Gameology: Commentary and Resources for the Game Studies Community

I haven't had a chance to pull out Ocarina or Majora's Mask lately, but what effects, specifically, are you referring to?

At any rate, I'm pretty sure Twilight Princess works differently. The effect was extremely subtle, and I actually didn't notice it until pretty far into the game. It's much more obvious in boss battles, which is where I finally figured it out. The bosses basically have two states: one where they are rampaging around attacking you, and another when you have an opening to do real damage. When you get them to the latter state, the triumphant hero music starts up. Otherwise, the regular boss music plays. Admittedly, the boss music wasn't very interesting, so I hadn't paid enough attention to it to figure it.

When I realized what was happening there, I was able to accept that I hadn't been hallucinating, and the Hyrule Field music actually DID get more exciting when I was doing more exciting things! It was still such a really cool coincidence that contributed a lot to the experience before I realized what was going on.