You’re really missing out. It’s a beautiful game.

I never liked BotW apart from the initial "shock" of exploration. It felt very empty and almost unfinished. Particularly in terms of the enemy and gameplay variety and the quests. I realise now that this is because TotK is the actually completed version. BotW feels like a tech demo now

After hearing users talk about it here on HN in 2020, I bought a Switch just to play BOTW - it was worth it. The sequel isn't as beautiful of a game play though.

I disagree. I find TOTK to be much more polished and they fixed everything that annoyed me in the first game.

I agree that it’s much more polished. However, because you can constantly just get into the skies and glide over everything, you (or, at least, I) don’t get as much of a “feeling” for the world as in BotW. I still remember several situations where I stumbled over a mountain, or forest, etc., in BotW and there was suddenly a whole different atmosphere. I didn’t encounter that in TotK, yet (the different layers of the map don’t feel the same, the BotW instances were more “intimate”).

> you (or, at least, I) don’t get as much of a “feeling” for the world as in BotW.

The world of BotW felt barren and empty, so maybe that‘s a good thing. It was huge, but not a lot going on. It felt like a lifeless desert with some events sprinkled throughout.

It's very much a sequel set in the same world. The original still exists, and allows you to experience the feeling of exploring a world after the end.

Tears doesn't want to repeat the exact same limited experience of exploration you had with the last game. It tries for something different.

Huh? The sequel is the perfect video game sequel and improves on a once in a decade masterpiece in every possible way.

you're missing part of my point (granted, I was not explicitly stated)

that what I find most enjoyable (by this point, at my "advanced age") is setting it all up, it was not that simple to get it all working

I have to start some command line daemons, I had to get some kernel modules, I had to recalibrate the thumb joysticks, etc...

after all this fun clicking around my PC, the game became almost an after thought... I did play around, brilliant game. the superb quality on release was impressive...