There is no chance Shepard is dead.

That trailer was framed within a Cerberus database if you go to the official site. Cerberus is a subversive "humanity first" renegade organisation whos goal is complete human domination of the galaxy, often doing more harm to our race than good.

It is likely that either Cerberus genuinely believes Shepard is dead by coincidence, or because Shepard has tricked them into believing it.

It is also possible that in some way Shepard is working with Cerberus and it suits them both to have him dead.

Nah it will save us something like Kotor 2 talks:

Dude: Revan was great villain

You: I've she saved the galaxy 

If there's any difrence beetween diffrent ways you chosen it will be minimal and probably visible only in prologue. Or something like diffrent prices in various marchants through the game.

of course Shepard is not dead... it wouldn't make any sense.

I think we'll obviously be seeing some new reapers, and I guess we (a.k.a. all the races) will be trying to discover a good weapon against them.

also there will be a spy sapping our sentry, but I don't know who. I mean, it's something we can expect, right?

well, there's a whole part of the galaxy to explore, but I won't try to guess any twist. Shepard could get rid of the Normandy though, why the hell there's a goddamn SLOW elevator where simple stairs would do it? :P

Personally, I don't believe Shepard nor his team are dead. I believe that something went down with Shepard going into battle and were listed as K.I.A. and suddenly they reappear to bring balance to civilization when they were cut off from the council. I think the fact that everyone believes he's dead will make their struggle to reach civilization even more epic and deep.

We will see the whole fury of the reapers upon the galaxy. Maybe there is another gigantic Mass Relay like the Citadel Ruin that has yet to be uncovered in unknown space, and that could be a gateway for them to come from outside the galaxy.
Either way, i beleive that M.E 2 will focus more on the defensive moves that the galaxy races are going to pull up against the reapers and the Geth. Also we will see if my theory that the Reapers once were exactly like the Geth (constructed by the first evolved civilization in our galaxy or another galaxy), and evolved into what they are right now, kinda like what will happen if the geth are not fully stopped

 Well, I don't think that the geth were the reapers. Remember the Quarians created them. The Reapers existed wayyyyyy before. The rest of your post sounds cool. I think another gateway will be created which allows them to come out, but who will create it?

Shepard and crew wont be dead, the Normandy will be destroyed in a space battle with Geth and there will be no traces of the crew... hence assumed KIA.

The game will be set about 5 years in the future i think, the Paragon ending of the game will be used if no save file chose, so the council will be alive and with 4 members.

The Shadow Broker will play a big part in this game and the Reapers will start to mobilise at the end of the game.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Shepard is dead at the start of the game, so you can re-build a totally new character. This way, new ME fans can start without worrying about the backstory.

The goal of ME2 will be to find out if Shepard is really alive or dead...I'll then assume that he will indeed be alive, and you'll eventually meet up with his character at some point in the game, and be a playable character.

I think some of the main points from your ME1 save will be:

- Killing/Saving the Rachni Queen
- Saving/Killing Kaiden, Ashley, and Wrex
- Romance Options
- Geth Outpost on the Armstrong Cluster quest
- Who was saved/lost on the council
- Kohoku's Cerberus quest
- Saving/Jailing Anoleis on Noveria
- Saving the Asari from the Thorian (or killing her)

Those, at least, would be the logical ones.

I'm really interested in finding out if you do any missions on planets mentioned in ME1 that may have had pre-Prothean races, like the Jupiter Brain on Ploba - I'd assume that it was an earlier victim on the Reapers, or the cataclysm on Klendagon/Presop. Will we learn about the Zeioph?

Lots of neat questions. I'm finishing up my last Mass Effect playthrough until I can get the current and upcoming DLC. I am 3 achievements (all biotic related) away from having 1000/1000 on ME.

i dunt carez... all iknow is that i get to play as my ME1 charecter... and i want this game NOW!!!!

 The Shadow Broker was someone we knew very little about in the first game! Great stuff! This is someone for everyone to anticipate in the next game.