I'm not convinced that I've met anyone who liked HMs. Everything other than Surf and Strength were a sub-par moves. They also restrict your team in multiple ways, either you have a full team that each knows an HM move (which feels terrible), or an almost full team with an HM slave (which also feels terrible).

On top of that, most of them were mandatory for progression, and there wasn't much of an indicator that you needed one sometimes. If you were a kid, and you didn't understand that you needed Cut for the Cut-bush to get to Rock Tunnel, it probably took you a while before you realized it. Ohh, and Flash isn't even mandatory for Rock Tunnel. Just play with cheater-palette.

The only problem anyone should have with this, is that Surf probably takes longer to find and teach, and that you don't have a delicious 90 (95) damage move to teach your Water Pokemon a third of the way through the game.