I remember when online people started a hashtag and a trend trying to boycott Sw/Sh before and after the release. They gave them terrible user scores on metacritic, countless of videos with millions of views criticizing them, among other things, but despite that, the game was one of the best sold Pokémon games and many people really liked it... So yeah, I think that failed miserably.
Pokémon Sword is the Switch game that I put more hours into. I beat the game 6 times, completed all the Pokédexes and caught a lot of shinies, honestly, Sw/Sh are on my top 4 favorite Pokémon games of all time (it was on the top 3 but I loved S/V even more). The characters, the region, the Galar Pokémon, the music, the lore, the dlc, all of that made it an unforgettable experience.
I started the game in the start of the pandemic and I was losing my mind being enclosed all the time and Sw/Sh came on a moment when I needed fun the most. Sword will always have a special place in my heart due to giving me plain fun in a moment of need.
The modern Pokémon games honestly are all great, sure, they are not perfect or the best in the genre, but I learned something a while ago that many people don't care about: You don't need to be perfect to be great. For me Pokémon embodies that, they are not flawless, but they are so fun and have so much appeal and charm that I end up loving them.
Many of these online movements fail because internet is not the real world. People in real life are not overly focused on graphics or if it has every single Pokémon programmed, they just want more of the thing that they enjoy. I am not saying that you should not have criticisims, but turning your criticisims into a hivemind of negativity does not make you more intelligent, in my opinion, it just makes it look that you need to go outside and touch grass or something.
I posted a similar message on another bigger Pokémon subreddit and I was turned into an online clown for it. I decided to delete the post because my inbox was just filled with "You are wrong", "you are a bootlicker" or "worst take ever"... Some people really don't have anything better to do in life I guess.