Thread drift is just one of those things that happens! I hadn't considered Anthem as being the reason that none of their A-listers were available to give ME:A a bit of a polish but that certainly makes a lot of sense. Though I do have to give them a lot of respect for I think mostly getting the problems ironed out themselves.
One thing that was lacking and which I think did require the old guard (and may indeed have actually been a requirement rather than a nice-to-have) is the awful shallow romances. Okay, I only romanced Suvi who was nice enough but the whole thing was a case of blink-and-you'll-miss-it. It seems that the basic groundwork was done for that story branch and then never expanded on. In more general terms, same with the general recreational side of things: although there was a reasonable amount of banter and personal quests while on missions, there seemed nothing when back at base, not like there was at the Presidium, for instance. Again, there was the basics but as with the romances it felt they'd been sketched out and then just forgotten.
