I hope it doesn't and I'm sure it won't.

That being said, I hope they experiment with a more linear open world like Dark Souls and Bloodborne in terms of level design. That is more accurate to what Zelda 1 and ALttP was than Zelda U is with its vast expanses. Though I think Wind Waker shows that this can work, I'd love a jumping between the two styles for the 3D games.

But I don't agree with the sentiment in this thread that Zelda has "always been" open world. No 3D Zelda aside from Wind Waker is open world.

I don't really even consider Wind Waker a true open world game. It technically is, I know, but the oceans are just one big loading screen, getting you from place to place. It doesn't seamlessly blend what an overworld is and just what the game as a whole is.

Well open world is more a sliding scale than a yes or no.  Zelda has gone up and down that scale a lot.  Wind Waker seems to go farthest to the open world side though.

The vast expanses of every open world is a loading screen. Wind Waker was just less detailed, because it was one of the first of its scale on consoles. And even calling it a loading screen feels disingenuous. That imlies that there was nothing to do in the ocean but sail to bigger island where the content was, which couldn't be further from the truth. On the contrary, I'd argue there was as much of significance to do in the ocean as in dungeons.

I absolutely do not consider any of the other 3D Zelda's even remotely part of that scale. I'd consider games like ALttP on the lower end of that scale, not something like TP.

I've played almost every open world game form there is, from your infamous and Arkham sandboxes to your Elder Scrolls and I personally feel Wind Waker qualifies for the open world classification.  The ocean is big but not entirely empty, with treasures, enemies, platforms, etc breaking things up, serving as objectives for certain missions etc.  The only difference between Wind Waker's ocean and, say, Oblivion's Cyrodiil is the density of stuff and enemy encounters.  

I remember when you go underwater in WW and you get to see possibly what a much more detailed WW open world could look like, Like basically the kind of landscape you could find in TP, but in a WW art style. If they ever go back to Zelda U's open world structure, I sincerely hope they do it in a WW style, but with the traditional overworld type, not mainly ocean.

I hope not, all "Open World" games are repetitive and boring.
The best thing about Zelda being "linear", is that it serves the gameplay and the storytelling, instead of just serving the "freedom" of the player.

Open world games are good for sandbox games like GTA or Just Cause, because the main thing to do is go around and have fun wrecking stuff. But for games like AC, Far Cry, the Arkham Series, etc etc, it gets really old really quick.
That is the difference between Arkham Asylum, a perfect game, and the rest of the series, which is really not as good.
Games needs to be kept to the point, tight gameplay, tight story, no filler, no boring side quests.

The thing is, you could really just only play through the main story if you don't like the sidequests. Then that just leaves the gameplay, which is what defines a game better than just "open world". That's the main focus. I take it you just really hate traversing large landscapes.

Everybody seems to be a little bit confused about what "Open World" means. A game can be "Open World" (meaning that you can freely go to any part of the map any time you want) in many senses: for example, it can be open world from the begining (like the first Zelda, GTA V, Just Cause or Skyrim) or it can turn to be Open World after you've completed certain missions, quests or progresses (like Wind Waker, which was linear during the 4 first dungeons and would not allow you to freely explore the ocean until you have reached certain point of the story, or the 3D GTA series before GTA V, which would let you move freely around big areas of the map but would keep other areas closed until you had advanced in the main story (Like Las Venturas o San Fierro in GTA San Andreas).

However, we can argue that a "pure" Open World game is the one belonging to the first category (go anywhere since the begining without fisical limits or barriers preventing you from visiting any part of the map). On the other side, a game it is not Open World if it has a linear progression, not allowing you to go to previous areas after completing them.

So; along the series, Zelda has explored the "Open World concept" in all its forms (from the "go wherever you want from the beginning" of Zelda 1 to the more "story driven" open worlds of TAoL, ALttP, OoT, MM, WW, TP or SS, which unfold while you progress in the Main Story. In that sense, it has gone back and forth several times, so every possibility is open =)

P.S.: I don't think that loading times or black screens between areas have nothing to do with the "Open World" concept, since the key issue here is "go wherever you want whenever you want".