I believe one of the issues you touched upon has something to do with the press in general and game/film journalists specifically being not honest with their audience because they're trying to predict what the trend will be. We often see that disconnect between what the media says and what consumers say, take The Last Jedi for example. When you have to deal with a high budget product from a mega corporation that owns several huge IPs, you can't be too careful right? What if you'll be the only reporter slamming the product into dust while everybody else praises it? Some doors might end up closed for you meaning you won't be able to do your job as effectively as earlier. The general audience is inert as a rule, they don't read reviews, they buy products for their kids or to just to have a couple of hours of fun after work. So I think it's the enthusiasts who set the trend. It wasn't until the enthusiasts pushed against EA with BFII that reviewers started hastily rewriting their articles to stay with the people.
Now about MEA. You can’t spell MEA without EA. And I agree with most of what you’re saying in this review. There is one thing that sets Andromeda apart from other Mass Effect games for me and that’s gameplay. In my opinion what they did to gameplay in the new installment is miles ahead of what we had in 2 and 3. Disclaimer: I’m a huge fan of the first ME and not so much of the sequels. So they brought back the elements from the original game and made them optional so that those who liked them would be able to use them, and those who didn’t, simply didn’t have to. For instance, overheating guns instead of thermal clips, the ground transport, several worlds open for exploration, a decent inventory. They added crafting you mentioned which is again completely optional. They made the actual combat a lot more engaging and now you have to maneuver a lot more. You can still play the game ME3 style but why do that, when you can soar above the battlefield, shooting all your biotic powers at the enemies, then take cover quickly and snipe what remains of them. And you don’t even have to choose your class permanently for the rest of the game. Lots of side activities for those who like exploration with random enemy encounters. Lots of armor pieces/guns/upgrades all of which belong to their niche and are indeed needed. All of this I really liked and considered it a step in the right direction (as a ME1 fan). But.
I agree with the pacing complaint. I also would like to add that I love the general direction of the story especially at the end of the game and I absolutely despise everything character related. Those attempts at humor (sometimes the jokes are pretty good, but most of the time just awkward and lame), those vague options in the dialogue wheel that trick you into choosing the least relatable phrase possible, those faceless, flat characters most of whom we’ve seen a million times. On the plus side – you don’t have to talk to them if you don’t like them. I beat this game while completely ignoring one of the characters.
They make you deal with death of your relative early in the plot when you feel absolutely nothing towards that person and try to make up for it throughout the game. It doesn’t work this way. Actions of characters, their motivation all of that feels as if it’s some sort of a holiday cartoon, especially at the beginning. My overall impression on the plot of this game: the beginning feels as if it was written by 5 year olds, the middle portion was written by teenagers but the ending was staged by gods of screenwriting, action direction and game design. Everything about that ending was amazing in my opinion, and I believe one simply cannot judge the game without beating it first. It is especially sad as now we may never know what happens next, never meet the guys who built this amazing world. But it is what it is I guess. At least you can see the devs really wanted to make up for the poor ending of the original trilogy and turn the gameplay into something more engaging. The game should’ve just been called Andromeda and released only after all the bugs would have been fixed.
So, sorry for the wall of text, keep up the good work. I love what you’re doing.