I don't think any team develops only Zelda games. Isn't the PH/ST team different from that which makes console Zeldas? Excluding Aonuma, I mean, who seems to have real passion for the series.

More, did one of the Zelda team make Wii Fit?

I wonder how htey're going to handle Zelda Wii. The controlled pacing of Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass, and Wind Waker seems to delight some but make others (like you) rather displeased with the state of things.

Though I think I know why they stuck to making Spirit Tracks and Phantom Hourglass the way they are in terms of exploration when compared to, say, Link's Awakening.

Traveling wasn't really separated in Twilight Princess, either - and I'm not sure I see the complaint in that game, as I play through it again. After the game opens up (when you get the Master Sword) you can warp to within sixty seconds of wherever you want to be, and new warp points are given to you as you do more and more exploring. The scale of Twilight Princess creates a problem, but I think it's solved pretty elegantly in that you don't have to run across it unless you want to. I often do, by the way: I just like seeing everything as I run from place to place.

Big, empty spaces is just a consequence of scale, and scale is something that's become increasingly more important to the Zelda series ever since Ocarina of Time. Majora's Mask probably had the least empty space, but even that had quite a lot. I think Twilight Princess presents an elegant solution to the "taking minutes to get to the other side" problem by introducing multiple warp points that can be used to quickly go to wherever you please, presenting the option of whether or not you would like to make the several minute long trek to your destination.

Spirit Tracks and Phantom Hourglass are different, though. Way different. Do you want to know why I think they're so different (which is to say what I think the reason for the difference is)?

I forgot how many times you tend to replay games, forgive my presumption. Though I don't see the problem if the field is there for your perusal, and you don't have to experience it if you don't want: but if you do there are monsters and horseback fights and all sorts of neat things you can do if that's what gets your goat.

Anyway. You may not like the PH and ST answer, because the answer is accessibility.

The thing about PHST in comparison to, say, Link's Awakening, is that they're engineered to be playable by anyone, and there's small - if any - possibility of getting lost. The geography of Link's Awakening was set up in such a way that finding your way to a place was a challenge in and of itself (I spent a long time trying to get to a certain place in Tal Tal Heights, if I remember). This isn't a bad thing depending on your value set, what you're looking for in a Zelda game, but for a lot of gamers it's terrible. My mother wouldn't want to spend hours searching for a particular path in frustration, she'll want to get to "the good part" immediately, or at least know where she has to go to get to the good part. That's the point: if you want to go somewhere in Spirit Tracks, you either can or can't, and it's possible to tell at a glance. If you can't, you enerally know where you need to go to unlock it, and if you can, all you need is enough time to hop in your train and go.

If you ignore the dichotomy of overworld vs. town/dungeon here (I love driving the train, though not so much the boat in Phantom Hourglass), then all it does is place emphasis on the part that some people enjoy more: the ability to get where you want to go to do what you want to do. You can explore the overworld by unlocking new sections of track, but you never get lost.

Is it good? Well, not universally. But it's elegant, for what it is.

I kinda see where you're going with that. You want Metroid in your Zelda, basically. You want to be wandering around Tallon Overworld and see that mysterious Plasma-beam door that's higher up in the room, but you know you can't get to it yet, nor could you open it if you could.

I kinda think that later Metroid is a good model there. Metroid you always knew where you were going (except in the sequences where they sent you on fetch quests), but you had freedom to sidetrack as you went along. I hate games where you just get lost and can't find your way around. Hate it. But the feeling of discovery needs to be there too.

I should get Spirit tracks.
It would be fun to play a game in a easy to read language.

I thought it was just the best game because of the gameplay, graphics, and overall quality and innovation. Gamerankings can't properly indicate how good that game was.