History SoundtrackDissonance / VideoGames

* Towards the end of VideoGame/GuitarHero III, you and your band are dragged down to Hell and must play a gig to free yourself from the devil’s contract. Songs in the set list include “One” by {{Music/Metallica}}, “The Number of the Beast” by Music/IronMaiden, “Raining Blood” by {{Music/Slayer}}, all of which fits the hellish aesthetic... but then there's the rather uplifting and definitely not hellish “Cliffs of Dover” by Music/EricJohnson.

* An unintentional example happens in ''VideoGame/SpyroYearOfTheDragon'', due to a glitch. The final boss battle is backed, not by a dramatic battle theme, but by the theme of the game's first hub world. Only applies in the [[ObviousBeta initial US release]] however. The European version recycles a boss theme from earlier in the game, and the Greatest Hits re-release gives the battle its own proper battle theme, which is kept in the ''[[VideoGame/SpyroReignitedTrilogy Reignited Trilogy]]''.

** For fans of the ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog'' games, it's also rather jarring to hear the [[EternalEngine Scrap Brain Zone]] theme playing in a stage based on ''[[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog1 the]]'' GreenHillZone.

** Do you enjoy running over pedestrians and destroying all the vehicles you come across with all over [[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoViceCity Vice City]] while listening to romantic music like "Tempted" or "Africa"? Emotion 98.3 is the station for you.

* ''VisualNovel/DokiDokiLiteratureClub'' starts out as a lighthearted RomanceGame, or AffectionateParody of one, with a soundtrack to match. After the SurpriseCreepy GenreShift sets in, it still mostly uses the same soundtrack.

* ''VideoGame/Mother3'': During the final boss fight, the battle music starts off with a heavy bass line with some creepy distortion, but as the battle goes on, [[spoiler:it fades into a soft leitmotif of the Love Theme, while Claus's attacks get weaker and he starts to [[IKnowYoureInThereSomewhereFight regain control of his emotions]]]].
** Another example from ''VideoGame/Mother3'': In Chapter 1 of the game, [[spoiler:Flint goes berserk after hearing of his wife's death, injuring two of the town folk with a two by four, while a lovely piano song plays in the background.]]

** Whose idea was it to put "Eight Melodies" into the second BGM mix for the [[VideoGame/EarthBound Onett]] stage anyway?

* An unintentional example happens in ''VideoGame/SpyroYearOfTheDragon'', due to a glitch. The final boss battle is backed, not by a dramatic battle theme, but by the theme of the game's first hub world. Only applies in the [[ObviousBeta initial US release]] however. The European version recycles a boss theme from earlier in the game, and the Greatest Hits re-release gives the battle its own proper battle theme.

* ''Buck Bumble'', a somewhat obscure bee-themed CuteEmUp for N64. The music? [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEEkyp2UdAc Drum-and-bass]], of course!

* Throughout ''Panel de Pon'', the music remains pretty calm and happy to fit the mood, but if you manage to beat hard mode, you are confronted by the real Final boss. The music it plays during her battle and when she first appears sounds more like it should be in ''Final Fantasy'', especially when in danger mode.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'' video game has a level with music that sounds directly like it came out of a Franchise/JamesBond movie, but when you enter an elevator, the Bond music stops for about ten seconds and is replaced by elevator music.

* The battle music in the ''[[VideoGame/MarioAndLuigi Mario & Luigi]]'' games is usually fast-paced and energetic, but in ''Partners in Time'' the final battle theme is a slow, somewhat melancholy theme.

