OTOH, I think that is what made DS9 great. Pretty much every episode of TNG might have been held in alternate universes as there was nothing that carried over from one episode to the next. There were no lasting consequences, and that stifled any real effort at world building. The one notable exception was the ongoing Klingon civil war arc.
Starting with season 4, DS9 changed up the formula - the series got a lot darker, and instead of trying to present a utopian vision of the future where humanity sought to bring light to the universe that Star Trek was otherwise known for, DS9 looked at our darker side What we do in war and the ongoing impacts of our actions. As a result, it needed to become a serial. You just can't tell that story when actions in one episode have no impact on the next.
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