Mass Effect 2: Prepare yourself for a suicide mission to save mankind.

It's been over a year and a half since Mass Effect first entered the spotlight, amazing audiences worldwide. The game was a phenomenom - taking people by storm and bringing them on a 40 hour quest to save mankind and the entire galaxy... yet it still had its shortcomings. Planet exploration was tedious and repetitive having around 3 repeated interiors on each planet, rudimentary items to find, none of which had much significance and after 3 or 4 times became lamented by almost all players of the game.

But BioWare listens to its fans.
Casey Hudson wrote to on his blog on the beginings of ME2's production, even from the release of the first,

"the first thing we did in designing Mass Effect 2 was to listen very
carefully to what people were saying about how they played the first one – what
they loved, what they wanted to see improved, and the countless anecdotes that
describe players’ personal experiences with their unique paths through the
story."

This gives much hope to the perspective audience of the second game, a developer actually caring about its fans? thats almost unheard of but this just goes to prove it happens.

"We read forum posts, reviews, watched people playing the (original)
game on YouTube, and literally noted and categorised every piece of feedback we
could find, to help us target an overall evolution of the gameplay to the way
people actually experienced it."

This is taken from the Mass Effect 2 Facebook - which has incidentally pushed back the release to Spring 2010, as it previously stated late 2009, no luck their I guess.

The second chapter of the Mass Effect story finds Commander Shepard in the
darkest reaches of space, uncovering the mystery behind the disappearance of
humans throughout the galaxy. In Mass Effect 2 you'll assemble a team of
soldiers and specialists, and launch an all-out assault on the heart of enemy
territory. Choose carefully, because your success – or failure – depends on the
crew you assemble and their loyalty to you and the mission Prepare yourself for
a suicide mission to save mankind. Did you play the original Mass Effect? Keep
your Mass Effect save-files, because the decisions you made in the first game
will have consequences... New to ME? Don't worry, we'll give you a new character
in Mass Effect 2 and bring you up to speed on the story.