OP

Quoted from pmWolf:

I don't know if Stern "pooped their pants" with this game. I think there were several people here that impacted how the game is viewed today. (Or...I guess you'd say that they were the ones that pooped in Stern's pants).
Even from the very beginning, X-Men was a great game. However, many people chose NOT to focus on the kickass aspects of the game, and instead took time to whine about a bunch of minuscule, largely irrelevant details. Instead of focusing on the tremendous DMD animations, and spectacular music, they'd whine about a voice they didn't like. Instead of talking about some very cool magnet tricks and super-deep gameplay, they'd complain about some missing feature in a wizard mode that 99.9% of humanity would never be able to reach anyhow.
After a while, those with positive things to say were just drowned out...and the detractors drove the narrative from there. Hobbyists were bombarded with: "X-Men is a total crap game", and tired posts like "$10k by Christmas" became the sneering response to just about everything. The reputation of the game was damaged by nit-picking, and by people that are unable to find anything pleasant to say about anything in the world around them.
Sadly enough, people who had never even seen nor played the game started believing all the negativity. ("Hey, nobody has anything nice to say about this game...it must suck!")
It's sad, because X-Men really is a great game. It gets better with every revision, but at its heart, it has never been BAD at all. It is quite a bit better than some of the Stern games that are a lot more popular.
We live in a world where it is just too easy to tear things down. It is much easier to spew negativity...and since there is an army of people willing to do the same, there is instant gratification when someone complains. Nobody focuses on the positives, because it is less rewarding in the long run. Being hyper-critical is just a better way to get attention.
It's been a while since I had a chance to really put some time on my X-Men machine. I'm telling you, it's an impressive piece of work. I really appreciate the full DMD show, and am so glad that it wasn't one of those 33% - 66% split DMD's. The animations are just incredible...particularly when you beat a villain like Juggernaut or Magneto...or get an Extra Ball or Replay. The music is incredibly varied, and fantastically composed. David Thiel did a marvelous job.
I'm very happy that I'm an owner of this game.
Pete