The problem is it smells exactly like Spyro syndrome where people got tired of the series for a while and wanted a shake up but then ended up with games that essentially barely felt like the original Spyro games.

The issue I have with BOTW popularity is it feels incredibly short lived because it still has some of the Zelda issues that people dislike (parts of the game are linear and very fillery and there is still some hand holding) and it only really succeeds at being open in a very shallow way compared to other open world games, like sure I get that climbing anything or gliding would be fun but they are tedious and feel incredibly limiting and unfun compared to say flying, or swimming, or riding on a back of a dragon. Plus the item durability is controversial, lots of fans dislike the dungeons, Shrines, Korok seeds, the puzzles, and a lot of other elements.

I’m not saying a shake up was needed but plenty of non Nintendo fans feel unimpressed by this game due to valid reasons because as they put it “it feels like Zelda is catching up to other open world games”

Yeah it became popular and did well commercially and critically but those are kinda of irrelevant because how much of the criticism was in depth and talked about the strengths and weaknesses?

BOTW game design and gameplay issues stem from the fact it’s a jack of all trades type of situation. Where it’s greatest strength Exploration is also kinda of a weakness. Sidequests? Majoras Mask did it the best! Swordplay and combat? Skyward Sword! Exploring in a deep blue sea? Wind Waker, fast big dungeons? Twillight Princess?

Breath of the Wild? Systematic gameplay? Well hate to say this but Morrowind was way way better about it’s systematic gameplay because not only did you have a lot of weapon options but you could play the entire game as a pacifist not killing a single enemy but using allies, or you could just levitate anywhere, you could also pretty much kill anyone and everything.