I think of it rather fondly, and still go back to play it. I have hundreds of hours of playtime.
I think the character designs in the game were top-notch. Love the look of the Zora (even if I am more nostalgic for OoT/MM models) and the variety that race showed in particular. The Rito's overhaul in design was weird at first, but I think I like the more animal design in comparison to them being part human.
I love it in any game when it let's me customize my character. There's something about having that option that makes the game that much more fun to me. Yeah I'm playing Link, but my armor choices/look can be totally different from another player's, and I like that.
The option of movement was great too. I love climbing stuff. I love shield surfing. The dang motorcycle they added at the end was fun, and, it may be a slightly unpopular opinion, but I love most of how horses were handled. Going out and finding that grade A horse with the stats I want was fun in its own way, and then having said steed was great. You can name them, dress them up a bit, it's neat and fun. Woulda liked more variety and for the inclusion of what the guardian gear gave us in the base game (teleport that boy from anywhere for good get aways), but yeah. I liked that a lot, and I think the biggest area I see where movement wasn't too great was in the water, but I guess adding underwater sections would have been a bit of a hassle, especially with access to the ocean, and I guess I can settle with climbing up waterfalls. Also, using stasis and log surfing, or rigging up random little contraptions or objects to launch yourself, and praying that that works is fun in its own rite. Stasis is definitely my most used rune, and for good reason.
The biggest part of BotW to me was just the aspect of discovery. Finding stuff in the game was its own reward. Seeing different ways you can interact with objects and enemies, and seeing how enemies and npcs interact with objects and other enemies made the game feel more alive than past Zeldas. I still can't hurt NPCs (not that I particularly want to), but seeing them at least flinch and react when you swing a weapon near them was a decent touch, as well as them panicking when an enemy was nearby, and them being able to attack/be attacked by an enemy was a nice touch too. Anyone who didn't know about moblins chucking bokoblins at you, and not laughing when they first saw it happen is lying. There's a lot of little touches in the game that I love.
Is the game perfect? No, but I loved it, the same way I'm very fond of and love older Zelda titles. I can't think of a "perfect" Zelda, they all have flaws, but that's to be expected, and like other Zelda's I enjoy, the good outweighs the bad in my books.
