Was Mass Effect 2 really that Much Better than MEA?

I prefer the Joss whedon mood instead. I don't like Dark Games. There is a good reason I avoid most dark anime as well. I prefer the light hearted cheeky stories over the grim ones, so I hope MEA 2 keeps it lighthearted nature.

It's all good, personal preferences and so on.

The thing I don't get about this is why would someone with such preferences be a fan of Bioware games at all, since they didn't produce any games of lighthearted nature until MEA. 

Same goes for fans of Bethesda-like open world games.

Seems like Bioware is supposed to be like everything but Bioware now and a lot of MEA fans don't seem to understand why this change of priorities is so widely criticized (among other things).

I like ME2 the best. IMO, it had the best balance between doing what you want ("exploration") and the main quest. I loved the suicide mission (minus the T-800), which I remember the devs saying they almost scrapped because it was a pain to code and they had a really hard time getting it working right (which makes me appreciate it more). I thought Shepard had better roleplay options in most conversations (aside from that one conversation about Cerberus with Miranda, and a couple others) than in ME1 which often had three dialog options that all lead to Shepard saying the same thing in the same exact tone. And the characters, despite their daddy issues (or in Thane's case being a daddy issue), were far better than then being a walking codex (Tali I'm looking at you). Also the music in ME2 in the best of any Bioware game, except maybe DA:I. Maybe.

However, I like ME:A as well. I like the lighthearted tone, because it's not like game isn't serious when it needs to be. I just saw my Ryder as someone who uses humor to deal with the crappy things in life (I played sarcastic Hawke the same way). I like Ryder and see potential for her to become an excellent character, she's already had more character growth than Shepard ever did, and there is a chance for much more and I'd like to see it happen. I like Ryder's crew, they felt like a team much more than previous titles (the only other Bioware game I got that feeling from was DA2) mostly because they interacted with each other on the ship and out in the field. And Drack is in the #2 spot for my favorite character in the entire series. The pacing of this game isn't really that great, but I've noticed a lot of open world and semi open world games are kinda that way, but at least this game's main quest isn't called "The Race Against Time" (ME1 suffers much much worse pacing, IMO).

Combat in both ME2 and ME:A is superior to ME1, but not necessarily ME3.

Hmm, looking back over this post maybe I just don't like ME1. lol

This makes me want to play a 1.04 Sara!

I agree in that I prefer a more hopeful tone to the story and setting than I do your typical grimdark angsty bullcrap.

I just found MEA's execution to miss the mark.  I thought the beginning of the game was genius.  After leaving Habitat 7 though things really start to break down, often delving too far into childish antics for attempts at humor.  There is plenty of critiquing around, so no need to rehash all of it.  If they can get some more competent writers for the sequel I'd agree in hoping they keep a more optimistic tone for MEA2.

Did you watch the video the OP posted?  It reminds us of a lot of flaws in the well-thought out story you mention... which by the way literally nothing you do through the entirety of ME2 makes a difference in ME3.  Not the Suicide Mission, not destroying or saving the Collector base.  Even the companions you recruit don't make a difference in the end because they are reassigned as side characters and if they died in ME2?  They are just replaced with someone else to fill the role.  Heck even the MAIN VILLAIN of the game Harbinger, who had an entire DLC devoted to his Arrival didn't make a lick of difference to the trilogy because he doesn't appear for more than five seconds in the final game, says nothing and ends up just being the Catalyst's stooge.  The Illusive Man ends up the big villain of the day we have to face for a lot of ME3.

Also, the rest is subjective.  I liked the characters in MEA and thought they were well fleshed out.  I liked the story line, which does have some contrivances and inconsistencies as well that the Andromeda video pretty accurately points out.  The bugs I'll agree with.  The amount of bugs, glitches and animation woes was unacceptable for Andromeda.  It's much better now than the videos I've seen of the initial release (I got the game after 1.05) but it shouldn't have launched in that condition.

