History LongSongShortScene / VideoGames

*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a24nq2w2NGs The theme for the Terminal Velocity map screen]] could easily have been used for an actual stage, but instead, it's subject to playing on the one map screen you'll be spending the least amount of time on. This can also apply to any of the maps, as all you do is move Sonic to a dot representing a stage and press A to start the stage. All of the songs take at least 2 minutes to loop, with the longest one being [[UnderTheSea Aquarium Park's]], which takes close to four minutes to loop. Very few people are going to linger around the map for that long.
*** The theme for the second phase of the FinalBoss, in both versions. This is the orchestrated version of the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcCrHZAKfPI "Reach for the Stars"]] theme for the overall game -- which plays for almost 4 minutes before looping. Even though the DS version of the track is abridged down to get to the dramatic climax sooner, most players will still only hear about 30 seconds of it before defeating the boss due to the enforced [[ButtonMashing quick-time event]] either succeeding or failing within that time. On the Wii version, most first-time players should hear the whole song, but an experienced player who knows what they're doing will sadly finish off the boss just as the song is really starting to get exciting.

** ''VideoGame/KirbyAirRide'' has [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piJ4SjRvtZ4 "Target Flight"]] (an orchestrated version of ''Super Star'''s "Cave Stage" music.). The entire song lasts for at least 2 minutes. Too bad that the actual Target Flight event only lasts 15 seconds long. At least the SoundTest is available right off the bat.

*** Galacta Knight's theme from ''VideoGame/KirbysReturnToDreamLand'' plays when he shows up in Guest Star ????...for all of seven seconds before Morpho Knight gets rid of him. The only way to hear the entire theme in the game is to listen to Track 170 in the Jukebox.

*** A programming error caused [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSM2F6JTHgA the first 36 seconds of Flaahgra's theme]] to loop endlessly. The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhnrH30411A full song]] works fine in the [[RegionalBonus PAL]], [[UpdatedRerelease Player's Choice]], and ''VideoGame/MetroidPrimeTrilogy'' versions, however.

*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JaiJxNhPvc Both]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhtOtXsiWdo versions]] of "The Marshalling Yard" are heard in areas that consist of only a few rooms each, and since both form the lead-up to [[TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon the Umbrella labs]], most players won't be sticking around either area for very long. It's even worse in [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil2Remake the remake]] if you have the Classic Soundtrack enabled, as each track is relegated to a ''single room'' in the sewers.

** In the pit hack ''Armageddon'', [[https://www.smwcentral.net/?p=section&a=details&id=26515 the Mario ground theme]] is 1 minute and 49 seconds long even though the player is supposed to immediately enter the level.

* In The Pandora Directive, fourth installment of the VideoGame/TexMurphy games, at some point you have to visit the house of one of the victims of the assassin you are chasing. A track of 4 minutes is devoted to this house, even though there's just one item to pick up there (another one is optional), and then you never need to visit the place again.

** In The Pandora Directive, fourth installment of the "VideoGame/TexMurphy" games, at some point you have to visit the house of one of the victims of the assassin you are chasing. A track of 4 minutes is devoted to this house, even though there's just one item to pick up there (another one is optional), and then you never need to visit the place again.

** The SongsInTheKeyOfPanic version of the Silo BGM only plays if the detonation timer runs down to a critical level, and the bombs will go off before you get to hear the whole of it.
** The Bunker 2 alert theme, which is actually a remix of the Bunker 1 BGM, is only heard during the very short run to the exit at the end.
** The Jungle level uses ambient sounds in place of music until you encounter Xenia, who can be quickly [[CheeseStrategy cheesed]], stopping the music. A proper BGM was composed for the level, but DummiedOut.

** The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbZa7pzpJNo intermission screen song]] in ''VideoGame/DoomII'' which plays once you finish a level. It's nearly 3 minutes long, but since there's no reason to linger at the intermission screen, most players will just hear the first few seconds. This is rectified in ''The Plutonia Experiment'' (the second campaign of ''VideoGame/FinalDoom''), because the 21st map uses this very theme as its own and the map itself is fairly long.

