Rank Trilogy in terms of replay value

opuspace ME1's combat did feel more organic as the levels actually felt more like actual places and didn't have conveniently placed chest high walls. ME2 and ME3 designs were very video gamey by comparison. But I can't complain about it because ME3's combat is just a lot of fun, especially in MP. And it has a lot of nuances that make it interesting to me.

To me, Garrus/Liara are the worst offenders in this regard. Garrus can at least be ignored and killed off if you don't like him. But Liara gets so much special treatment its silly. I like LotSB DLC, but I hate how buddy buddy I act with Liara even if I hated her guts in ME1 and told her to mind her own business. And that final scene where Shepard can vent frustration in the DLC is a great scene for him/her, but its only possible with Liara. In fact, many of the humanizing scenes are only possible with Liara. Lame. And Citadel DLC is annoying if your romance is from ME2 or you don't have one.

But, one issue I have with Garrus is he is fine with you all the time. Even in his loyalty mission, if you don't kill Sidonis, he barely seems upset and accepts Shepards lead despite being so adamant about killing him. I think even if you don't help him, in ME3 its not even mentioned and he acts the same I bet. And you example of killing Wrex and not helping his people is a good one. Where as everyone else from ME1/ME2 can either be betrayed or killed off in some capacity.

And ah ha. The Mako "drove" you nuts... I get it.

I'm seeing exactly what you're seeing.

I thought the London fight in ME3 felt very organic.  Even though it was mostly a linear-style mission, the areas where we moved from the street into various buildings and worked our way through them felt quite natural.  Things like cashier counters, phone booths, cafeteria tables and numerous doorways all felt quite natural for a "bombed-out" city setting.  Likewise, the setting of the mission going through the Lessus monastery had what I considered to be very organic and natural cover for the style of building that was involved.  Although it was very linear, the mission to save Admiral Koris on Rannoch certainly had a lot of organic cover.  In ME2, Tali's recruitment mission certainly did not feel linear even though the cover was, for the most part, crates strewn about the area.  Mordin's recruitment mission made use of various sets of stairs to give the player less linear options for approaching individual battles. 

With very few exceptions, ME1's base facilities were all just various sizes of cargo crates strewn about rooms.  Feros was just a series of concrete hallways lined on alternating sides with chest-high concrete blocks.  Fighting through the commandos to get to Benezia really was just going from one small hallway-like room to the next using the ever present chest-high cargo crates as cover.  Virmire was a series on concrete walkways with cargo crates placed at intervals on either side.

However, the bulk of ME1 combat did not occur in these outdoor locations on the side planets... the bulk of the combat occurred once inside the main facilities on each planet or on the main mission planets.  In addition, there was often a great deal of "inorganic" crate-like cover placed around the bases outside as well. The geth base on Rayingri is a prime example... where you fought more geth troops upon leaving the building.

I agree that most of the bases were surrounded by "strategic" rock placement such that there were always an adequate number of sniper perches that make it possible to kill pretty much every enemy outside on any of the side planets at a far enough range that they never even fire a single shot back at you.  That is something that is pretty unique about ME1's combat compared with the rest of the Trilogy; however, it is not representative of the majority of the combat in the game.

Still, London was an "organic" setting... the cover that was their belonged there.  It was an urban battle, so it would have been out of place to have mountain-top sniper perches as a set up.  ME3 brought in the feeling of being bombarded by mortars and other heavy fire... something the previous two games lacked and something that was totally appropriate for the sort of all out war atomphere that was that game's aesthetic.  Still, there were opportunities for using the organic sniper perch even in ME3.  The Admiral Koris mission takes well above and at a distance from one of the geth locations, so you do have an opportunity to snipe them early... or you can continue to walk towards the area and take them down closer in.  The cover in that case are completely natural (i.e. organic) rock formations.

Weren't those phone booths an easter egg?  I'm not arguing the linear nature of the game... I'm talking about the use of the term "organic."  Crates strewn everywhere, both inside and outside of a warehouse plunked in the middle of nowhere for no apparent logical reason is NOT organic.  Giving you a planet with 1 objective and 5 "loot crate" level locations is not making the game less linear since the decision is really only to drive to the dot on the map. 

The facility missions were linear... you have to fight through the base to complete them.  Zaeed's LM in ME2 was not linear in that you were given a clear choice as to how to complete it and different consequences dependent on the choice you made.  Samara's loyalty mission was not linear in that you needed to select only 3 of all the various situations in the bar before the mission progressed, so you could complete it in several different ways.  I honestly can't say whether ME1 allows you to complete UNC: Espionage without killing Haliat since I have always killed him.  I do know the message I get signifying the end of the mission only appears after the last enemy drops.  If it does allow you to just drive the mako off without killing anyone and gives you a different mission complete notification as a result, then that one is perhaps the only non-linear UNC mission in ME1.

You might find it "interesting" to think about sniping from a mountain rather than finding places to duck in an urban environment while being bombarded by heavy fire from above (as at the start of the one Turian Bomb mission)... but I like that ME3 did it differently than ME1 because that alone makes the two games different from one another... and that alone is more interesting than had they just repeated ME1's format over again in the other two games.

ME1 was more ambitious. It at least attempted to give you the feeling that this was a real galaxy where people lived and worked. This is very apparent on the Citadel. It felt like a living breathing station and you could go to many different places on it. In ME2, we are confined to like 4 floors on a single ward because from a design perspective it would leave too much down time for the players (to explore the Citadel and not enough shooting) if the Ctiadel was bigger. The planet exploration was completely removed for planet scanning which felt like a very video gamey way of leveling up your stuff.

The worlds in ME1 were not really great, but you at least got the sense that you were exploring or landing on a world. In ME2, you basically got to a planet for a side quest and can only go in one specific area in that world the game allows you to. They basically removed a lot of stuff from ME2 because they wanted the games pacing to engage a more casual audience. There is nothing wrong with that, but I'd have preferred if they kept the exploration and expanded on it or made it better. 

ME3 is even worse in that every level feels like a shooting gallery. There is no exploration at all, and the gameplay resembles Gears of War in its approach. Don't get me wrong, I like ME2 and ME3. ME1 isn't even my favorite games as I find it too tedious to play. But I do appreciate that the game felt more open, had more things it tried to do (instead of removing stuff in the sequels), and generally had a more ambitious approach lacking in the sequels. 

3-2-1 for me.

The different combinations of choices in the prior games make each of the successive ones more replayable to me. I also like the combat better in each game in the series, with 3 being my favorite even over Andromeda. I do think that ME3 suffers a little bit from restricting what I can do until after Palevin, you can't even explore the Normandy until you leave the Citadel for the first time and go through some cut scenes. I feel like ME2 "hands over control" earlier than ME3 does.