Anyway, back to ME2, I thought the final mission in MEA made more logical sense with better construction over ME2's Suicide Mission.  It's never explained why in ME2, these specific characters mattered and why they were the only ones who could stop the Collectors.  Heck, half of them just kind of stand around on the mission and are just there because "reasons" and other characters are actively killed if you actually use them for an assignment.  Then you show up at the Human Reaper which still makes no narrative sense since it's not space-worthy, the Reapers don't care about organics yet designed one lonely ship to look like them despite the rest all being cuttlefish, and it doesn't matter one way or the other when you destroy it because what was the point to begin with?  The point was the Reapers wanted to harvest humanity specifically because they were the genetic diversity key to stop the spread of dark energy in the galaxy... oh wait, no they weren't because that story was axed completely.  So nothing in ME2 actually made a difference anyway.  Also, it's all on you and your crew despite the game establishing that the entire Alliance fleet knows about the Reapers and the Collectors and have put in place defenses against them (defense guns at Horizon and Alliance personnel in the Terminus system confirmed by Ashley/Kaiden to be there directly because of the Collector abduction) yet NO ONE comes along to help the mission to STOP the Collectors and instead act like Shepard is crazy.

Compare that to MEA where you've been pushing toward Meridian and the teraforming network in Heleus since the first mission.  Then you arrive at the final destination and if you've been doing missions for people throughout the game they ALL show up to help you make the final fight.  All the Pathfinders we've found, if we bothered to find them, Sloane or Reyes, the Krogan, the Hyperion...  Everyone is there to fight with you because you fought for them.  That had a pretty epic scale and feeling to it.

I loved ME2 when I first played it.  I still like the game now.  However, when I replay the series, of which I haven't done in some time, I have a really hard time with ME2.  It's tough not to wish I could just jump from ME1 to ME3 because the entirety of ME2 is basically filler episodes in TV series.  They don't really matter to the overall plot and it's all just one big side story.  It's a fun game by itself and the characters are fantastic, but in the overall narrative ME2 is the weakest of the trilogy by a substantial margin.  That of course, is just my opinion.

Whether or not ME2 is "better" than ME:A, I can't really say. All I know is that, while ME2 definitely has its flaws, I had a lot more fun with ME2 than ME:A. I found the companions in ME2 more interesting, I enjoyed the soundtrack from ME2 100x than Andromeda, etc. The only thing ME:A does better, to me, is the combat, I love the mobility. Other than that, ME2 just had far more memorable moments than ME:A. I mean, I just finished playing ME:A not too long ago and it's been years since I've played ME2, and yet, I remember far more about what happened in ME2 while I'm struggling to remember parts about Andromeda.

The games are sitting on my shelf.  Collecting dust.  I think I only replayed ME2 and ME3 twice back in the day.  I've rewatched the games multiple times because I do enjoy the story, but playing them is a nightmare.  The games look good, sometimes beautiful.  I'm mostly trolling on that part since everyone and their grandma thinks MEA is ugly when it beats the snot out of the OT in some regards.  And on par in others 

Of course you do, you are a ME-A fanboy.

ME2 is my least favorite ME game, by far. It is the reason why I don't do trilogy runs. I have 6 Shepards - one of each class - that I've run through the trilogy. I'll replay ME1 & ME3 with those characters from time to time, but prefer not to play ME2.

The very premise of ME2 is preposterous. Shepard was not just merely dead, but really most sincerely dead, and decomposing - and they brought her back to life? So she would be willing to work with an organization that the Alliance and Council considered to be terrorists and enemies? And we are to believe that the Alliance would stand idly by and do absolutely nothing to protect the colonies - but somehow, TIM has it all figured out? VS calls her out for working with Cerberus, but Anderson and Hackett still support her and ask her to do stuff for them? Yeah? Uh - no. Just no. It's a steaming pile of utter nonsense.

Some of the things Shepard did in ME2 seemed completely out of character for the Shepard I thought I knew from ME1. Like releasing the prisoners on Jack's recruitment mission. Tracking down the Shadow Broker, and killing a fellow Council Spectre. The non-explanations of why she'd be working with Cerberus. I could go on.

I can appreciate the characters even though it's hard for me to imagine that Shepard would be willing to work with some of them. ME2 also expanded the world lore a fair bit with visits to Tuchanka, the Quarian Flotilla, Omega, and Illium. But I really dislike the mechanics - both combat and P/R - though the SM is generally well done.

Different strokes, I guess.

I'm pretty much over grimdark.  ME3 took it waaay too far, imho - the entire galaxy suffered immensely under reaper attack - and even though Shepard ultimately 'won', it didn't feel like much of a victory to me.

But I can enjoy a variety of tones, including MEA's.

Are you 6?