** The UsefulNotes/PlayStation version of ''Doom / Doom II'' replaced the... ''interpretations'' of rock songs in MIDI format with a dark ambient score, but instead of the six second PsychoStrings [[http://www.doom2.net/~doomdepot/music/pc%20doom/Doom%2001%20-%20Title%20Music.mp2 title music]] it had an epic march that tended to last for all of the few seconds before the player pressed start. The full song [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V18kQ7kvrrQcan be found here]].

* Starting a game on the UsefulNotes/WiiU brings up a splash screen while it loads, along with some music, with multiple games syncing the music length to how long the loading takes. After a system update that decreased the systems loading times across the board, a lot of older Wii U games have their startup music cut out before they're finished.

* ''VideoGame/EarthwormJim'': [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6QJ1m7EQ3I "Use Your Head"]] is played very briefly in the "helicopter" area of the last stage. It takes approximately twenty seconds to pass this part, but the PC/Sega CD version of the song goes on for 3 minutes before looping (and includes a wicked guitar solo). That particular song gets used a fair bit more in the Genesis/Megadrive version; appearing during the mechanical chicken battle and in the fight against Queen Pulsating, Bloated, Festering, Sweaty, Pus-Filled, Malformed, Slug-for-a-Butt. This song appears again in the Beast Chase level in the UsefulNotes/PlayStation game ''VideoGame/{{Wild 9}}'', which also had Music/TommyTallarico as its composer. Interestingly enough, the ''Wild 9'' game disc, due to using standard Red Book Compact Disc Digital Audio for its music rather than a proprietary format as with most [=PlayStation=] games, also serves as its own OST (when played in an ordinary CD player or computer disc drive), with "Use Your Head" being track 10 (track 1 on the disc being the game data track, with everything else being Compact Disc Digital Audio). (The CD version of ''VideoGame/EarthwormJim'' also uses Red Book audio.)

* The UsefulNotes/GameBoy version of the game adaptation of the film ''Film/NavySeals'' has [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yV2WaroR82Q a title screen theme]] that goes for almost ''three and a half minutes'' without fully looping (on a ''Game Boy'' no less!), despite the fact that under normal circumstances you won't hear more than about 10-15 seconds before you start a new game. To hear the whole thing you'd have to watch both the intro and the AttractMode playthrough cycle multiple times.

* ''[[VideoGame/StreetPassMiiPlaza Find Mii/StreetPass Quest]]'''s battle themes are long compared to how short battles are (you probably won't hear more than 30 seconds of it unless lots of people around you own a [[UsefulNotes/Nintendo3DS 3DS]]). Fortunately, there is a SoundTest.

* In the UsefulNotes/TurboGrafx16 CD version of ''VideoGame/WonderBoyIIIMonsterLair'', some of the stage themes run on a bit longer than the stages, and the boss battles time out before the music track plays all the way, so you can only hear the full songs by either pausing the game or listening to the disc in a CD player.

*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duzC-H6BrYo "Concealed Passage"]], which plays in the underground hallway after the boulder smashes the wall, it ends after you leave the hall and is never heard again. Also, one of the few songs that wasn't remixed for the UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube [[VideoGameRemake remake]].

* ''VideoGame/SpaceQuestIVRogerWilcoAndTheTimeRippers'' has two distinct music tracks for the streets of Xenon in the Space Quest XII era. The first only briefly plays when Roger first arrives in the time period, and is never heard again except in the unlikely event that you randomly encounter the [[RoamingEnemy Droid 'o Death]] and manage to evade it.

* ''VideoGame/SpaceQuestIV'' has two distinct music tracks for the streets of Xenon in the Space Quest XII era. The first only briefly plays when Roger first arrives in the time period, and is never heard again except in the unlikely event that you randomly encounter the [[RoamingEnemy Droid 'o Death]] and manage to evade it.

