I'm not saying story is a bad thing. It's not, but it seems like a lot of devs focus so heavily on coming up with an engaging story and good visuals that they forget to actually make the game fun to play.
I think about some of the games I've played over the years, and a lot of my favorites either had fairly limited or even downright absurd plots that basically boil down to an excuse to make the gameplay loop happen.
Just a random musing.
Retro games barely had a story. It was just sort of expected to be there.
If anything, there was a period of time where screaming idiots felt the story was supposed to be le epic deep lore where everything has to fit together like some kind of fantasy novel series of books with 5000 pages. Sonic Universe. Zelda Timeline. It was nonsense. During the era I was halfway expecting the Tony Hawk Canonical History.
That being said, I don't mind a good story, just don't make it the main focus of the game. Hell, windwaker had a pretty decent story (even though it was for kids), but it was fun to actually play, in spite of the grindy bits.
...and I know I'm gonna get flak for this, but ocarina of time is overrated... if I have to go back and forth over hyrule field one more goddamn time...
Wind Waker is superior in my opinion. EVEN though I have much more nostalgia for OoT, simply because of the 2D > 3D leap blowing my kid mind. But, in hindsite, now I go back to Wind Waker every time. The cel shading also helps it hold up visually.
i'll give skintendo credit, they've always tried to make their games fun, even though they've had their missteps, and they've always been at the forefront of innovating controls