This game sounds like typical Nintendo retard baby-toy fodder.
Would I be wrong in assuming that?
I mean it's hard to deny that a large part of the game is mashing the A button while 'whimsical' (i.e. infantile) disney characters gesticulate at you with unskippable dialogue and you either have a stomach for that or you don't. And yes, the game essentially hands you a giant LEGO set to play with. But underneath it is a massive open-world that's fun to get lost and dick around in. Look at twitter memes and all the monstrosties there and it's easy to come away with a very 'toy-box' impression of the game, but in practical terms it can just be kinda fun to cobble together a flying machine in order to reach some uncharted sky island or a build cannon robot to clear out the fallen rocks in a cave. My cannon buddy basically has phasers and shoots photon torpedoes and I'll probably recreate a Star Trek craft at some point.
Most of my complaints are centered around Zelda-isms or Nintendo-isms. The unskippable dialogue is a big one. Upgrading armor takes 10x longer than it needs to because you have to sit through the same animations and dialogue every single time. This goes as far back as Link's Awakening shitting out unskippable dialogue because you accidentally touched a rock without a power bracelet equipped, but cmon. And inventory plays too massive a role in this game to have a giant talking shrub being the sole person who can expand it- you could feasibly go tens of hours never finding the guy and I think that's dumb.
But I'm not sure what you're looking for? It's an open world game that has its flaws and that also avoids many cardinal sins of the genre. There's a shitload of content and places to explore. The gameworld is strewn with interesting caverns and point of interest. Link has some fun abilities to traverse the environment, forget the minecraft stuff. There are treasure chests in out-of-sight places that might have significant rewards or intriguing treasure maps. There are worldbosses to have epic fights with wandering around the gameworld, even in the 'newbie' areas. Many of the reagents and components are tied to specific regions you need to track down and mark on your map or memorize. There are three different massive biomes that each have their own unique benefits and dangers to exploring. The alchemy and cooking systems are robust, maybe not so much as something like morrowind, but still not bad for a fucking Zelda game. In my game Link subsists on basically energy drinks (haste potions) and pizza. But I've pumped out a few whoppers using alchemy, such as a potion that grants +16 'bonus' hearts (more than double my current lifepool). It's like an uber Aid potion.
Quests are not simply worthless money rewards. They are there, sure. But I've gotten some unique rewards such as vendors expanding their offerings, special horses or farmers who will now plant crops for me, and that's just scratching the surface. I still have a few special tokens that I have no idea what they're for, the world is so darn big.
The puzzle shrines vary from obnoxious to fun but there is more variety than you'd think. Plenty of areas where you're forced to start without any gear and scavenge on-site either by sneaking through or going guns-blazing. There are several puzzles that I've solved in clearly unintentional ways. But if the puzzles aren't your cup of tea, it's not like you can't complete the game with fewer hearts of extra endurance.
But the highlight for me is weapon fusion. I like that the game teases you with a Nashkel iron shortage scenario right out of the gate. BOTW's shattering weapons that everyone hated are now even shittier and break even easier. But it's all remedied with weapon fusion. The weapon / item selection quickmenu almost reminds me of VATS or accessing the spellbook from BG if I'm being honest. There's so much variety in what you can do by nocking an arrow and pressing up on the d-pad. It doesn't feel unlike chain-casting Magic Missile when firing off a 5x projectile bow with homing arrows and 'pausing' with the item menu between volleys. Strike a group of enemies with an electrified whip, 'pause' game with the weapon menu, swap to a higher-damage 2handed weapon while they're still stunned and spin-to-win like a D2 barb, flattening them while wearing a lobster t-shirt. Seriously, most of my fights end up feeling like a bastard child of Baldur's Gate and Amalur. And keeping some 'utility' weapons around that can be used more sparingly can mitigate the weapon-breaking problem. I like a ruby-tipped longstaff that can keep Link warm in colder climates as well as dish out some fireballs for crowd control.
Obvious autistic longpost after obvious trollpost but those are my pristine, uninebriated thoughts on the game so far. I think this is the best Zelda game that's come out in many, many years and the first open-world game I've sunk my teeth into probably since New Vegas. It isn't perfect and you'll need to suffer some babby-like Nintendo aesthetic here and there, and yes there's a lot of soyjacking and overhyping surrounding this game, but what can you do.
