I have about 35 hours in this right now and I've shelved it. I couldn't put the first one down. Though I didn't complete all of the side stuff in BOTW, I did all of the shrines, a good bit of the good side quests, and the story. TOTK, in almost every sense, is a better game objectively. What its predecessor didn't have to deal with though was a game very similar to it.

BOTW was fresh and inviting. To me, TOTK had that for the first 15 to 20 hours. The shrines were exciting since the new abilities added so much to the game, and the new fuse ability made weapon degradation a non-issue. It felt like everything I wanted in a TOTK sequel. As I started to go through it though, the issues for me started to arise. It felt like deja vu just like God of War: Ragnarok did. It also suffered from the same problem: bloat.

Sometimes less is more, but Nintendo clearly didn't get the memo. I enjoyed getting all of the towers again, but by the time I ran around every corner of Hyrule again, I wondered if the depths (the new area below the main map) would provide the same level of discoverability that Hyrule gave me in BOTW. Unfortunately, it didn't. The first couple hours were enthralling in the depths, but they should've just called it the Hollows because it's bereft of anything interesting outside of a really cool aesthetic. Now, I know there are probably many areas that are freaking awesome down there that I've yet to explore, but they were so few and far between that it started to make it a chore to find something cool. It's exactly what happened to Hyrule after going through it a second time around.

My biggest disappointment, however, was something that I was actually ecstatic about when leaks started to emerge that they were coming in the BOTW sequel: dungeons. To keep it spoiler free, they are glorified Divine Beasts. They definitely look cooler, but they are way too easy, way too short, and lack all of the great puzzling earlier Zelda titles excelled at.

Maybe I am just a jaded Zelda fan who wishes we could go back to the days of old. Maybe. I think if you haven't played BOTW, TOTK will be the easiest 5/5 for you. It's a better game, but it's hard to look at it from any other perspective after playing BOTW. It's more of the same with a coat of paint. A great coat of pain that is, but one nonetheless. Most fans of BOTW are going to adore this game, but it's just not the same for someone like me who isn't already a huge fan of modern massive open world games. I'd pay top dollar for a traditional Zelda game that takes some of the gameplay mechanics that the team has learned over these two titles, and I feel like I would have much more fun playing the Twilight Princess HD remaster if they'd just release it on the Switch.