* The ending credits theme for most video games is a triumphant or happy piece, or a medley of the various songs throughout the game. However, in ''[[VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiPartnersInTime Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time]]'', the ending credits theme is instead played by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujQwJdykk68 a very sinister-sounding oom-pah band]] for some odd reason

** While [[Franchise/KingdomHearts Sora's]] addition to the roster was [[SugarWiki/AndTheFandomRejoiced much welcomed,]] the soundtrack selections he brought with him were more hit-or-miss, due to the fact that all of them came from ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts1'' exclusively. This is a particular problem for spirit battles, because other than Kairi and Riku[[labelnote:*]](and Riku still has this problem to a lesser extent due to not getting his own {{Leitmotif}} until ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'')[[/labelnote]], every other ''Kingdom Hearts'' spirit comes from a game ''after'' the first one, meaning [[AwesomeMusic/KingdomHearts iconic boss themes]] like "The 13th Struggle" (for Axel), "Vector to the Heavens" (Xion), and especially "The Other Promise" (Roxas), were left out of their owners' spirit battles and replaced with more generic choices (like "Destati" for Roxas, a song that he has never been associated with before ''Smash''). One of the first things many {{Game Mod}}ders did after Sora's release was patch the appropriate songs back in.

** ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry3DixieKongsDoubleTrouble'' has an incredibly moody, restrained soundtrack which contrasts ''very'' heavily with how silly and cartoony the rest of the game is (even compared to its predecessors). The contrast ends up giving it a rather creepy and unnatural vibe that pushes it squarely into DarkerAndEdgier territory. You think swimming a coral reef around as a literal giant baby steering a goofy fish into munching on even goofier clownfish (complete with CHOMP and BURP sound effects) sounds like silly, light hearted camp? [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrP5QuCcBZM&list=PL1vrUSpeKCa04qze_1Ia9js5QZEQRj2qv&index=9 Think again]].

*** When the game was [[UpdatedRerelease ported to the GBA]], the music was redone, including the trees track being replaced by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7fbzUxEkLE this]] ditty. However, one of these levels involves a giant saw destroying the tree under you. To quote one of the Website/YouTube comments:

---> "This song does not suit a situation involving a rising bandsaw. It just doesn't." It ''does'', however, fit the situation for every other stage with that theme, which includes things like jumping spiders and monkeys throwing coconuts.

** When ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry3DixieKongsDoubleTrouble'' was [[UpdatedRerelease ported to the GBA]], the music was redone, including [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7fbzUxEkLE this]] ditty for levels taking place inside the trees. However, one of these levels involves a giant saw destroying the tree under you. To quote one of the Website/YouTube comments:
---> "This song does not suit a situation involving a rising bandsaw. It just doesn't."
** It ''does'', however, fit the situation for every other stage with that theme. (Bouncing spiders and monkeys throwing coconuts, for example.)

* ''VideoGame/MarvelVsCapcom2'' features epic battles between uber-powerful warriors and friggin' ''superheroes'', yet it's scored with a bizarre mix of elevator muzak and lounge tunes that would be out of place in pretty much any setting that isn't an elevator or a lounge. The absurd dissonance here is about on par with using zydeco music in ''Silent Hill'', and even better: you can neither turn it off nor adjust the volume. Oh, it's gonna take you for a ride, all right...

* ''VideoGame/TheWorldEndsWithYou'' hardly has any dramatic music as boss music; only one song plays exclusively during boss battles. The boss battles that don't use that song use regular battle music instead. The final battle does, however, use its own remix of "Twister", the game's main theme.

** ''Yoshi's Island DS'' in general is pretty bad about this. Nearly every track is cheery, upbeat, and full of xylophones, sounding like something from a preschooler's educational TV show. The levels that play them? Well, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3fdRoYcUfs this]] plays in an auto-scrolling level full of Chomps and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDDN2QyQo4U this]] plays in some of the [[BrutalBonusLevel Brutal Bonus Levels]] of the game, [[SequelDifficultySpike among]] [[NintendoHard other]] [[PlatformHell things]].

* In ''VideoGame/StalinVsMartians'', UsefulNotes/RedsWithRockets fight colorful cartoony aliens while techno music, Hong Kong pop and {{camp}}y-sounding GlamRock plays in the background. Then again, given [[WhatDoYouMeanItWasntMadeOnDrugs the above premise]], it's doubtful if ''any'' soundtrack could be made for this game without falling into this trope.

