The Suicide Mission in ME2 is perhaps one of the most satisfying missions in the entire series. (Well, at least until you get the big Human-Reaper reveal.) Having the team work together, selecting specialists for certain tasks, and the uncertainty of whether they will survive or not (at least if you are playing bind your first time) all contribute to the suspense and immersion. I suspect that a good deal of the disappointment with Priority Earth was that people were expecting another mission like the Suicide Mission.
The problem, of course, is that if you can kill off any and all your squad mates, later games are going to be vastly complicated by trying to come up with different versions, one that has a squad mate alive, and one that doesn't. (Which is even further complicated by having to take into account whether they were loyal or not.)
So how could you do another Suicide Mission like game, but not create all the complications that might surface? I don't know for sure if the two are compatible, but perhaps there is a way.
First, I think you would need to limit the size of the team. A smaller team not only means fewer variations to account for, but also allows more time to be devoted to each character so that they are more well developed. Garrus, for instance, is not well developed in ME2 unless you are romancing him. He ends up spending most of his time "calibrating."
Second, I think you would need to limit who and how many squad mates can die. On Virmire you could lose two squadmates: Ashley/Kaidan and Wrex. With the VS situation, Ashley and Kaidan play the same plot role in later games and all that needs to change is their individual dialogue to reflect their differing personalities. With Wrex, his presence or absence makes a huge difference later on. So, maybe have two squad mates that can be interchanged with each other later on. Additionally, plan out a squad mates' replacement for later on so that whether that squad mate dies or not, they are still replaced in a later title, only the reason for the replacement changes. For instance, if Mordin dies or lives, he is still replaced by Padok Wiks in the later game, in one case because he died, in the second because he has moved on.
At any rate, I hope we can see something like the SM in the future, but it needs to be better planned on how they will deal with the consequences in later titles.
That's what I've been thinking when I played ME2 then 3. Sure everyone says ME2 is the best because "choices, choices, consequences, YEAAAAAAHHH!" But like you said, I believe Bioware went too big too fast with ME2 and I think that's what lead to the short comings of ME3 that made people hate it's guts (I'm not one of them BTW).
The plot of ME2 is divided too much. The main story of Shepard and the Collectors isn't too interesting on it's own other than the revelation that the Reapers harvest to create another Reaper to join their ranks. The rest of the Story is a collection of interesting but rather disconnected short stories for the characters. Each Character is interesting but there's hardly any connection to the main story or any other characters' story and like you said there isn't a lot of depth to explore the characters with unless you Romance them. (I didn't romance any because I stayed faithful to Liara.)
In ME3, the characters' stories are more connected to the plot of coming together to fight the Reapers as one and there's more interaction and insight from the squad mates that aren't as numerous. The plot is a little more focused and the Narrative is more engaging even with it's small shortcomings to the end.
As for making a suicide mission work better, I like your idea of a smaller squad size because there are way too many variables to consider when you have a dozen characters that could die. Wrex's death affects an aspect of the story greatly while say Jack's, Jacob and Miranda's deaths for example don't have much effect.
From what happened with the Trilogy, I believe Bioware can learn from the mistakes they've made in the Trilogy, not just ME3, and make sure that when they go big they can keep it big for the rest of the trilogy and variables can be game changing in the end. ME was the first to attempt this and they achieved it with mixed success. Now that ME4 is coming, I'm looking forward to what they have in store.
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