Now the score itself is fine but the songs they picked just aren't very good, wish there was a custom music playlist for us pc users to import our own music.

Ehh, I just use Spotify in the background and pause the music when I don't need it....but yeah, Watchdogs's soundtrack is pretty shit

There's a option to not start music when you get into a car, after looking at the playlist and used that option and just listen to the city

Yeah, I like the Chicago brass stuff and the music made for the game but not much else, soundtrack wise.

I went into the music app and disable all songs. Was super disappointed with the choice of songs in this game.

Spotify integration on a system level would be amazing. All suitable games would be upgraded tremendously.

The soundtrack, like everything in this game, is mediocre at best.

How about the ambient neighborhood sounds though?

@ryanmgraef: Yeah, same for me too. But those few songs i like a lot, driving or jogging around with them playing sets a nice little tone to me.

Does anybody else really like that little jingle that plays right before missions? Love that shit.

There are a couple of licensed songs on the soundtrack that I like, but the rest I just care for, also it seems like a super limited selection. I usually just turn on Sirius in the background when I play the game.

I'm struggling to think of what sort of a soundtrack would really suit this game? Anyone have any suggestions?

This is the only song I actually honestly enjoy. The rest sounds like an angry 13 year old's playlist shouting at the sheeple to wake up

My problem with the soundtrack is that, while it's actually full of pretty great songs, even with the option to whittle things down to specific playlists it comes off as haphazard and unfocused. There are Chicago artists abound but few of the ones you'd expect especially for a near future hacking game. Why does Aiden Pierce have such a love affair with Chicago's post-Fall Out Boy emo pop punk scene? Why is his favorite Cool Kids song the one that's a bit of a tribute to Houston rap? Why is there randomly a folk playlist at all, as respectable as Califone (and perhaps the others) are?

Perhaps the worst thing they did in regards to the licensed music was turning Aiden into a neurotic who can't just keep listening to the song he was listening to before when he gets in another car. Because you're rarely driving for more than a couple minutes let alone the length of an entire song all you ever hear is the opening moments of a given song. Whenever you get into someone else's car there's no sense of they were as people the way there is in a GTA game; you just jack the car, slam your iPhone into their aux cable and pound on the shuffle button. It's disjointed and unappealing on both an entertainment and character level.

Aiden's fairly random, obscure (even by my standards, as someone whose been paid to write about music for six years now) taste coupled with the fact he's always jumping to the beginning of a new song just makes for a world that seems as if it couldn't care less about flow, flavor or context in regards to music. An academic could attempt to write an essay on how it's a commentary about our impersonal relationship with music in the MP3 era, but I think the near-universally negative reaction to Watch Dogs' music is proof that you can't just throw great tunes from all over the map in a shuffle and host a party.

Copy paste the music from Shaq Fu? I don't really know. I've been listening to Fleet Foxes with this game.

Yeah it really blows, but at least there's a 2 Chainz song, so I made the playlist repeat that.

As much as I really enjoy the actual game, yah the soundtrack is a MESS. Why is there so much old time "blues" as they label it? Nas One Mic? C'mon guys..

I will agree that the actual original score is pretty good and appropriately electronic - I wish you could just have that running in the background instead.

Yup, it's pretty forgettable except for a few songs - and even those aren't that great. Original music is good at parts, though even that gets a bit irritating during some car chases if you screw it up too many times and have to listen to it repeat. Custom music support and/or a way better soundtrack and proper radio for the sequel.

Well from what I know of Chicage, blues is supposed to be kind of one of its things. So I've got no issue with the idea.

How the calibre of blues they have in the game holds up though I have no idea having not played much of the game, but also knowing nothing about blues.

I would of thought a bunch of moody or ambient techno would of worked pretty well given the theme of the game.

@humanity: There's only 5 blues songs in the game, so it's really not that many. Also, the blues play a huge part in Chicago's musical history. Also also, speaking as someone who loves the blues, I resent your comment. Whippersnapper.

I enjoy jazz, but I'm not a huge fan of blues, and all the songs they have in the game pertaining to that genre - which I will admit to not being too familiar with - are not to my liking. As for how it relates to Chicago, well I can see how that might influence them but seeing as I'm from NYC (you know, a better city) I honestly don't know enough about the culture of that hellish place to recognize that the music on the playlists somehow connects with it. To me most of the music is simply bad, but I can understand that this is a fairly subjective matter. IT seems to break down into old timey music/newage trash rap (2 Chains etc) and emo rock.

@exiledastronaut: I do!

I disagree. I like it.

And it has Alice Cooper on it.

Fuck the haters.

I was going to post I was laughing, having heard this day 1.

Then I saw this post;

#22 Posted by CornBREDX

"I disagree. I like it.

And it has Alice Cooper on it.

Fuck the haters."

I no longer see the problem. I concur, WTF people...

Especially you, JEFF!

(Hoping for Halo of Flies, will settle for Ballad of Dwight Fry)

Are soundtracks and licensed music considered the same thing? The soundtrack to watch_dogs is fitting:

hate it or love it at least it fits into the vibe of the game. If you dislike the songs that play on Aiden's phone that's a different thing.

@vinny_says: the original soundtrack scored by Ubisoft is fine, above average I'd even say. The licensed music choices are poor.

I really like the original score for the game. It fits the tone of the game and sounds cool. The soul and jazz stuff is great. There are a few other songs that are good but apart from that, the game's soundtrack is a little lacking. I don't know how many songs there are to unlock but the initial amount is thin and unlocking more should not have been one of the ambient hacking things.

@ulquiokani: Unlocking more songs via hacking is fine, they just should have had a larger initial selection

This is my biggest problem with soundtrack in a nutshell. It makes popping out the car for 2 seconds to check-in or use an ATM really unsatisfying. GTA and other open world games have managed to have the music play continuously for years, so it is pretty amazing that this can't manage it.

