Was this all because of the animations backlash?

Honestly I'm inclined to say that in a manner of speaking, yes.

Andromeda has many issues, but the animations were the proverbial rock at the center of the giant snowball. Well before the game even released, they gave people an instant means to critique and mock it; rather than requiring paragraphs of text discussing the game's plot and tone, they could just post a gif of an awkward animation or facial expression, and it was so easy to spread.

Even now, you still see people posting gifs of animation issues that were patched out months ago, using them to laugh at the game.

I still honestly believe that had the game released in it's current state, while there likely would have been many who considered the plot and characters lacking and would consider it weaker than the OT, the level of vitriol and toxic behaviour would have been massively lower. Many people have many issues with BioWare and MEA itself, and those memes gave them such an easy way to go about tearing the game down and spreading their negativity around, and it's clearly had an impact.

No, better animations wouldn't fix the issues people have with the game's story or characters, but I am 100% certain there's a good number of people who would have found it far easier to connect and become invested if they weren't so distracted and unimmersed by the animations and awkward faces that have long since been fixed.

No, they said in the blog post they always planned to continue the story via APEX missions.

The author of the quarian ark book also knew in advance her book would wrap up the quarian plot.

MEA SP DLC was never planned. The reception had nothing to do with it.

Precisely why they didn't say anything.

I will be reading a summary of the books online at some point, not buying sorry - not after this mess.

I'm guessing now, looking at the game in hindsight that there was never DLC planned, that because they only had a year and a half to make what we got, they literally didn't have time for it. They just wanted to get this sh*t off their backs and move on. What's not right is the teaser at the end of the game, that's just not cool to do to the game's fan base.

I never had any interest in the books because they would have messed with my head canon. I always played femshep and wasn't interested in reading anything broshep. Same with Ryder. Sorry, but when I read some book, it won't be game related. Same as I don't watch any game based movie.

I believe the quarian teasing in the main game is actually teasing multiplayer content. I expect something quarian related in MP soon, possibly to coincide with the book release.

The hamfisted hints at the end of the game made me sure there's already a DLC close to it's release date. The only reason why, despite the poor reception of the game, I was sure we would get at least that one. I never would have imagined this to be down to books or MP content. That's really on the lines of flipping SP players the middle finger.

Of course not. No one was expecting for the game to not have DLC. No one was expecting Bioware to develop a "destiny clone" either.

They knew the decision to not have DLC would cause this exact backlash. Precisely why they didn't say anything for so long.

Unequivocally stating that DLC was never planned is a bit presumptuous, don't you think? I think DLC is always in the cards when it comes to BioWare, whether it materializes or not and why is another matter.

I doubt that's what they planned. But they did plan for a sequel that was scratched after Andromeda's release.

All Mass Effect and Dragon Age games had DLC. If they planned to not have DLC in Andromeda, than they planned for failure. 

Again, unless Bioware is outright lying they clearly said they planned for the pathfinder's story to continue via APEX missions early on in development. Plus if the game had been critically and commercially successful, how would not having SP DLC for MEA result in failure? The revenue lost by not making DLC would be recovered via MP transactions. MP also requires less money and personnel to develop. It's simply a new business strategy.

If that is truly the case, if BioWare knew from the start that they were never going to make SP DLC no matter what (something I still find hard to believe), then my respect for BioWare has dropped a few notches. Firstly, they should've been forthcoming about it from the start, especially when they announced there wouldn't be a season pass (an excellent opportunity to discuss DLC plans or the lack of them). Secondly, if this is what we should expect from future BioWare titles, specifically, plot threads that are purposefully left unresolved for tie-in content like comics, books, or even MP, then count me out. I don't mind tie-in content expanding the universe but never at the expense of the story you're trying to tell. Thirdly, it's bonkers that anyone would've thought this was a good idea in the first place.

Of course, the alternative here is that they're now trying to spin the lack of SP DLC as a creative decision made early on to reinforce the narrative that "Mass Effect: Andromeda did no wrong," what would be inherently dishonest, dropping my respect for them even more. Keeping mum about it for so long does lead one to suspect it was a play to postpone the backlash that would inevitably hurt lifetime sales.

Damn it, BioWare.