Profoessors in my classese usually know your name. The classes are typically large, especially for 100 and 200 level (freshman and sophomore) classes. The largest class I ever had was also the most fun. It was a 600 person lecture, with the most charismatic professor I have ever met. We are still occasionally in email correspondence. Most of the professors like to meet and talk to students, which makes your anonymity a personal choice more than a result of the system. On the other end of the spectrum, higher level classes sometimes have very few students. I had a math class with 10 people.
There are lots of conversations about classes outside of the classroom. Especially in higher level classes when you are beginning to have lots of classes with the group of sutdents in your major, and the homework gets hard enough where doing it alone is perilous, everyone likes to get together and work together (which is usually encouraged by professors). This sort of experience makes you realize how many talented intellectuals attend a university like MSU, as just about every day the students are teaching each other as much as the professor is, which is--just to clarify--definately not a bad thing.
Students try to help each other on homework and understanding, but many courses are graded from the average (curved) so students have to be competetive to get good grades. I feel like this is a bad educational system, but it is pretty muchuniversal. The problem is that theoretically, a 3.0 could be very close to a 2.0 or a 4.0, however, this is getting into semantics and hair splitting.
The most unique class I have taken was a communications class with 600 people (referenced above). The class was tought by Steve McCornack and his wife, and it was on relationships. Even though this course was way outside my major, it was the most fun class I have ever taken, and the way the lecture was given, it was almost like going to a comedy club twice a week. Using humor as an avenue to teach, I ended up learning a lot in that course.
I am a physics major. There are probably 400 students in my major, but way more than half are freshman and sophomores, so in the classes that you really need help in, the student to faculty ratio becomes reasonable. For the freshman and sophomores, there is a lot of help provided by the upper classman on those classes. The professors are often willing to help as well.
There are a lot of professors in East Lansing too, so sometimes you see them outside of class. I acutally play Ultimate (frisbee) with several professors at the institution, and I will be doing a 300 mile bike trip this fall with several other professors. You will find that the professors are very real people, and not just teachers as they sometimes are in high school.
MSU's degree completion requirements assure that you will have a basic grasp on the subject, which is the goal of an undergraduate curriculum. I would say that the classes that are required are--although sometimes annoying--almost always beneficial to the fireld that you have chosen.
Your educational experience at any institution is really what you make it, and what you put into it. That being said, typically the more important upper level courses are geared towards what you really need to know in a job or in the "real world" and sometimes the other stuff gets pushed aside a little bit. Usually it is coverred bu not emphasised. This is neither good or bad, but just a philosophical statement of how my professors have been on average. Some of my professors have been just the opposite. It just depends on their goals and interests.