It is the little touches like this that prevent me from getting really immersed into their game world.

Aiden has some teenage angst

There are a few good songs though. Most of it doesn't seem like it fits at all in with the tone of the game or the time period.

It would have been cooler if they went all electronic.

The soundtrack IS pretty underwhelming. I've liked most of the original score I've come across so far, though. Still, I'm admittedly picky when it comes to music. I don't mind the soul, blues, and jazz stuff, because that's fairly appropriate. It's more the rest of it. It's disappointing they missed out on the opportunity to include some classics from The Blues Brothers. There is plenty of gold on that soundtrack that would have been fitting. I'll admit that I did have a particularly poignant moment when "Cold Night in Chicago" came on at just the right moment, but even that was later spoiled a bit by other attempts at "on-the-nose" stuff like that shitty Winter in Chicago song which probably got included only because it was titulary relevant.

I think my biggest issue with the music is that it doesn't set a consistent tone. With the GTA series, R* has always done a pretty masterful job making their music seem to fit the era/area in their games, and Ubi missed the mark in that respect. I'm also not crazy about the lack of continuity that @nodima referenced. I don't remember which song it was, but I was driving and actually enjoying a song, got out to use an ATM real quickly, and got back in the car, only to have a different, crappy song play. Boo. Part of me wants to just make a playlist of just the songs I enjoy/tolerate, but hearing the intros over and over from the 5-10 songs that are decent is arguably even worse than the shuffle. Overall, the soundtrack is definitely not one of the game's strong points.

I am enjoying the game, though. Gang Hideouts and Criminal Convoys are particularly enjoyable. And for the most part, the sound is good. The NPC banter is pretty great, and there are some neat features like a freestyle rap competition I ran across in the wards, a street musician playing for change, et al. that are done pretty well. I haven't gotten that deep into the main story yet because I've been grinding a bit, but I've liked it so far. It's a good game, and I've had fun with most of it. However, the lackluster soundtrack is one of those areas that keep it from being a truly great game.

So "Day and Night" by Kid Cudi isn't good? But yeah, the licensed sountrack sucks....

Yeah, all the emo music is pretty weird, I thought that the genre was long dead already.(It must have just caught on with Canadian kids, I guess.)

I haven't played it, but looking at the list of songs I saw it had High Class Slim Cam Floatin’ In by Tortoise, and Funeral Singers by Califone, which are both rad. Other than that, yeah, not really anything too appealing to me. I also didn't like GTA V's licensed music though, and I know people thought that was pretty great.

Or you can just select a song when you arent in a car, by using the dpad, and the music constantly plays, in or out of a car.

@evilsbane said:

@spraynardtatum said:

Aiden has some teenage angst

There are a few good songs though. Most of it doesn't seem like it fits at all in with the tone of the game or the time period.

It would have been cooler if they went all electronic.

Holy shit. That made me laugh my ass off.

Yeap, pretty much. I think the blues tracks are quite good (there aren't many), and some of the electronica stuff fits the over all premise of the game.... but most of the rest of it is just a random jumble of "okay" to "bad".

I agree. I get really happy when Vampire Weekend comes on and a couple other songs but overall it's not a very good list of songs. I mean, you're trying to compete with the GTA games here, those games have INCREDIBLE soundtracks. Saint's Row even had better songs. That said, I actually think the score itself and the rest of the sound design is very good, it's literally just the songs mostly.

This is my number one problem for sure.

But on top of that, even the idea that you'd be able to listen to songs both inside and outside of cars (a great idea, as seen in Saint's Row 4) is ruined by the game's constant insistence that you listen to its score during every single mission, even the side missions with no story relevance whatsoever.

I wanted nothing more than to listen to some soulful R&B while shooting up a gang hideout in slow motion, and the game wouldn't even let me do that.

Well, as a cyber noir thriller type of story, I would say a bunch of jazz and blues mixed with sinister electronica.

But as a game set in Chicago, I would say the best way to play that up to people that don't live in Chicago is like, a bunch of music you'd hear while drinking and watching sports.

"Boys Are Back In Town" would almost definitely be on there.

Yeah. Aside from the blues in the game, I don't really like any of the licensed music.

Yeah, it's not very good. The original score is pretty darn great though.

I find the selection to be really strange. Like someone mentioned, Day and Nite is a cool song by Cudi but somehow it manages to feel dated. Maybe it's because they put Kid Cudi, 2 Chainz and Nas in the same rap category? It's difficult to explain but all things considering I wouldn't be too surprised if Ace of Bass or Brandy came on at any moment.

Great tracks can make or break a lot of moments. The Saints Row 3 mission with Kanye's 'Power' blasting in the background isn't very interesting on it's own, but that iconic song really pumps a lot of life into a relatively run of the mill shootout.

In Watch_Dogs I'll very often get done with an interesting mission or something really serious, like the serial killer sidequest - only to hop into a car and get that Vampire Weekend emo wailing pumping out my speakers and it's like christ not now!

Man, what is it with "Dogs" games and their inability to make music play continuously? At least Sleeping Dogs uses the licensed songs better.

It's also pretty nuts how a simple change from a radio-style system to putting all the songs (and newscasts) onto Aiden's phone has made everything worse. Justified, of course, as the song choices can be interpreted in a different context.

The only good song on there is Vampire Weekend's Diane Young. And even then it wasn't really a surprise because they played it in a lot of trailers and showcasing stuff.

Weezer and Wu-Tang are all I have on my playlist with an occasional appearance from Vampire Weekend, but with how often I get into cars that doesn't really matter. I usually just turn off all the music and throw on some Kavinsky or the Hotline Miami soundtrack anyway.