Everything that was wrong with Andromeda. A video that sums it up well.

I mean sure, it's not like ME1 was perfect.
But for instance, Andromeda and the Archon. I never felt anything for him or his lackeys, not hate nor empathy. It was a boring villain, and killing the kett was the most mundane shit to do. I felt like in Doom (reboot), no story whatsoever just kill over and over for the sake of it, granted in Doom it kinda works, the game evolves around that. But on a ME game? hell no, I'm not here for the killing or the pretty graphics or the gameplay, I'm mostly here for story and the characters.

I remember asking once on Twitter to Chris Wynn what he was working on when he tweeted something vague about Andromeda (before he left the Studio). To my surprise, he answered and literally said to me "things to shoot in the face". I'll never forget it. That's exactly how I remember the kett: things to shoot in the face. Nothing more, just mindless drones without any interesting background. The same with the remnant and any other enemy faction in the game, completely bland npcs with the sole purpose of providing some degree of fun when you kill them, if you're into that.

Not gonna deny MEA didn't have its ups, I've said it on my review of the game in the review thread, the game had nice moments. But it tends to get obscured by how inconsistent the story is and how forgettable the characters are, just when I'm starting to enjoy it, some shit writing comes up and ruins it, when I wanted to know more about the kett, nope, there's nothing more. So on.
I don't even remember the names of my own crew mates at times, that's how little engaged they were for me. And other NPCs we met? I can't even tell who they are even if you show me a picture of them, I'll probably be "who was this guy again?".

The important thing with a story I think, is making it good, and keep it there. If there're ups and downs, you're not gonna end up remembering anything of importance. It's hard to do it, no shit, but it's literally the most important thing in a game based around that.
ME1 was this constant mystery: who or what are the Reapers? Why is this Saren fellow helping them? why no fucking body believes me? is it really true the entire galaxy gets wiped out every 50k years? Plus it had the major advantage of being the first game: it introduced all the lore, the 11 or so new alien species, their lore, past wars, treaties, culture, how these weird shit guns even worked, what happens when a ship goes into FTL, ancient races and what little we knew about them. Like holy shit, I cannot tell you how fucking intrigued I was about all the lore, I spent entire play sessions just reading and listening to the Codex because I loved so much this universe. It's really hard not to appreciate ME1 when it started it all, and it started it well.