A competent, fun-to-play game that does nothing new doesn’t suck IMO, thus the distinction.

Saying anything that doesn’t do something new or exciting sucks is a pretty bad take IMO.

Like you wouldn’t say a new horror movie sucks just because it’s about a serial killer holding a family captive in their house and there’s like 50 movies with that premise already, y’know? Execution counts and Valve is still amazing at execution, is my main point. They would absolutely make a fun game that feels intuitive to play with great level design. It just might not necessarily be anything special in terms of mechanics. Mechanically I haven’t seen much new from them since maybe Portal 2.