So I was not even aware of this time limit they were talking about on the goty podcast. It really bums me out cause I have a bunch of missions left and no save before the crew was kidnapped. Can someone explain to me how it works? IIRC I got the iff and legion then when I went to do legions side mission, I was ambushed. Is it possible to do legions mission after the ambush and still not lose crew? I also read somewhere that if you do all loyalty missions before the iff mission, you'll be ambushed right away and not have time to do anything else. It's very confusing and I'm considering just giving up on trying to get the ending where you save people. thanks.

I got ambushed, did Legion's sidequest, did the suicide mission, lost no one on the squad or crew.

I also had the same problem.
 
I was about to start the legion loyalty mission where the crew got kidnapped. After I finished it, I went to do a 2nd mission (some distress signal crap), and when I finally went onto the mission only half of the crew survived.
Because I screwed up later and lost 3 party members I went to try it again using a guide. This time I didn't do the legion mission , and still hadn't done the Jack and Jacob ones. Fortunately I hated Jack and Jacob, and they
were the only ones to die even though I didn't have legion's loyalty yet (also I was able to save the whole crew).
 
Basically what you want to do is to go to the save mission right away. If you do up to 2 mission beforehand, you'll lose half of your crew. Do more, you lose them all.
 
 So if you want to have all your squad members survive and the crew alive too, I think you have to do all the loyalty missions and then the mission where you retrieve the codes. However I' mnot sure if you'll have time to do the 
legion mission then.

Once you get the Reaper IFF, the clock starts. You have time to do Legion's side mission and maybe one more, IIRC, before you start losing crew members. The time limit only affects the crew that was captured off your ship, as far as I know.

" Once you get the Reaper IFF, the clock starts. You have time to do Legion's side mission and maybe one more, IIRC, before you start losing crew members. The time limit only affects the crew that was captured off your ship, as far as I know. "

I could be wrong but I don't think you lose REAL crew members. If you take too long Kelly gets toasted, which I think is what Brad was bitching about. But I think it is unfair of Brad to criticize these invisible timers in games like ME2 or Fable 3. The reason these timers are there are to stop people from exploiting the game mechanics and producing a more pure story experience that unfolds according to how you naturally play the game.

I'm just gonna copy paste my comment from the last podcast about the story award:
 
 Brad's complaint about Mass Effect 2's story is bullshit, it had an great story, and alot of small stories around it with great characters
 
Calling the story bullshit because of an end boss that he didn't like is just stupid, and the time complaint is weird, the game made it pretty clear that you should finish sidequests
 
Also, continuing to disagree with Brad on everything, I know that he has his own opinions but the way he explains them is flawed sometimes

" @Venatio: The overarching story was seriously weak. "

It cuts both ways I think.  First time through without looking anything up I saved everybody (as I'm sure plenty of people did).  It was neat, but in some ways I feel like I missed out.  Hearing everybody talk about how they lost x or y makes it seem like the ending probably would have had more impact if I'd lost somebody.  Getting through it so painlessly and easily made all of the talk about it being a 'suicide mission' seem like just that - talk.
 
I think anybody that wants games like this to make sure the player has complete control the whole time, and telegraph the consequence of every action, is missing the point.  It's not about having the 'best' ending, it's about having your own ending.  If you made a bad call (and poking the hornet's nest before having everything in place turns out to be a bad call) and it gets somebody killed then you gotta deal with the consequences.  The pay-off is greater immersion in your own character, in the universe as a whole and in Shepard's motivation to kick Reaper ass.  
 
I don't see losing somebody at the end of that game to necessarily be a bad thing at all.  It's not like Bioware are going to have you miss significant chunks of content over it - they already showed that with ME2.  If Shepard is giving some big call to arms in ME3 and starts talking about absent friends and the sacrifices they've already made, that could have just as much impact as if they're stood beside her for 10 seconds in a cutscene, maybe even more.

" @drag said:

" @Venatio: The overarching story was seriously weak. "

Agreed. Seriously, how anyone can claim ME2 had a great story is beyond me. "

Unfortunately for me I tend to be a completionist, I don't like the thought of missing content and knowing bioware's formula when it comes to it's levels and freedom. ( tutorial mission, first new area which upon leaving is destroyed so you can't return, opening up the whole world, restricting everything upon the beginning of the final act)  I tend to do all the side missions I can before going onto the next main quest. That means my first playthrough was one of those perfect runs, unfortunately this also made the end feel like it was too easy to achieve everyone living. This feels like it's one of those canon playthroughs and doesn't necessarily feel like it's one where I decided what would happen.