If you want story in BotW, you read through the dialogues, you go to a stable and listen to the myths and legends there, you talk to Kass... Gerudo town has plenty of story, or at least world building, that's unintrusive and well written. Same for Hateno, or even Lurelin Village. That fits the game perfectly.
The more involved story, the one you go through to get to the Beasts, could be better, sure. But the way the game is designed, there could be 50 hours between two of those missions, so you can't exactly design them like a regular linear one. They were absolutely right to focus on world building instead of actual story. Maybe in the next game we'll have both, and it'll work very well, but for now they did what they had to do, with the right priorities.
The more involved story, the one you go through to get to the Beasts, could be better, sure. But the way the game is designed, there could be 50 hours between two of those missions, so you can't exactly design them like a regular linear one. They were absolutely right to focus on world building instead of actual story. Maybe in the next game we'll have both, and it'll work very well, but for now they did what they had to do, with the right priorities.