I would definitely agree that the people who're painting ME1 (or any of the other games) as "cerebral" are blowing smoke. Especially considering how many of the various conflicts are undermined by lol indoctrination. About the only interesting ones are (and this is just off the top of my head) Mordin's dealing with his role in the Genophage modification and the Geth/Quarian issue.
Honestly, though, people (or at least sci-fi fans) tend to hugely overstate the intellectual chops of your average work. Like, take Star Trek, a series notable these days for its fanbase that will not stop insisting that the pre-JJ shows were bastions of intellectualism. No, they weren't. 95% of the stuff they talked about they did with the emotional and academic subtlety of a 100-ton hydraulic press. "These guys are half black on the left, and these ones are half black on the right, and they hate each other! Isn't that irrational." There are important messages there, but they weren't particularly intellectually rigorous, by and large. Ditto ME. Interesting themes are referenced, touched on, occasionally wielded, but not explored in any great depth, or with any great skill, and that's fine. It's not the objective.
