Dude, it's not even an excuse. I was just pointing out a minor way in which I personally felt like the modular levels contributed to immersion, before proceeding to the actual reason, which is that they prioritized story and breadth over level design on the side missions. I like vignettes and I don't care all that much about level design, so of course I'm going to prefer the game where they sacrifice level design so they can give me 30+ vignettes (do you really think it's reasonable to design and code 40+ unique levels for all those side missions?), over the game where they prioritize level design and give me a bunch of really cool-looking levels but only a small handful of stories that go beyond just what Shepard is doing. Honestly, the higher expectations I get from the better level design just makes me even more disappointed when I find a computer console and am suddenly teleported back onto the Normandy with no explanation of what happened there or what I accomplished.

I told you, I want the gameplay of ME1 back because I want it to be less shooter-like. Normally I don't play shooters, and ME1 isn't trying as hard to be a shooter. You think it's tedious to explore a nonlinear level; I think it's tedious to sit in cover, pop out a few rounds, back to cover, over and over and over with only like two good powers to change things up. (ME3 was much better at this, but you're still stuck in cover way more than I would like.) Nor do I enjoy scrounging for ammo. You're perfectly entitled to like shooters and want Mass Effect to correspond better to the specific design goals of a shooter, but I'm equally entitled to not like shooters and want Mass Effect to correspond to different design goals that I like better.

Oh, and btw, I meant to say this in my first post but I edited it a lot and ended up accidentally deleting it: for what it's worth, I see a lot of comments on this sub saying that ME1 hasn't aged well and is basically just necessary to get through so you're not missing part of the story, so I definitely don't think you're alone in not liking it as much.

Personally I think the story was about equally good throughout the three games. ME1 and ME2 pretty much follow the exact same formula of, "here's a problem, here's a bunch of different missions you can go on that will indirectly help you solve the problem, oh you've gone on all those missions? Good, now you get one that more directly progresses the main plot." I can only assume you like the 8-18 squadmate missions better than Feros and Noveria because you like the way they develop your squadmates and/or because you like the combat better; well I like the squadmate missions because of the way they develop your squadmates, and I like Feros and Noveria because I like the way they develop the world (I like getting to know the colonists of Zhu's Hope, navigating the creepy abandoned systems of Noveria, and getting involved in the conniving corporate politics of ExoGeni and Binary Helix). Again, personal taste. ME3's story is a lot more cinematic and grandiose and I love that about it, and I think that's what the third installment of the game needs for the epic battle against the Reapers, but I don't think that makes it better, and it certainly wouldn't be the same if it wasn't building on the foundations laid in ME1 and ME2.

And sure, the exploration in ME1 could be better, but the sequels didn't make it better, they just cut it out. Considering that you can very easily skip the exploration if you don't like it and it affects almost nothing and in any of the games, why can't those of us who enjoy what exploration they have anyway continue to enjoy it in the one game that has it at all?

Oh, and thanks for the straw man of "people who think ME1 is special and are making excuses," when I clearly said all of them have their strengths and weaknesses and it's a matter of taste. If you want to give actual critiques about what you liked and didn't like, and listen to the answers to the question you yourself asked instead of dismissing everything you don't personally agree with as "X sucks, Y is lazy, Z is boring", please do, I'd love to have an actual discussion. (Really, like I said, each game has something I wish the other two had, and each game has something I think it did particularly poorly, which I think is a more interesting discussion than "which game is better/worse and why," but I answered the question you asked.) But don't ask why people like ME1 if all you're going to do is rudely dismiss them when they answer you.