My Fear for the future...

They screwed up the ending... The other 99% of the writing was very good. In Andromeda, 99% of the writing is shit - so your comparison doesn't work for me. We're on very different wavelengths here that will never be bridged.

perhaps. But everyone of the ME games had major plotholes. Or things that did not make sense. Or Shepard becoming a Spectre before proving themselves.

Actually, Shepard had a distinguished military career of well over 10 years before becoming a spectre, if you pay attention to the codex the events of the Skyllian Blitz, Akuze or Torfan that gave Shepard his/her fame all happened years before the events of ME1. undoubtly he/she participated in many other military campaigns between those dates. Furthermore Shepard was selected to be the Executive officer of the Alliance's most advanced warship, not an easy feat if you ask me.

Then What is actually?

It is repeatedly made clear in ME1 that Shepard is the Alliance's most decorated special forces member behind Anderson, not only that, but both the Alliance's Leadership and te Citadel council considerd Shepard to be a viable candidate, that was the entire point of the ME1's opening.

So I recently finished Andromeda. I really liked Andromeda.

Bioware has been a tale of two games recently.

DAI was a game i personally really liked, it was critically acclaimed and financially successful, to the tune of being called the fastest selling launch in Bioware history.

Yet it was a game with repetitive meaningless fetch quests, a huge disconnect between story and optional content, and occasionally lifeless open zones.

Now Andromeda has been a game that has been critically panned, general perceptions on the forum aren't strong, at least compared to Inquisition, and may even be a financial failure.

Yet its a game that had far more effort put into its side quests. They were often fully fleshed out stories or part of a larger story arc.

It would be.so easy for bioware...and especially ea...to go backwards. To say'gamers must prefer repetitive fetch quests to story content given how they feel about Andromeda. But yey that means less money. 'And i don't want bioware to go backwards after all the lessons they have learned.

Is that an absolute necessity though? It don't believe that condition was ever specifically mentioned. Heck, in ME3 Kaiden/Ashley where in a Hospital bed when Udina put the forth for the Spectre position, no long term evalution ever happend there.

Nihlus, aboard the Normandy SR-1, told Shepard that he'd be evaluating him, and that they'd go on a series of missions together.

It was never explicitly stated, but it was heavily implied that such evaluation was part of the selection process for becoming a Spectre.  Having the VS be made Spectre in the same way is just another example of poor writing in ME3.

Nihlus, aboard the Normandy SR-1, told Shepard that he'd be evaluating him, and that they'd go on a series of missions together.

It was never explicitly stated, but it was heavily implied that such evaluation was part of the selection process for becoming a Spectre.  Having the VS be made Spectre in the same way is just another example of poor writing in ME3.

I found that fairly reasonable, or at least tolerable - lol.

Shepard was the very first human spectre, selected at a time when humanity didn't have council representation.  By ME3, Shepard and humanity had proven themselves - and the VS could be viewed as Shepard's protege, thus qualified.

Sure, but then Shepard does this whole investigation and proves that Saren is a traitor etc.

Shepard's resume + already being a candidate + investigation + political pressure from Anderson, Udina and humanity in general

Plenty of good reasons to speed things up a bit, all of them were presented in the game in exactly this order. Not doing so could actually compromise the council...

Agreed, In context of the story however Shepard was clearly ready for the Spectre role, Anderson even reveals the council was watching Shepard for several years before ME1, when Saren got rogue they just fast-tracked the appointment. The ingame execution could have been better obviously, but the idea of Shepard being the ideal spectre candidate was conveyd well enough.

Sure.  But once it happened, absolutely nothing was done with it.

But then, Udina went so far off the rails we don't really know WHY he did anything in ME3.