I think that BG3 gameplay has little to do with the game feeling less like a BG game. Yeah, I will agree about the surfaces and the goblins using exploding arrows and zombies drinking healing potions. But I think it's much deeper than that.
Look at the Fallout games for example. Obviously Fallout: New Vegas is totally different game from the first two, and yet, they captured the magic of Fallout and made a worthy sequel, even though game-wise the games are fundamentally different. The reason is that the world in Fallout is the main character. The way NPCs talk, their mannerism, the music, the atmosphere. The gameplay is only our vehicle to experience the world. But many players who played Fallout 1 and 2 felt back at home when they played New Vegas.
It's like Star Trek: TNG, DS9 and Voyager all speak the same language and make you believe everything really happens in the same universe, and suddenly you get Star Trek: Picard and like BG3 it might be a good product on its own right, but it is clearly not related to those who came before it.
In BG3 it's a different world, the NPCs have totally different mannerism, you will never hear something like: "Dang and bloody blast it! I swear I be thrice-damned the way ye yank me about from one place to the bloody next 'ere since we met! What does ye want now?" (Krogan Bloodaxe, BG2). It is much easier now to just write "Fuck yes" (Karlach, BG3) instead.
I am very disappointed so far.
