After the first few hours of Mass Effect: Andromeda, I was discouraged–maybe even a little distraught. Within that short span of time, I’d already encountered unconvincing animations, bog standard missions, clunky user interface, stilted dialogue–basically every red flag you hope to avoid when approaching a lengthy shooter-RPG powered equally by action and story.

Thankfully, Andromeda did improve. As I progressed, I unlocked exhilarating new combat options, met characters with deeper appeal than my initial crew, and discovered freely explorable worlds that finally fulfilled the series’ decade-old planet-hopping promise. And yet, some of those early problems persisted throughout, and while I did catch glimmers of the original trilogy’s greatness, that shine wa…