I was a massive fan of BotW, but saw a lot of criticism over the years from some people. Whether those are contrarians or people who genuinely didn't like it, I feel like they (Nintendo) listened to a lot of their critiques. The weapon break system is a lot less irritating because you can now very easily make whatever your heart desires over and over again with the fuse ability. Also more enemy variety is a plus and the whole sky and chasm additions are so wonderfully done. Feel like the world is way more lively than the first and it feels like there is more content to me. I can't stop playing and for the first time in a long while I feel like the wait for a specific game was so worth it.
I bought BotW for my little nephew when he was 10. He doesn't really care about gaming all that much these days but he still goes absolutely wild over Zelda games, even bought a 3DS just to play OoT and MM. I did my duty as an uncle well I'd say. We even went to a night release for TotK, I was stunned they still did those. Big nostalgia feeling.
I think you can be a critic of the game and still appreciate it. As i said before i feel combat is unrewarding and i have to grind tons of shrines and get fairy upgrades to have take on enemies in the wild since i have experienced more than once that what i thought were weak enemies one shot me and when expend myself to defeat them i feel i get little in return apart from expending my weapons and arrows. I got a super horse through a certain quest but i cant call on it unless im near a stable and the horse stearing in this game is far behind even Roach in tw3. Im only on my 2nd main temple quest but so far they are better but how it all works is still very much like botw which i thougt was one of main weak points.
The story... i dont know. Ive been playing it for 5 days now and i think maybe slighty better but i havnt completed the game. I think the overall dialogue and certain side quests are better written. The voice acting is still fairly terrible but i guess they had to keep the same voice actors from botw.
However all the little puzzles and stuff to unlock towers and in general are certainly better. I think if you loved botw you are going to love this. If you still liked botw but felt it needed to fuse with more traditional Zelda elements like me, i think the overall feeling is a bit the same. A quality game no doubt and if you love the mad max kind of shit you can pull off its definitely a 10/10.
Im on 5th day of playing and ive only battled 1 proper boss and i think that is also one of the major differences between botw, this and traditional Zelda games. Of course being shot up through towers and gliding and having that kind stuff is a freedom and experience that former Zelda games didnt have but putting all those resources into those mechanics also means that the main meat of the former games are missing.