Epyo posted... I've mostly finished World 1, missed a couple levels I need to go back for...
I'm not a huge fan of the game so far, surprisingly! Which is weird for me, because I'm usually blown away by a brand new Mario game--Odyssey's in my top 10 games of all time, NSMBU is my favorite 2d Mario for sure. So, I'm not a "new game = bad game" type of fan.
But so far, it constantly feels like the game is playing ME, more than I'm playing IT. Something wacky happens, and I'm just making split second decisions analyzing what I think the level designer wants me to do. I feel like I might prefer to watch someone else play through it so I can just enjoy the spectacle.
It's also giving me a familiar stress about missing "key items" that are gonna block me later in the game, and constantly worrying about having to re-play entire levels to fix my mistakes, except my mistakes aren't really mistakes, I simply didn't think exactly like that level designer wanted me to.
(3D world also had this problem with its easily missed green stars which are required to unlock all levels, and sure enough, I wasn't a big fan of that game either. This game has the easily missed wonder seeds AND easily missed purple coin stuff.)
BUT I'm still very early, and it is very pretty =]
I think you just have to change your mentality with collectibles. I was like this and had that problem with 3D World initially too. Eventually I learned to only replay the level right away if I actually wanted to experience the level again. Don't do it just for collectibles. You need so few Wonder Seeds to progress through the main game here. I just go back at the end of the main game to wrap up 100% and always have a good time doing it.
I'm surprised you enjoyed NSMBU so much (I did too) because that also has a lot of collectibles and easily missable secret exits.