simple when I comes to the natural instruments because the tribe was stronger more than they were creative.

The last song "Wadijam Izila" is for the Izila tribe. This tribe has a strong religious like worship of the fire and sun. They cover themselves in blue paint and like to use more ranged weapons than the Udam because they are not as hulking as the Udam. The Izila tribe relies on spears, bows and there own creation of firebombs. Graves made the music in this song very fast and softer to represent the idea of these fast footed warriors and spread through the song is the use of the Aztec Death Whistle. The Death Whistle when used can create a sound that close to that of a human screaming and the instrument is shaped like a skull to add effect. Those screams add a feeling of fear into the music and that is one of the weapons that the Izila use because they can not meet straight head on in a fight. 

Primal's soundtrack truly shows that fantastic musicians and composers can create music even with the simplest of instruments and Jason Graves knocked it out of the park. I enjoyed this song even more because it came with the deluxe version of the game. This soundtrack opened my eyes into Jason's career as I discovered that he made the soundtrack to some of my favorite games. If you want to check out the soundtrack you can listen to the whole thing on YouTube or buy it on iTunes or Amazon as well. Thanks for reading everyone and keep on jammin'.