* Towards the end of VideoGame/GuitarHero III, you and your band are dragged down to Hell and must play a gig to free yourself from the devil’s contract. Songs in the set list include “One” by {{Music/Metallica}}, “The Number of the Beast” by Music/IronMaiden, “Raining Blood” by {{Music/Slayer}}, all of which fits the hellish aesthetic... but then there's the rather uplifting and defnitely not hellish “Cliffs of Dover” by Music/EricJohnson.

* An advertisement for ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyBlackOps'' is set to "Gimme Shelter" by Music/TheRollingStones. Said song is a famous protest song written during UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar, and the ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'' series has often been accused of being pro-war. This creates a confusing message, [[DoNotDoThisCoolThing to say the least...]]

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'' had Lulu's calm and melancholic theme song plays [[spoiler:when you fight the soul of the summoner she failed to protect, who had morphed into a fiendish version of her Aeon]]. In a similar example, the battle music in [[spoiler:Zanarkand]] is the same bittersweet tune that plays out of battle.

!!General:

[[folder:General]]
* On certain circumstances, you can override a game soundtrack and have your own tracks play:
** With some Windows PC games where the soundtrack resided on the game CD as CD Audio, it can be possible to swap the game CD with an Audio CD of your choice and use that CD's audio (e.g. if the game doesn't require its game CD to execute itself or continue running after launching).
** Also in the Windows PC platform, if the game's audio tracks are a standard audio format that can be understood by the user (.mp3, .wav. etc) and reside in the game's installation directory as they are (eg not inside a proprietary archive/compression file), they can be replaced by a user's choice of audio tracks if the same format is used.
** The Microsoft UsefulNotes/XBox console introduced the ability to upload your own music tracks into the console's hard drive, and if the game supports it, they can use those instead of what was programmed into the game.
[[/folder]]

!!Specific games:

* This is done intentionally at multiple points throughout ''VideoGame/SpecOpsTheLine''. One of the game's first unsettling moments is gunning down insurgents to the tune of Deep Purple's "Hush", a song that would sound cool in most other games, but clashes chillingly with the more serious context of this game's gunfights. Much later on, Walker's slaughter of the American soldiers guarding the Radioman is set to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6JQ2Vzr0bQ "Nowhere to Run" by Martha and the Vandellas]]; the lyrics are somewhat appropriate, but the mood of the song itself? Not so much.

* ''VideoGame/{{Skullmonkeys}}'' has the level Castle de los Muertos, a level with a creepy red skyline and black castle towers that shoot into the sky. Skullmonkeys poke out from the ground with spears and you can barely see Klaymen with how dark it is. The level theme? A ListSong about ''Mexican food.'' Yeah, it's that kind of game.

* ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV''[='s=] extensive library of songs can get kind of depressing depending on what's on the radio at the moment. For instance, they have 1979 by Smashing Pumpkins, which is gentle and sad, and a touching rap track by Russian hip-hop group Basta which is about a youngest son of the family apologizing to his mother in his verge of death asking her what his life is worth now. If you understand Russian, it takes some of the fun out of gleefully speeding around the city.
** [=GTA IV=] also has The Journey, which is a station that plays ambient music and the like. Feels weird driving on the sidewalk and using pedestrians as brakes to Jean-Michel Jarre.
** And backtracking to ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto2'', you'll find [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swQULRb2oH4 this Christian pop song]] in what should be a dark cyberpunk future, coupled with lyrics that preach the exact opposite of what a player would normally be doing in a GTA game.

** Do you enjoy running over pedestrians and destroying all the vehicles you come across with all over [[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoViceCity Vice City]] while listening to romantic music like "Tempted" or "Africa"? then Emotion 98.3 is the station for you.

*** A specific example of this trope is in effect during the beginning of the level ''Crystal Maze'' where Trevor Philips goes on a RoaringRampageOfRevenge against the [[HalfWittedHillbilly O'Neil Brothers]] for stealing his competition. When he gets into his car to go drive to the O'Neils farm, "What A Fool Believes" by the Doobie Brothers plays and Trevor groans that the music is "...all fucking wrong" before automatically switching channels to something more aggressive-sounding.
-->'''Trevor Philips''': (after changing the channel) That's what I'm lookin' for!