The problem is that it comes across like nintendo is only changing things up because girl game, and the mechanics they do change end up feeling sexist asf when viewed in that context

I really don't know how you'd come to that conclusion if you took into account the trajectory of what Nintendo has done with Zelda recently. The sort of systems-driven and open-ended gameplay of Echoes seems to be much more of a continuation of what they already started with BOTW (especially the 2d prototype they created for that game) and continued exploring with TOTK than something they would have come up with if they started out from the idea of having Zelda as the protagonist and designed the game downwards from there. This is obviously not how Nintendo always operates, and I'd bet money that the Princess Peach game that came out this year actually was the result of some market research telling them they'd need a game to market to girls specifically and that was then designed from that idea downwards, but I really don't think that is how they're conceptualizing Zelda games right now, where the team and their games seems to have been successful enough to be free from such concerns.