Finished the game about an hour ago.

Thougts about combat;
I liked that it kept the danger up through the end, constantly. In my ME1 game plus play through on hardcore, I'd run up to a guy in the middle of a battlefield and shoot at him for 10 seconds while he shot at me and so did his buddies. And I'd be fine. ME2 worked well at keeping combat dangerous all the time.

But...the sticky cover system was terrible. Half of my deaths were due to hitting the shift key (remapped from spacebar) and vaulting over a box into the firing arc of three machine guns instead of backing off the cover, or not being able to crouch if not directly behind cover, or getting shot from behind and having to stand up to shoot the person.

Why, why, why oh why didn't they just add a crouch toggle key?! Or at least make the "go into cover key" different from the "leap out out of cover" key.

I still don't like taking all the armor and weapons and mods out.

About the ending...
Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
I didn't get the best ending.
I chose Legion for the vent shaft, but he died in a cutscene.
Then I chose Zaeed (DLC merc) and he died leading the parallel fire team the second time (having survived the first).

Then I told cerberus to screw off regarding the base. In those scenes, telling off the Illusive Man, gave Shepard the chance to stand up to cerberus that all paragons needed.


About romances...
Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
It seems that if you're compatible with NPC, conversations will go to romance even if you don't want them to. It's either 'continue talking' and go down the romance path, or stop asking 'how do you feel'. I had a male shepard.


I loved all the side conversations. One conversation between nameless crew members on the Normandy struck me...
Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
The father who gets his family off of New Canton right before the collector attack, and then says he'll give his daughter the longest hug when he sees her again. And then the collectors catch him. And then I saved him and he was so glad to be able to see his family again. What's that? Oh, I must have got some dust in my eye...


Overall, a great game.

CR