I read a couple of french reviews (french gaming journalists are far more honest than US reviewers in general) and it's the cold shower. They say the game is really linear, that weapons and mods management is really teared down, that the RPG aspect has been downed to the minium, exploration is gone, and that the gameplay as been focused way to much gunfight.
On the good side: gunfight have been improved a lot, realisation, cinematics, and voice acting is top notch...
The game seems to be full of terrible game design choices that were actually working very well in the first game. The dudes are asking why the hell did Bioware changes good things along with the bad one. It's like they removed and redone everything: and they done it wrong on so many points...
So GAF, please tell me that once more, french journalists are just being insanly unfair, or is it really not that terrible ? Maybe the general overhall/balance/feeling/experience is better than the original game... But I'm left ice cold down beside the hype train now.