My issue with commenting on this thread is that I feel as if everytime my initial impression of a game is that it's ugly, even if I play the game for a few hours and still feel that way, by the time the game is over I'm usually used to the graphics and don't mind them or have even found some positive qualities in them.
Like I thought Mario 64 was pretty ugly when I first started, but the charm was a little evident and becomes moreso the more you play.
I think one game where I don't think the game is putrid looking, but is kind of visually ugly, is Silent Hill 2. It's not enough to be terribad, and it does sell the dreaminess of Silent Hill at times. But, honestly, I actually think it's an example of how better graphics can sell a concept worse than the original game. Silent Hill 2's more detailed visual makeup does do a better job of selling a story than Silent Hill 1, but given that this is a Silent Hill game, it's a bit disappointing how the environments are actually less interesting, scary, and dreadful than the originals.
The originals take on PS1 graphics was that you could essentially make horror games more interesting by embracing the warping of PS1 textures and filling in spaces in the hardware with figurative "blanks" like dream-like fog. I think that the focus on putting more detail into the environment took away a lot of the abstraction and just made Silent Hill 2 look a bit too brown and dull at times, especially in the beginning of the game. I know the game is supposed to conjure up images of morning dew in a rainy early morning storm, and it kind of does a good job of that, but not nearly with the simplistic perfection of Silent Hill 1 - which has much more interesting graphics. In addition, ALL OF THE CHARACTERS have ugly fashion sense, like insanely ugly, and I don't even think it's intentional at times.
It's actually kind of sad given how much work was put into SH2 being one of the first technical showcases for the PS2.
