They weren't lying when they said the combat in this game is uh not good. BioWare as a studio was kind of in a weird spot when ME1 came out; the actual company itself was merging with a lot of EA subdivisions, and the contemporary projects around this time (Jade Empire and the Sonic RPG) are still the black sheeps of their catalogues. ME1 carries that 'black sheep' polish on it as well, despite it's post-hoc success. There's a certain...weirdness to the game--the cinematic dialog angles don't always work the best, the skills and talent trees are a mess of progressive scaling, what on earth is this equipment progression, the awkward sex scenes, etc.

What it does do really well though is carry the sense of ambition that is missing from those other projects--there's a lot of thought going into into the world here, and the political and historical tensions are shockingly deep for a new IP. Tolkenism aside (especially with the Krogans/Savage and Volus/Jewish connections) there's some engaging lore that reflect social realities in a surprisingly compassionate way? I mean it would've been very easy to write Wrex as this Brute With a Heart of Gold archetype, but as you move through his character arc you really come to understand how being in the midst of what's essentially genocide fuels his apathy and rage. The feeling of an unamended historical wrong colors a lot of his perception, and the game never condescends or pathologize him for feeling some time of way about it. The Krogans in general are not a bad take on the feelings of Diaspora, which is a big compliment to give a janky Sci-fi RPG from 2008. Teasing out the allegories and meanings behind the lore of Mass Effect was really the big positive of this replay, and honestly getting new Codex entries quickly became my favorite part of the game.

The actual plot itself was okay, nothing startling--there might be a way to read the Reapers as some sort of allegory for the Movement of History or something equally cringeworthy & Hegelian, but considering how the rest of the series threw that interpretation away it's not worth discussing.

Also kinda mad I accidentally romanced Ashley, I 'friendzoned' Liara trying to skip through some dialogue and didn't realize the game thought I had a connection with Ashley. Her only two positive traits are that she has a cute nickname for Shepard and she reads Whitman, otherwise she's an openly racist, condescending, and resentful person that kinda gives me the ick to be around. Kaidan is also just a bland character, if it weren't for Captain Anderson the whole human cast woulda been a miss.