** ''Simma Hem'', the song that plays in the intro to Jake’s two levels, is about four minutes long. Like ''Deep Cover'', there’s not a lot of reason to linger before heading to the level. That being said, [[DownllayedTrope only the last thirty seconds of the song play in the game]].

** ''Dust'' plays over the score screen, and the song is around five minutes in length.
** Subverted with ''You Are The Blood'', where the intro screech plays in the outro of ''[[WhamLevel Casualties'' [[spoiler: when Beard is caught in the San Francisco nuke]]. The song later plays in full [[spoiler: during the ending where Richter, Evan and his family, Manny, Martin’s costar, and Jacket are caught in the nuking of Miami and Hawaii as WW3 breaks out]].

** The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbZa7pzpJNo intermission screen song]] in ''VideoGame/DoomII'' which plays once you finish a level. It's nearly 3 minutes long, but since there's no reason to linger at the intermission screen, most players will just hear the first few seconds.

* ''VideoGame/{{Battlefield 3}}'' uses [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJlN9jdQFSc&ob=av3n God's Gonna Cut You Down]] by Johnny Cash but only in a short trailer, and for less than a minute in the first mission. Which is probably just as well, seeing as how the next immediate verse is about Cash praying to Jesus... while the mission itself is set in Iraq, which would have been all sorts of unwanted and distracting controversy.

* ''VideoGame/SpaceQuestIV'' has two distinct music tracks for the streets of Xenon in the Space Quest XII era. The first only briefly plays when Roger first arrives in the time period, and is never heard again except in the unlikely event that you randomly encounter the Droid 'o Death and manage to evade it.

* The world map theme in ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG'' for the Platform/SuperNES has a very short loop, appropriate for what amounts to a level select menu. In the Platform/NintendoSwitch remake, the rearranged version is massively extended and runs for over a minute, yet you spend exactly the same amount of time on the world map as before.

* ''VideoGame/FZero GX'':

* ''VideoGame/ScottPilgrimVsTheWorld''[='s=] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7c1KDmxKUA shop theme]]. On one hand, you'll hear the first few bars a ''lot'', given how many times you'll be taking a snack break to boost your stats. On the other hand, the entire loop lasts a minute and a half-- the longest single music loop ''in the entire game''-- and in most cases, you won't even get to the acoustic guitar solo by the time you've left the shop. The official soundtrack CD doesn't even give this tune a single full loop before fading out, unlike ''every other song on the soundtrack''.

* The Subspace music in ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros2'' (a remix of the Ground theme from the first game) runs a bit longer than the time you are allowed in Subspace (and you cannot pause there). A trick involving a Super Sar and perfect timing will replace the normal stage music with the Subspace music (and allow you to pause and listen to the "bass and percussion" version of the track).
* In [[GameMod ROM hacks]] of ''VideoGame/SuperMarioWorld'', this is the result of using a long song as an overworld submap theme. Some examples:
** In the pit hack ''Armageddon'', [[https://www.smwcentral.net/?p=section&a=details&id=26515 the Mario overworld theme]] is 1 minute 49 seconds long even though the player is supposed to immediately enter the level.

* ''VideoGame/SuperMarioGalaxy2'': Three of them.
** You've got any of Squizzard's themes, because the battle is the only place in the game with a different Fire Flower theme;
** The (unfortunately) ''incredibly awesome'' final battle music, because not only does the battle itself last for a ''very short time'' if you know what you're doing, you also have to go out of your way and not attack Bowser for a whole ''three minutes straight'' just to have it loop completely.

* The UsefulNotes/GameBoyversion of the game adaptation of the film ''Film/NavySeals'' has [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yV2WaroR82Q a title screen theme]] that goes for almost ''three and a half minutes'' without fully looping (on a ''Game Boy'' no less!), despite the fact that under normal circumstances you won't hear more than about 10-15 seconds before you start a new game. To hear the whole thing you'd have to watch both the intro and the AttractMode playthrough cycle multiple times.