I don't see why you people think G3 ponies are ugly.
I mean, maybe they don't look too good animated, but as toys they looked really pretty compare to all the other toy lines.
Not that G4 ponies aren't pretty, too. But they as toys they look like elves. Ugh.
And the G1 ponies were just too chubby. The G2 ponies looked nice, though. But they're still outranked by the G3 ponies when it comes to prettiness.
And G3.5 toys looked extremely ugly, imo. (I still love them, though)
EDIT:
Well, actually, the G4 merchandise sucks in terms of playsets. I mean, the G3 ponies interacted with most of the playsets they came with. Plus they were bigger so there's that.
Also, the G1 cartoon was awesome. I actually would prefer the G1 cartoon over FiM (hate me). While, I will admit that FiM is a lot better in terms of character development and animation. But G1 had better villains, not that I don't like Discord and Nightmare Moon. But they're like jokes, basically.
The G1 villains scared me when I was little.
Plus, I really love fantasy, and G1 had an extremely high fantasy feel.