*The same amount of combat (even a bit more) would be fine for me. To me that's the best part of the game. Skipping combat would be unthinkable. UC is first and foremost a cover-based shooter. What I would like is a bit more variety (see next point).
*Bosses have no real place in this series. A boss fight should instead be something like the helicopter fight in 2, or the roving tank battle. It needs set-pieces as boss fights. As Rich said, get creative with the environment to amp up the difficulty rather than make bosses bullet sponges. Bridge collapses, fires, crashes, sinking ships, fights against vehicles, etc. That's how I'd like to see UC3 deal with bosses. Use Nate's climbing and jumping abilities to the advantage of the combat more.
*Totally agree on your melee attack point. I was actually hoping they fully removed the slo-mo counter mechanic but it seems from the demos that it is still there, though to a lesser degree (I never saw that issue during the E3 demo). I was hoping for a more free flowing melee system that didn't lock you into combat with a single opponent while another guy is filling you with lead. I totally want to run up to someone, bullets flying, crack the butt of my AK into his face, and then roll to cover. The melee system, as is was in 2, seems totally divorced from the gunplay.
*Platforming? Well, I have mixed feelings on this. There is no pathfinding in the UC series really. Everything is laid out in front of you and there is only one way to go. ND needs to either make more dead ends or, what I'd like to see, is open it up so that almost everything is climbable as in AC but make the hand holds less obvious.
