Studying a Reaper artifact, what could go wrong?

Arrival starts small, with an innocent-sounding mission to rescue a covert operative, and takes a little too long building toward its major reveal: a plot to slow down the Reaper invasion by fucking exploding a mass relay.

Which threatens to be a really compelling side-story -- but is immediately interrupted by space madness indoctrination and a rushed-feeling series of fights before Shepard presses the "blow it up" button and calls it a day.

Arrival's ambitious plot is underserved by how little storytelling time it actually gets. And while it's fun to observe the effects of this mission in Mass Effect 3, re: pissing off the batarians, I can't help but be disappointed that the angles of understanding and interfering with Reaper tactics are glossed over so quickly.

Better than: Mass Effect 2: Zaeed - The Price of Revenge
Not as good as: Mass Effect 2: Lair of the Shadow Broker
All in all, despite a handful of cool ideas: Mass Effect 2's DLCs feel ... unnecessary, neither as compelling nor satisfying as the main game's character-centric missions.