In my own experience, from a creator's standpoint it's quite a bit different. You have to make sure pretty much every track loops well, and for non-cinematic music you don't really have the luxury of an "intro" section of a song; you have to hit the hook or otherwise the "meat" after the first measure at the latest. This is especially true of intro or menu music; the player is probably only going to listen to 10-30 seconds of the music before they move on to another screen that plays different music.
For someone who tends to make music based on "whatever sounds cool" and experimentation, it's very jarring to actually have to make the music accompany some on-screen, non-linear action and fit the theme of the game. It forces you to use instruments you might not be comfortable with (ex: an orchestra for a fantasy game) but also lets you explore instruments that would never fit in one of your personal tracks (ex: panflute and mandolin in an electro house track). It forces you to rethink your melodies and arrangements; it's surprising how bad or unfitting some non-game music can sound when played in a game, because it was designed to be the center of the audience's attention. Thankfully, because of this and the fact that the player is generally distracted with the game, the tracks only need to be about a minute or two minutes long, which is a lot simpler to make than a five-minute or longer track, and allows you to just focus on one set of patterns and be done with it. It's sort of like how a short story doesn't allow the space to develop subplots or excessive exposition, you've just got to get your point across and be done with it.
For someone who tends to make music based on "whatever sounds cool" and experimentation, it's very jarring to actually have to make the music accompany some on-screen, non-linear action and fit the theme of the game. It forces you to use instruments you might not be comfortable with (ex: an orchestra for a fantasy game) but also lets you explore instruments that would never fit in one of your personal tracks (ex: panflute and mandolin in an electro house track). It forces you to rethink your melodies and arrangements; it's surprising how bad or unfitting some non-game music can sound when played in a game, because it was designed to be the center of the audience's attention. Thankfully, because of this and the fact that the player is generally distracted with the game, the tracks only need to be about a minute or two minutes long, which is a lot simpler to make than a five-minute or longer track, and allows you to just focus on one set of patterns and be done with it. It's sort of like how a short story doesn't allow the space to develop subplots or excessive exposition, you've just got to get your point across and be done with it.