The most recognised power of music is that it can “engineer” emotion and set the mood of a scene. This function depends on a shared cultural understanding of musical convention. Key elements of harmony, tempo and instrumentation are manipulated to create the desired emotion response.
Control of mood is also possible through subversion of expectation. A classic example is the extended ladder climb in the video game Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater by Konami in 2004.
Following a boss fight, the player must climb a ladder for well over 2 minutes. All the ambient sound is removed and the full non-diegetic vocal theme song of the game plays in its place. This bold choice transforms a frankly mundane act of traversal into a powerful moment of meditation. It serves as a deliberate “hard stop” to the preceding tension, leveraging the reflective pace of the song to give the player a singular moment of calm and introspection before the climax of the story.
According to Annabel J. Cohen, this emotional power often derives from “congruence” or “contagion”. The music’s emotional character matches the scene and is “caught” by the audience, dictating precisely how they should feel about the images they are seeing. (Cohen, A. 2010)
References
Konami. (2004) Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. [Disc] PlayStation 2. Konami
Cohen, A. (2010). MUSIC AS a SOURCE OF EMOTION IN FILM. [online] Available at: https://musicog.discoveryspace.ca/sites/default/files/31-juslin.pdf [Accessed 4 Nov. 2025].