I'd agree except that I always get the feeling that BioWare wants the player to romance someone. After you talk with each of your squad members enough (like 3-4 times each) there's always that "do you want to take this to the next level?" I know emotions are high but even in a 20-40 hour game, going from 0 to relationship seems oddly quick. I think Miranda's character would have benefited from a more draw out relationship, one where she wasn't forced to drop her emotional barriers on a dime and crumple into Shepard's arms. The fast track romance just seems to dilute people for the sake of love plot.
I also want BioWare to try something new for once. The same old romance check list has become yet another BioWare trope that holds them back. Romance seems more like a simple game mechanic than an actual relationship. I think it's quite telling that the community so quickly employs the phrase "I'm going to romance X" as if it were some sort of task (talk 3-4 times, do this and that, and ding! you get a sex scene). In my opinion, that kind of defeats the purpose of most romance. Mass Effect 3 showed how expertly and naturally BioWare can execute completely platonic relationships. Maybe removing the sex bit will give BioWare enough room to replicate that.
My personal preference would be to remove "romance" from the first game and push it into the sequel only as a natural extension of the more platonic relationship established in the first. I just think everyone needs a bit of breathing room.
At first when I started to do romances I was confused to i mean 1-4 talks and i can get a scene?! how strange is that....but then i realized.....down time.
When i say down time i mean the time when the team isnt on a mission trying to fix things. It might take 30mins-1hr to finish off an arc but it must have been, **** idk, days even for them. At least thats how i think about it. I know things were pretty urgent, but do you really think Mordin was able to make the cure in 1hr? You really think Shepard killed the reapers in 35 hours (thats how fast i finished the game i dont know about other ppl)? (i hope im not sounding rude those are genuine questions) Rome wasn't built in a day and it took the reapers to harvest everyone (during the prothean time) i think close to 100 years or more (forgot someone might know exactly)
Bioware did show a bit of it when going around the ship in ME3 where people are sitting a chatting with each other. I always make sure that when Im going for a romance I headcannon an actual relationship that includes intimate parts and sometimes its when my Shepard broke down in from of said love interest after those dreams (i changed the kid to someone who dies....more believable)
In theory it all comes down to head-cannon and a hint of crazy fan-fiction