And that's what the review sort of said. People overblown the review as yet another "can't spell ignorant without IGN" but the reviewer had a fairly reasonable reason for saying "too much water", and it's pretty much what
Volt-Ikazuchi said above. Doesn't help the reviewer played Alpha Sapphire version where the main villains used Water-types (at least later in the game) and the titled Legendary was a Water-type, however had she played Omega Ruby she'd still have the same complaint.
I think the problem all comes down with the move Surf. It's powerful, too powerful for early game thus why with the water routes you had to travel early game you needed a ferry. However, with the theme of the game being the balance between land and sea, this meant they couldn't really do an equal amount of land and water routes throughout the game. They had to shove all the water routes in the second half of the game. On paper it's not a bad idea, instead of a small stretch of water they'll give us an ocean to explore plus diving locations to double that (thinking about it, it's odd they don't have a Hoenn version of the Sinnoh Underground). But the problem is the water routes all looked the same, same with the diving locations. While in a sense realistic, they really needed to fill out the oceans a bit more.
Oceans have plenty of biodiversity both above and especially below waters and I don't anyone would complain if they were conveniently next to each other. Throw in a waterfall or two. You could have added random boats sailing by you could board. Added another shipwrecked boat or even sunken ship accessible only by diving. Maybe have another Sea Mauville drilling platform or multiple smaller ones or hydro/wind turbines. The key here was keeping things visually fresh just like when we were traveling on land... and they didn't do that. "Breaks" from ocean was usually just another land mass, the water had almost nothing interesting or happen on it. Yes, there's Pacifidlog Town and Route 132, 133, and 134, but those are side locations.
I think the issue here was players just not wanting an HM Slave or just nerfing their team in a small way when they're about to have the climatic face off against the villain team. When playing the first time you don't know what they may be packing so going in nerfed somehow can feel unfair. How to fix this? The only way I could think is just before reaching the peak you'd come across a Team Galactic campsite where they'd have a bed to rest in, PC, and maybe a Move Deleter and Move Reminder.
If they keep the max amount of damage it could do at being just a quarter (even if the opponent is quadruple weak to rock) would really help some "soft banned" mons be able to get back into the game.
Which I don't mind. I like the idea behind HMs, Poke Rides were a nice compromise but does take away the feeling you and your team is progressing on your adventure when you're using someone else's Pokemon (wouldn't mind HM items though since those would be an extension to the player's ability, it just doesn't feel quite right when it's a Pokemon you don't own).
However, if they bring HMs back and they make them a required feature, they do need to change some things. Some suggestions:
- As long as we have two Pokemon in our party that can learn the HM, we can delete that HM and replace it with another move.
- Instead of teaching it to our Pokemon, just let us be able to use it from the TM.
- Give us extra slots for Pokemon and/or moves, having these extra slots lock during battle but outside of battle we can switch around Pokemon and Moves from these extra slots.
- Have HMs Power and effects strengthen as we get more Badges. That way we can get certain HMs earlier than we would and would make normally weak HMs stronger.
This is beginning to sound like wishlisting so I'll stop there, but I think some basic changes would help make HMs more tolerable to use to progress. Granted, you may still need an HM Slave if your main party doesn't cover an HM you need, but as long as they give you an opportunity to swap that Pokemon out before the next major battle that shouldn't be too much of an issue.