Good review as usual, best reason to get up on wednesday morning.
On the point of the debate, Nintendo are kind of in a bind as far as Zelda goes, any time that they've tried to mix up the formula either they've been criticised for it or the game has underperformed. Personally I loved Wind Waker and could forgive the sailing and poor final third to a degree because it has so much going for it. The characters are portrayed far better than in just about any game I've ever played, every one of the NPC's has individuality and personality, even the totally insignificant ones, and the game has so much charm I found it wasy to forgive the mis-steps that it took.
Twilight Princess was an example of Nintendo giving in to the publics demands rather than doing what they want. The public demanded a Zelda game that was more like Ocarina of Time, and Nintendo oblige, then the public turns around and complains that its too similar to Ocarina of Time, well duh!
More on topic, Zelda games aren't plot driven RPG's like Final Fantasy, the plot really is just there to give an excuse to leave the starting area and to give you an enemy to fight so complaining about the plot, or lack thereof, is kind of missing the point of the games. The point of Zelda games has always been about exploration and discovering secrets, this was laid out in the first Zelda which really gave you almost no hints as to where you had to go and what you had to do (didn't even give you a map) but threw you into a world with only a sword and shield and expected you to discover everything yourself.
My big problem with Nintendo games now is that they do a bit too much 'hand-holding' in how they give you hints and tell you where to go. First example of this I think is in Mario 64 level 4 (Cool, Cool Mountain) where on the first time you enter it tells you to jump down the chimney of the hut and there's a sign next to it talking about Santa not being the only one who can go down chimneys', this is despite the fact that there is a trail of coins leading down the chimney meaning that only a blind chimp couldn't work out that you can jump down it.
On the topic of new IP's, I can't really see the point in a lot of ways. If the new IP's do something different (like what Animal Crossing and Pikmin do) then fine but if its just to dress what could be a Mario, Zelda or Metroid game (and a lot of people do say this is a route Nintendo should take) up in a different image then why bother? These series consistently spawn good or great games and how many other game series can say that? Not many. However I will say that the Mario spin-offs like Mario party etc need to be put down for the good of all, Mario Kart and Paper Mario are fine but others take it a bit too far.
