Mass Effect 3 vs Mass Effect Andromeda (I made a crappy video essay for N7 Day '22)

2 hrs, ouch! Well, I'll give it a try later, we'll see how long I last. But just looking at your chapters, my intro comments:
1 - agree
2 - hmmm, I would say no, but I'll give your video as shot at defending
3 - No doubt, slam dunk
4 - definitely a selling pt for MEA - an alternate way to get UR's, etc (though maybe that's not your focus)
5 - agree
6 - I like ME3's guns more, but I'll give it a watch and get back to you.
7 - Yes. But I like MEA's not being limited to Rank1 splosions (IIRC)
8 - We'll see what you say, but off the bat, MEA def wins with the following (personal ammo boxes, already mentioned Strike Team UR's, one-and-done permanent gear items, ability to buy ammo packs, higher UR drop rate and ... PITY TIMER FOR THE WIN!)
9 - slam dunk
10 -yeah, but I'm not a fan of the dash, just looks silly
11 - We'll see what you say, but to me it's ME3 by an ... infinite
12 - ME3 wins ... for most bugs (some nicely exploitable)
13 - hehe, we all know. MEA is actually quicker to everything-but-UR. But from there, it is foreverrrrr. And such a cynical ploy they pulled with the last patch bloat.

Okay, I watched the entire vid, and here's my thoughts...

Prologue: I did post here on ME3 vs. MEA multiplayer a couple of times. Check here if you are interested:
My first post trashing it a bit
My second post, defending it a bit and follow-up. This was after I revisited it on PC (original was XBOX)

Now, on to your video essay...

In the Outro, you say you prefer MEA, but admit to playing ME3 more (for reasons I totally agree with). I don't get a clear idea why you like MEA more. Your balanced chapter by chapter coverage would more suggest "ME3 is better, but not by the margin you'd think from social media. Hey people, MEA is really not that bad, so don't diss on it so much". So, why do you prefer MEA?

Maybe I missed it, but I don't think you comment on the biggest differences.  Gameplay:
ME3 is more static, featuring a balance of cover, strategic positioning, tactical response/retreat.
MEA is more dynamic, with 3-dimensional movement and fast acting cover-busting enemies. It's a cluster f*** of a fight most of the time.
So I see ME3 being more a balance of strategy, tactics, with eventual CF's (W11 and others) where you have to think fast. MEA is just bam, move, shoot, fight for your lives.
I far, far, prefer ME3's style.

Some simple points chapter by chapter:

Chap1 (stuff) ME3: Yes, that's a given. On your "all the races feel the same". YUP!! So I think ME3 wins not only on amount of content, but quality of it as well

Chap2 (character) MEA: Ah, so by character, you mean they have faces, voices, back-story. Got it. To me, this is far less important than how they play. And for me, that is ME3 by a wide margin. Plus, 3-games worth of story has given them sufficient character/backstory.

Chap3 (Challenges) ME3. Yes, and I'm sorry you missed out on the weekend Ops/Events on release. Good times.

Chap4 (Strike Teams/APEX) MEA. Obviously, and a very nice addition to the game.

Chap5 (Powers) ME3: Agree, slam dunk

Chap6 (Guns) MEA: Disagree. Your main point seems to be all are Gold/Plat viable. I'll give you that. But ME3's are more diverse, better sounds, better "feel". I can't stress that enough. And every game doesn't feature 2-4 with the PAW (even the Reegar/Harriers aren't near as abused).

Chap7 (Consumables) ME3: agree

Chap8 (QoL) MEA: agree. See my above posts, but you mentioned many of them. To me, the biggest is separate ammo crates and the Pity Timer.

Chap9 (Objectives) ME3. Agree, not even close. I hate, hate, hate the contested hacks, the ultra-short devices timer and the new uploads.

Chap10 (Controls) MEA. Agree. I still don't like the dash. It looks stupid (especially spammed).

Chap11 (Enemies) ?. Your points are balanced and fact-based. But which do you prefer? For me, it is ME3 easily. Admittedly largely due to 3-games of many 100's of hours of playthrough. So I relate more to them. Plus Banshees. No other enemy in any game I've played comes close.

