Legend of Zelda breath of the wild is the absolute worst Zelda I've ever played. I've played and beaten the following: OoT, MM, SS, ALttP, ALbW, LA, Zelda 2. I've almost beaten wind Waker and twilight princess, so you could say I've played a few Zelda games.
BotW is a mix of assassins creed, Minecraft, and Zelda characters with shit dungeons. The divine beasts are garbage replacements for dungeons and shrines are not a replacement for dungeons either, it's just a terrible Zelda, but a decent open world game.
I honestly don't know, I've had people tell me it's BotW 2.0, so I've stayed clear. The weapon degradation system is what truly pushes me over the edge with these games, and from my understanding TotK still retains that mechanic, so it's a hard pass for me. I've also heard there are real dungeons also, so idk what to think. I'm probably going to skip TotK altogether, I've currently been playing baldurs gate 3 and powering through the guild wars 2 story so I've got plenty of games to play and I don't feel like I'm missing out.
It still has weapon durability but any fused weapon lasts a lot longer so they break much more rarely than they did in BotW. If you're craving the classic Zelda experience I still don't think this is it but I think it's worlds better than BotW.
"Real dungeons" is a big misnomer in my opinion. They feel just as complex as the divine beasts in BotW but because they're physically larger I think folks have fooled themselves into believing they're more challenging. I didn't okay many Zelda games growing up so it's hard for me to compare it to them. It could be that all Zelda dungeons were just as complex as Divine Beasts but I don't know because I haven't tried them. Like, the ascend ability that lets you go through a ceiling. All the floors are (for the most part) higher than that can reach so it makes them artificially bigger. Aesthetically they are unique though. I know that was a major complaint in the first one. Yes, the Shrines are all still the same look but the dungeons are varied.
Building stuff is sort of the highlight but also a big let down in some ways. You'll quickly find making vehicles is a lot tougher and not worth it a lot of the times. You'll make a hover bike and stick with that forever. Don't get me wrong, the hover bike is a lot of fun to fly, but I would like if I could make a car that's viable too.
Any weapon durability system without a repair mechanic is terrible. There is no strategy to the fights just go down the list of weapons you currently have and hope to kill the enemy before you get to the end of the list. Sure you can use a weapon for the right situation but it'll break regardless and there's no way to reasonably get a new one. I essentially speed ran my way to the master sword because of the weapon durability only to find out that even the master sword "breaks", what a crock of shit.
As for the divine beasts, they weren't complex at all, they were a shitty representation of a digital rubrics cube and the Ganon bosses were copy/paste with a few changes here and there, nothing complex. The only challenge were the lyonels and even those could be cheesed one way or another.
The building is just too gimmicky for me, it's so out of place for a Zelda game it ruins the whole experience. I get that it's the feature and a lot of people like it, but it's just not for me.
They did add an option to repair them in TOTK. If you let a rock octorok suck them up, they spit it out fully repaired. It can be a bit of a hassle though especially when you can only do it once per octorok until the next blood moon. There's also going to Tarry Town and having your fused item separated from the weapon without destroying it if it's something particularly rare, but that doesnt change how much durability the weapon itself has left.
I wouldn't call that a proper repair mechanic. They had that in BotW but it had to be a certain type of weapon from a certain type of octorok at a certain place at a certain time of day only once per blood moon. I'm guessing this is a slightly less restrictive system but it's still not really an improvement if your weapons disappear from your inventory like BotW.
This is actually one I slightly agree with. However, ToTK is what BoTW should have been and is for sure a representation of what open world can be like.
That's great, but as long as the master sword "drains energy", shields and other weapons break, and dungeons are lacking I'm gonna pass. The merging and crafting mechanics are cool, but I'm not playing Zelda Minecraft edition, I'm trying to play a legend of Zelda game. Building makeshift helicopters and hover crafts aren't really what I'm looking for in a Zelda.
I mean to each their own but this Zelda game feels more like Zelda to me. The dungeons and the bosses. It has a plot. The building adds to the adventure.
I don't really think your opinion is unpopular though. Feels kind of like the music comment. If it's not for you it's fine but I just respectfully disagree with your opinion. I personally think Wind Waker isn't great it is endless sailing with zero to little guidance. The game also was hated before it was loved.
The story is great but Wind Waker is minutes of sailing and trying to figure out where you are going. Feels like the same concept of using something to get across the world. On top of that collecting tons of items to get an NPC to interact with you or give you something.
The remaster of wind Waker helped out, the sail you could get to go faster and always be sailing with the wind makes a huge difference. The original release though I would agree.
One thing that really erked me was how most criticism of open world games suddenly were lauded as good elements. Endless, monotounous fetch quests, or pointless busy work (Korok, those assassins) was suddenly good. An empty world devoid of much live, that wasn't much but filler between mini dungeons (shrines), the pointless busy work, or towers was suddenly good and necessary.