This review contains spoilers
I'm still hacking my way through Hyrule, but I "beat" the game some time ago. I puzzled through every shrine, awakened every Lightroot in The Depths, and traversed every Sky Island. I defeated Ganondorf, and I cut my way through droves of Moblins, Bokoblins, and Lizalfos. I'm taking some time now to upgrade my armor sets and knock out some side quests, but I've spent enough time with the game to have a comfortable sense of what I think about it.
And I feel pretty much what I felt about the game after my first several hours of gampelay, which is that TOTK improves on BOTW in nearly every aspect, particularly in its mechanics. And yet, I strongly prefer BOTW, purely because I played BOTW first. A significant part of my joy in playing BOTW came from exploring Hyrule, charting the four corners of the kingdom and uncovering the different regions and adventures that lay between them. But the topography of TOTK is pretty much the same as it was in BOTW. I activated the entire map. I had fun. I think TOTK is a fantastic game, and I'll probably devote another dozen hours to it (to say nothing of whatever DLC emerges down the line). But I found myself forgetting that I wasn't playing BOTW, and I was looking forward to something, well, new.
And of course, there are new layers to Hyrule in TOTK: the Sky Islands and The Depths. Because the Sky Islands offered new adventures and environments, I enjoyed them more than anything else in the game. The Depths, however, I found tedious. Don't get me wrong: I unlocked every Lightroot, and I found a sort of enjoyment in bringing light to the shadowy corners of The Depths, but they are so unvarying that I found myself eager to get back to the surface.
So, if I had to choose, I would quickly vote for BOTW as the better game, even if TOTK made substantial improvements to the mechanics of the former game.
And I feel pretty much what I felt about the game after my first several hours of gampelay, which is that TOTK improves on BOTW in nearly every aspect, particularly in its mechanics. And yet, I strongly prefer BOTW, purely because I played BOTW first. A significant part of my joy in playing BOTW came from exploring Hyrule, charting the four corners of the kingdom and uncovering the different regions and adventures that lay between them. But the topography of TOTK is pretty much the same as it was in BOTW. I activated the entire map. I had fun. I think TOTK is a fantastic game, and I'll probably devote another dozen hours to it (to say nothing of whatever DLC emerges down the line). But I found myself forgetting that I wasn't playing BOTW, and I was looking forward to something, well, new.
And of course, there are new layers to Hyrule in TOTK: the Sky Islands and The Depths. Because the Sky Islands offered new adventures and environments, I enjoyed them more than anything else in the game. The Depths, however, I found tedious. Don't get me wrong: I unlocked every Lightroot, and I found a sort of enjoyment in bringing light to the shadowy corners of The Depths, but they are so unvarying that I found myself eager to get back to the surface.
So, if I had to choose, I would quickly vote for BOTW as the better game, even if TOTK made substantial improvements to the mechanics of the former game.