this is something else which is kinda nitpicky because it didn't really bother me but just something I noticed that felt shoehorned in. ashley became a romance option for femshep and kaidan became a romance option for shepard. it's fine that they wanted to broaden the appeal to a wider audience and obviously the kaidan/ashley romance opportunities in Me3 are still optional and not needed, but it feels forced because they weren't romance options for the same-sex shepard in Me1.
I'm sorry, but I have to flatly disagree.
As a gay guy, kaiden's romance was one of the high points of ME3 for me - it was the first time a gay romance felt completely natural and cool in a game, rather than being a "OMG it's a gay thing". His lines on the ship, and at the end, were actually really well written.
In terms of it contradicting the first ME - the first Me had a Fox News article on it being a alien lesbian space sex simulator, and even when ME2 was released there was someone at Bioware quoted as saying "male Shepherd just wasn't gay". The fact that retconned Kaiden into having some personality and a decent storyline and character isn''t going to leave me losing sleep at night. I think it's a really silly objection to make, especially considering everything else they retconned or just flat out ignored for no reason. at least THIs change had a some decent writing, a pay-off and let them do something that in previous games they had been dead set against. Heck, maybe the end of the entire galaxy made Kaiden realise his feelings, whatever - it just feels like a really silly argument that verges on the same ones made when comic book heroes are turned into gay superheroes - the ones that go "Oh, I have nothing against gay people but you shouldn't make existing characters gay you should create new ones". Because no-one ever realised they might have feelings for someone of the same gender past the age of 16...