I wish I could give this 5 stars. But after nearly completing the game I was thrown a curve ball that I cannot ignore. Let me start from the top here.
The fighting is pretty good in the game. I love the special moves, however at a certain point the enemies are no longer that much of a challenge. There is no way to change weapons midbattle or cook meals to increase certain protections. I appreciate that stamina isn't an issue however.
There are a lot of times when Zelda or the others are just straight up in your way. Like they are ON. YOU. TALE. You're trying to fight battles and You have Zelda or her Guards right on top of you so that you cannot do what you need to do easily. Can Zelda not go hide behind a bush or tree until the monsters have been taken down? Really?
You may not travel freely as you wish. You must go to desired areas via challenges and missions ONLY. Which is an irritation if you are only needing to search for certain materials or Korok seeds. Some of these challenges and missions do not allow you unlimited time to search independently of the mission. If you spend too much time searching for items that you need you risk Zelda or one of the other party members being routed and then you must restart the battle entirely to try again, as the items you acquired were not saved because you were defeated. This is a major annoyance because if you are on a race against the clock and you barely have time to fight enemies and search for needed items such as Korok seeds, you must try many times in some cases to get the seeds and complete the mission. Why do the Korok seeds not save automatically? Why is there no option to save at any point during the mission or challenge?
This is a fail in my opinion.
The next problem is if you get to chapter 5 and complete the Calamity Strikes mission, you may no longer complete other challenges or battles that require Mipha, Daruk, Revali, or Urbosa because after you successfully complete that one mission they become locked inside their divine beasts, and now the other things you wanted to complete are no longer available to you. Therefor if you wish to complete the game you must start over again remembering this and do your best not to forget to do the other challenges and missions in which these characters are required. NOTE: There is NO warning that this is a side effect of completing the Calamity Strikes mission. This is a complete surprise you are hit with after spending a cumulative LOT of hours on this game only to be hit with this when you near the end. Why would that ever be considered a good idea? I now am deciding if I even want to start over or complete what I am able thanks to this. I have a feeling I don't have the mental energy to do this all again, nor do I want to simply go ahead knowing I will never be able to achieve 100% completion if I do not. Nintendo, you could have done so much better than this!
I do not recommend this game. I feel they put this out to appease us until BOTW 2 (or whatever they will call the next installment) is ready. If you need something to keep you busy meanwhile go find something else to do. Because this is not only a fast game, but a disappointing one to boot.