Why Mass Effect Andromeda is Well written.

I'll point it out the next time you do this - like I have before.

and i will.point out that again i have stated an opinion.

PS 4. Sadly in this case.

Here's a fact for you: the ending to ME3 stirred up an unprecedented shitstorm from which the IP has yet to recover.

I don't find the Cora, for example, is just fixated on the Asari commandos.  There is a lot of great ambient dialogue about her playing poker, for example, or a very good set of conversations between her and Jaal in the Nomad regarding the meaning of family.  From what I've seen on YouTube, though, not many people drive slowly enough to allow these conversations to develop... but I consider them to be an integral part of the narrative... a narrative that changes and deepens depending on who you happen to select to bring with you on the various missions.

When the player (Ryder) actively listens to what his squad is talking about when in the Nomad.. That's when he/she truly gets to know his/her companions.  You're complaining because they just didn't stick with the info-dump formula conversations they used in ME1... which weren't all that deep.  Tali was a very one-dimensional character in ME1, so was Garrus, and Wrex and even Kaidan.  Ashley had a little more depth to her conversations... but not much and certainly what depth there was to her character never went anywhere.  In two conversations combined with Lexi's comments, Ryder knew more about Suvi's faith in God than he ever found out about Ashley in ME1.  He gets even more by listening to how she interacts with Kallo.  No, the squad in ME:A are not one-dimensional characters... but the player has to be willing to listen to enough of the game to unearth the multiple dimensions within each character and understand them better.  It's not just about the conversations you have at on the ship anymore... and that's a vast, vast improvement over ME:A.

colfoley, in his review way back when, got it right... this game is a "slow burn"... The problem is that so many people really don't want to put that much time into slowly progressing through the game to learn that depth is really there.  Like they continually demonstrate on this site... they can't wait for anything and can't wait to pass quick judgment on everything... so, they've just completely missed out on what is a very good RPG game.

ME:A got serious when it needed to be. Like when the revelation of the origins of the Angaara or what the Kett was doing to them.

If a game who's focus is on characters and story, doesn't grab me in the first hour, it's not going to. The OT did just that and I loved it. MEA clearly was going another direction and story characters weren't the main focus. They should have created the story/characters first and then shaped the world around that, but it seems to me that they created the world first and then tried to cram a story into it.

Like I have said before, this is the FO4 of the ME series. Shooter with rpg elements. Some like the story/characters and that is fine. I'm not one of them.

I really should do a thread analyzing the characters...

Anyways something i wanted to expand on from earlier. Good writing= consistent writing.

Its one of the most surprisingly maligned parts of the game but Ryder becoming the Pathfinder was consistent with Alecs character arc.

Whereas Shepard being made Spectre was not consistent with the internal rules of the Council. Unless of course the Council was purely incompetent...or Sheps appointment was purely political. That last issue, however, wasn't mentioned in the game.

the other issue is most of these characters are really young. Let me put it this way...which characters have the most to talk about? Jaal and Drack. And while Jaal has to because of the Angarra gate Drack is by far the oldest.

Alec was alive for all of 5 minutes - he didn't have an arc to speak of... which is an example of poor writing imo because there is zero emotional connection on the part of the player with Ryder as she becomes pathfinder. If anything, the player is left to think - "that's undeserved... and kinda dumb"

The whole concept of pathfinder is very poorly explained, for that matter. Although the writing is consistently lighthearted and filled with jokes, so there's that I suppose, if that's your thing.

No, I don't agree with that.  Asking Tali about her government was not really being "interactive" anyways.  It was very stilted... "what's that" sort of dialogue.  The necessity of pausing to use the wheel breaks a lot of the immersion.  Too much of it just drags the game right down, IMO and makes the NPCs feel like walking codices... not 3D characters.  Hearing how Jaal describes his family differently with each different crew mate in the nomad (because he perceives them to have different personalities and adjusts to talk with them) tells me a great deal in more depth about Jaal's own personality.  I can even compare it to how he interacts differently with different personalities of Ryder when they do have a conversation on the ship or in one of the outposts.  It tells  me what character traits he values and which ones he doesn't... which is far more three dimensional than describing one's government or culture in an info dump.

Even just looking at it numerically, there are more actual dialogue wheel conversations of a personal nature with each individual of the crew throughout the game on multiple different topics than there ever was in ME1.  Most "personal" conversations in ME1 were limited to 4 for each crew mate.  For example... Garrus - you talked to him once when he first got on the ship, you talked to him again when he told you about Saleon, you talking to him once where he asked you if you were ever going to catch Saren, you talked to him again after you did that message and he thanked you... and he basically repeated that for the remainder of the game.  I honestly do not get why people think he's such a deeply written character in ME1... clearly there is just not much to him.  The depth of the ME1 characters is all in the heads of fans who are, for the most part, just intent on endlessly criticizing any ME game that came after ME1.