I can't tell who's joking and who's serious with the "If it wasn't a Zelda game it'd be rated lower" posts.
Didn't see those posts, but I certainly think that it might have been lower if it wasn't a Zelda game. I didn't play it yet, so I could be completely wrong and the game is the absolute masterpiece that deserves an 98 of course.
I have these doubts mainly because of the recent release of FFXV, a game which I thought would be reviewed fairly this time after FFXIII got way too good reviews. But I and many other people don't think it deserves the score it got for obvious reasons. I doubt that Zelda is really similar, since a 98 doesn't come out of nowhere.
I'm not trying to downplay the success of Zelda, I absolutely loved TP and was looking forward to BotW as the game where Nintendo could go all in with that kind of approach.
There just are sometimes games that are rated too highly just because their part of a famous franchise. I don't think that this problem really applies to Zelda, but I don't think that the franchise argument in regard to reviews is entirely invalid. In some cases, at least.