Chap12 (Bugs). Yeah, ME3 has sooo many. Admittedly many work in your favor, which is fun to exploit.

Chap13 (Grind). You defend MEA basically due to it being less random. But I'd like to see an analysis of time to Max manifest. I think ME3 would be much shorter. But in MEA's defense, I do think you max out the non-variants/non-UR's much faster than ME3. And you are probably Gold/Plat viable much earlier.
But I just detest the cynical 1.09 bloat so much I can't forgive MEA. And here's the key: ME3's grind is mostly fun (except the massive griefing from long UR-less streaks). I enjoy playing the game, doing the challenges, watching my manifest improve. MEA is no fun getting there. XP is too low, credits for Bronze/Silver are too low.

And I like to Solo. You mention once how it is solo-unfriendly due to the objective timing. I'd add it is HORRIBLE to solo for that and others (very low credits, very low XP, uploads and devices are near-impossible). It is terrible for solo'ing. ME3 is an absolute blast.

Thanks for taking my comments as intended (I was afraid they'd come off too critical). I think we're pretty aligned on our positions (or at least properly understanding each others), so no need to elaborate further.

Oh, I do agree, and even mentioned, that ME3 can quickly devolve into a cluster-f***. I think that is one of its charms. But for me, all the waves of MEA sort of feel like ME3's W11

A bit more on grind (I'm into #'s). ME3 vs. MEA:

total items: 204 vs. 373
total "cards" to max each game's manifest: 1270 to 3394

But in the long run, it is UR's that dictate how long it takes to max a manifest (I've never gotten there!)
ME3: 210 cards (not including characters as they have separate pool and will max out much earlier).
MEA: 850 (70 char to 10, +70 char for veteran char's, 180 UR's 1-10, +530 UR variants!)

MEA packs have a much higher UR drop rate. About 25% vs. 15% for premium packs. So there's that.
But MEA Gold games give only 2/3 the credits/game at best (full 4-man extraction). Games are shorter, but not 1/3 shorter, right? Let's call it a wash at best.
So, not including MF impact, it'll take 850/210 *15/25 ~ 2.4x as long to max MEA vs. ME3. Honestly, I expected the #'s to be worse.

I liked both but am back playing me3 and have played it way way more.

Some things were just counter intuitive. MEA Find cover! Enemy destroys your cover! Being a sniper I found way way tougher in mea.

The multi level fighting was okay other than having giant robots leap up levels.

I'll have to go back to mea again and give it a whirl I did not complete my manifest in that game.

I would have loved to be a fly on the wall in the meeting where they decided the Claymore would not appear in ME:A..

like, wtf was their line of reasoning? Were they all drunk that day? Wtf happened there? 

Such a confoundingly unforced error.. 

Ash, +10 for the effort!

As to the comments on why now expend all the effort comparing 10 yr old and 5 yr old mp’s - your passion is obvious, and admirable.

However, MEA lacks the High Lord.

(for those who don’t know what that is, well, condolences…)

PS: The Hurricane just told me it is embarrassed by MEAMP…

I can get paid, but the view count is so low that it doesn’t matter. My non-effort and random videos seem to get the most views.

I got fucked by YouTube when I uploaded this. It didn’t come up in “recent” for Mass Effect 3, but a certain cunt’s stream VoD did. As well as a load of N7S stuff. Go figure I’d put effort in and lose out, again.

I have considered streaming Mass Effect 3 on twitch more than once a month again, and I’m working on a document of all my builds which I hope to make into YouTube Shorts. Twitch is my main focus, YouTube is secondary, don’t have enough time and my channel is 11+ years old so it’s got no real chance of growing, especially if I’m doing niche videos like Mass Effect multiplayer.

Still, online content has always been a hobby/passion project for me, so I’ll keep going. For me.

Yeah, subscriptions, ad revenue and cheering. Usually scrounge up £50 every 3 months. It’s not much, but it’s better than nothing. Should’ve been higher by now but I lost like 75% of my viewers because of my very open meltdown in early 2021. I did use to get 20-30 viewers for ME3, now I barely hit 5-9 🤷🏻‍♂️, my channel and reputation within the ME3MP community was permanently damaged thanks to the N7S founder. Shit happens. Still salty 2 years on. 🧂🧂🧂