I loved it and I was like 14, not so nostalgic about it, I remember the dissapointment was before the game released cause some people disliked the artstyle, but once it was released and it was praised to death by all critics the opinion changed a lot, for me it was a mindblowing game.

Them being simliar is fine in my book. I never bashed WW. And loved it since day 1. Them expanding elements from WW for BOTW, is great. Also, no Navi/Fi character is a godsend.

Within the online community it got knocked around for, amoung other things, being too easy and for having mind numbingly boring sailing aspects. That and the whole end, fetch quest bullshit. 

I bought the game when it came out, played it and enjoyed it but MM and OOT it was not. 

I think BotW is doing what Nintendo should have done years ago, picking up the great aspects of WW and expanding on them.

They seemed to seen not long after Twilight Princess that the realistic fantasy art style isn't built to last and they will quickly be outshone by other games in the fantasy genre, so the cartoon/anime soft colored art style works in the franchise's favor.

The other stuff and becoming more open world is them finally putting to rest the ALttP/OoT ghost of game design after TP and SS had people questioning if the franchise had plateaud. Even WW with its large and explorable over world still was beholden to the familiar dungeon set up so it wasn't that open world as BotW is expected to be which harkens to the very first Zelda.

Yeah, coming off of the epic Ocarina of Time, my reaction (similar to Starfox Adventures and Mario Sunshine) was "wtf Nintendo, why did you have to go and mess with what worked?" For me, the Gamecube's library was experimental in the wrong kind of way. I wish then as I do now that they had simply taken what had worked so well on N64 and improved it instead of going off on a tangent with all these wierd art styles and gameplay gimmicks. Thankfully, they later returned to form with the likes of Twilight Princess and Mario Galaxy.

Wind Waker is a pretty great game so I'm happy with any similarities 

overall its a highly praised game. Looks great, plays great. The only super understandable complaint I can get from someone about it is that the ocean is a bit tedious to travel through in it, but that in a way is good because it really enforces the feeling that you're in a world of just water and truly traveling through space

Yeah, Sunshine, Mario Kart... both of those got shit on too. People talk about the Gamecube's library like it was legendary but back then, just going online and saying you OWNED a Gamecube got you mocked to the point of no end. There were a few amazing games for the system like Metroid Prime and Rouge Squadron 2 etc. but also so many underwhelming games as well. It was the first system I can remember where their main games weren't met with almost universial praise. 

Yeah, the Gamecube is Nintendo's least impressive console in my opinion. Amazing hardware, lacklustre software. As an SNES/N64 kid, I felt really let down by it. It has some real gems, but I think nostalgia and hipster culture places it in higher regard than it deserves.

I disagree as an N64/SNES kid :P .  I thought it was very good.  I think that nostalgia and hipster culture elevate the N64 higher than it deserves.  Not cause it's bad, it isn't.  But whenever I hear people say that Super Mario 64, Ocarina of Time, Golden Eye, and other games in that vein "haven't aged a day," it really bothers me.  I'm playing the 3DS version of OoT and it has clearly, badly aged.  If Nintendo launched a new Zelda with characters written like OoT and the ammount of vast, empty space with absolutely nothing in it they would be drawn and quartered.  Cause the characters are as engaging as cardboard boxes with silly faces and Hyrule Field, while an impressive achievement on the system, is a desolate void.  Shoot, people wanted to hang Nintendo over the Sky in Skyward Sword and yet Hyrule Field in OoT is better?  And don't get me started on the camera control in these games.  Just saying, so much of the hype over N64 I don't get.  I loved mine, but I think a lot of the praise it gets *now* is unwarranted.  

N64 has definitely aged the least gracefully of Nintendo's systems, but games like Mario 64, Starfox 64, and Ocarina of Time felt like true epics, overflowing with raw ambition, while their GCN followups felt watered down by comparison. (Pardon the pun :p)