These are the three faces of Mass Effect. On the one hand I applaud that they kept the heart and look and feel through all three games. The minigames are in both 1 and 2. Not too shocking, right? They just changed the type. None of them are too complicated. The sticky cover dynamics have changed throughout the series. Each game has its own quirks.
On the other hand, they did make some changes perhaps in part due to user feedback... for better or worse. (ME1:We hate the Mako! What's with all this driving?! ME2:No Mako? We hate this planet scanning thing! Where's my ride?!). It moved more into the action RPG category than ME1. I still love all three games, each for its own merits, and the overarching environment and lore.
In ME, there are several times when you can use a Paragon or Renegade check in conversation to bypass a fight, gain a better quest outcome, give yourself options. ME2 interrupts mostly give roleplay responses, style mostly. No real fight bypass options there. My pure Paragon Shep went Paragade in ME2. The situation Shepard was in seemed to call for it (if you don't find a sense of humour after coming back from the dead and finding yourself shunned, just go back to being dead), and many of them were very amusing. So I still like the RPG aspect of 2. The combat was more fluid, so I liked that better than 1. I agree about the magic pixel traps that you run into that lift you into the air and make you reload to continue. That sucked, but wasn't too frequent for me.
In ME3, I liked the combat dynamics even better, though they nerfed some of the things I had loved in ME2. I still play ME3 multiplayer, eight years later. The majority of renegade interrupts in this game are dark though...too dark for me. But that's RPG agency for you.
