I’m talking about games that you still like but you had no idea were criticized so much.
The perfect example for me is Sonic Unleashed.
I admit that the game has its bad things, but I would have never imagined that it was so hated at the time… Although, that could be extended to the entire Sonic franchise, since for many years I was not aware at all of that “Sonic was never good”, “Sonic had a rough transition to 3D” nonsense.
Interestingly, the two example you shared (Sonic Unleashed and the whole Sonic franchise being bad) are likely a good example of “hanging with the bad crowd”. Unleashed is… not great, in my opinion, but the whole franchise? Please. We’re not talking Sonic06 level of horrible decisions.
Another view on this is, if you enjoy something, and people have to tell you it’s bad just so you know, it can’t be that bad. People enjoy different things, and seriously, the toxicity of large communities is the worst thing ever. At this point, even with what seems to be “unanimously loved”, you’ll be able to find a large enough group of people happy to tell you it’s shit.
With that said, some games are really, really bad. But these games usually don’t need to be pointed out for people to know.
edit: dang, that was full of typo.
Jumping on your last point, I was in a local Game store and a woman who clearly knew nothing about games was birthday shopping for her son, she asked the owner what if he thought Superman 64 would be a good gift.
To the man’s credit, in complete deadpan, he said “that game is absolutely terrible, it’s the worst game on the system”
That’s my favorite Sonic mission.