Counting the Number of Seconds

This one confuses me quite a bit. For some reason, the author makes Tom count how many seconds it takes before something significant happens. What person thinks of doing that? The number of seconds Tom counts in Sonic.exe varies; it could be 5, 10, 15, or even 7 seconds. It would be like if I were to watch a new horror film and start counting how long it takes before a jump scare shows up. You don't do it.