Huh? I thought it was pretty much considered a fact, that the sequels were better gameplay-wise, and the 2nd had better sidequests, whereas the first had the upper hand in story and atmosphere. Possibly also in having more options to spec the characters, if you enjoyed tampering with the clunky inventory.
The talk about the size of the environments makes me worry that it's going to be yet another game, that puts emphasis on quantity over quality. Personally, I prefer fewer and more confined areas, that make me feel like there's a continuous progress in the story, instead of having larger and predominantly empty areas just because that's the thing to do nowadays.
I still fear that it will taint the multiplayer portion as well, especially after DAI's MP, where the maps were more like running contests, and lacked the strategy of the ME3 maps.