Just ignore the usual Codex sperging and play the games.
The ME trilogy is the kind of game I replay every 2~3 years and enjoy. I like the shooting, I especially like the setting, and I like most of the characters. It still holds up graphically in my opinion and is very fluid to play.
Regarding whether to play the originals or the LE, here are some considerations:
- ME1 is clunky and was clunky even at release. It did not age well because of that, and it also relied on an unreal engine 3 version that is somewhat hard to get stable today, mostly due to its audio engine. MEUITM applies fixes that help a lot, but it's not uncommon to have ME1 crash several times during a playthrough, and it's 99% of the time audio related, and it's Bioware's fault;
- ME2 has a lot of bugs that were never fixed (remember floating in the air when getting close to certain geometry?), not even by mods;
- ME3 DLC is a pain to get working, usually requiring save editors to unlock everything;
- ME1, ME2, and ME3 with MEUITM + ALOT + ALOV can look amazing, and you can also force MSAA since these games are DX9;
- LE1, LE2, and LE3 have butchered lighting at some locations. The community patches for LE2 and LE3 have fixed most of it, while LE1 has a dedicated mod called MELLO;
- The modding community has shifted efforts for the Legendary Editions, mostly because they all now use the same engine, thus using the same modding tools. In fact, in this short period since the LE release, the modding scene for it is way ahead of the original games;
- LE1 is the most different game, and it plays considerably better now than ME1;
- LE2 and LE3 come with every piece of DLC ready to go and working out of the box;
- The community patches for LE1, LE2 and LE3 fix a bunch of longstanding bugs that plagued the trilogy since 2007;
- ALOV now uses the LE videos for the original games as well, alongside their own upscaling and 60FPS improvements.
While the LE changes some stuff, I would say it's worth it if you use mods. You can play the three games without serious issues and they work fine. ME3Tweaks makes it easy to install all the mods and it comes with the texture tool for installing ALOT, waaaaaaaaaaay better than that piece of shit MEUITM installer.
Some of the mods I consider important for LE:
- The community patches for each game;
- ALOT + ALOV;
- Better Camera (LE1, LE2, and LE3). Let's you set the FOV. Also, this works way better than those FOV binds we had to use for the original games;
- Charted Worlds (LE1). This one marks the location of mineral deposits and other points of interest on every planet;
- Classic Heatsinks + Universal Thermal Clips (LE2 and LE3). This restores the same ammo system of Mass Effect 1 for the later games;
- Expanded Galaxy Mod (LE3). Way too much to list here;
- Galaxy Map Trackers (LE1). Marks active and undiscovered assignments on the galaxy map;
- Miranda Butt Shot Restoration (LE2 and LE3). Undoes the Bioware faggotry of hiding Miranda's ass shots during conversation;
- One Probe All Resources (LE2). Fuck the planetary scanning minigame;
- Pinnacle Station DLC (LE1). Restores Pinnacle Station to LE1 since Bioware was too lazy to do it;
- Skip Mini Games (LE1 and LE2). No more hacking and bypass minigames;
- Take Earth Back (LE3). Goes alongside Expanded Galaxy to enhance the final mission;
- Unlimited Sprint and Boost Duration (LE1, LE2, and LE3). Fixes Shepard morbid obesity, turning you into a soldier;
- XP Rescale (LE1). Now you can achieve level 60 on a single playthrough.
There are other mods, but I would say these are the most relevant ones to make the LE worth playing.