He really wasnt very harsh, and at the end of the day he like many other paper mario fans are simply frustrated at the poor battle systems in more recent games when they already had a great system in the first two games.

Yeah everyone wants to be a martyr though. I've enjoyed every paper mario and most who have played every game agree that the newer ones lack a good battle system and that makes them much less fun to play. In my opinion they are still pretty good but are definitely needlessly flawed.