Of course a game with modern mecanics have today more fans than a gameplay that has (nearly) not evolved since 1998... This is not an argument, this is obvious.
That's an important point for me personally. 20+ years is a long time in gaming and the late '90s was a bit of a personal nadir for me. Conversely, my formative years comprised the 8-bit era of the early '80s which I still remember fondly and tend to be very nostalgic about... but would I want to play them now? I put that to the test and bought a reconditioned but otherwise vintage early '80s home micro with a virtual HDD pre-loaded with lots of stuff, and beyond some initial curiosity I never played anything.
I'm not saying it's quite that extreme but from my point of view I like to see actual innovation that's in keeping with the times. That doesn't mean that I think what made a game great should be torn up and thrown away, just that things evolve. I don't always like the outcome but in general I feel happier with new taken on things than I would be if time somehow stood still.
As for the specific "is this Divinity or BG?" concern, I would like to think that any Divinity-isms are just a case of placeholders being used until everything is done. Though my background is Divinity and I've never played any BG game, what I want to see is BG, not Divinity with a BG flavour.
People can have different takes on stuff though. Several parallels have been drawn with "The New Fallouts". As someone who'd just immersed themselves in Oblivion, FO3 being "Oblivion with guns" was actually quite a positive thing at the time... and as descriptions go it was certainly a contentious one, but it had some merits, which was a positive and a negative. I'm not sure I'd want to repeat the experience again though. But my observation is that it showed just how fickle the fanbase can be when the virtually identical New Vegas was praised to the heavens while FO3 remained the worst indiscretion gaming has ever seen, which just left me thinking, hmm. Whatever point was being made must've gone right over my head. I don't care, I enjoyed Morrowind, Oblivion, FO3 and FNV pretty much equally.
With that in mind, I hope I enjoy BG3 in whatever form it takes. It will be more satisfying for me if it's proper Baldur's Gate, but that's the gnarly question: who will be the arbiter of what counts as "proper BG"?
As you said, you don't want to play an old gameplay in 2020. This is not the problem. TB game had evolved thanks to Larian, but the core gameplay of Baldur's Gate nearly didn't except a few try.
This said, I also hope I'll enjoy BG3 because I really like Larian, I really like TB games and I really like D&D and The Forgotten Realms... But I'll never forget that the only Baldur's Gate 3 that will exist for all times and we're waiting for about 20 years (with hopes, deceptions,...) has nothing in common with the Baldur's Gate series.
Bioware created the original games but if this name is still alive in video games after 20 years, it's only because of us (players, modders, public of the EE, dreamers,...). We pay tribute to this name for about 20 years. I really think Larian and WoTC should have done the same or at least consider us in return wathever the direction they took for this new game.
