Mass Effect 2 Plot Holes (Spoilers)

[Fire Daemon]

Just guess work, but in one of the audios at the begining of the game you can hear Wilson malcontent, and worry about cerberus. i.e. where the hell the funds were coming from. As such he probably thought he was on the moral high ground by trying to destroy the Cerberus base, and thus destroy Sheapard.

In the same log Wilson says that he wishes more of the funds coming into Cerberus found themselves to him so it seems that he likes the money more than the job and we know that the Collectors wanted Shepard and were using the Shadow Broker to get to him from the conversations with Liara. The Shadow Broker could have paid Wilson to try to kill him and get the body out and give it to the Collectors. Wilson actually tried to kill you before, when you wake up and his 'estimates' were off. He would have been able to kill you then if Miranda hadn't ordered him to double the sedative.

He was shot by the mechs though which I find hard to match up. Maybe he shot himself to cover his ass, he was conveniently next to some medi-gel after all.

Think about Harbinger's dialogue. He refers to the process of turning humans into genetic paste to fuel the larva's growth as "ascension". Why use that word in particular? Why not call it "assimilation"? Or "consumption"? "Ascension" implies that they are raising humans to be what they consider to be a higher form of life. They see value in humans.

That is exactly what I was thinking. He (it?) often says 'This harms you' when you kill one of his remote controlled buddies which instantly gives the impression that cleansing the galaxy and creating new forms of Reapers is good for the life in the galaxy. He might have just been trying to fuck with your brain but it seems that the Reapers help the strong, take them to a new plain of existence while destroying the weak to allow for other species to show their strength.

One possible reason for this is the reapers fighting a war or preparing for a war with another powerful species. Perhaps they create new and varied Reapers in order to have a diverse army capable enough to destroy this other group. The Reapers may also cleanse the galaxy to stop civilization from discovering a means to journey to other galaxies, maintaining some level of peace. Perhaps they reasoned that killing all advanced life every 50,000 years is better than setting them free and allowing the universe to burn. Just a theory though, guess I have to wait until Mass Effect 3.

Now the plot hole that kind of annoys me in Mass Effect, is the entire Prothean thing. I guess they decided the previous cycle of the galaxy only had one species for the sake of simplicity, but I find it hard to believe. Even if the Protheans were the best, I would have expected there to be remnants from dozens of sentinent life forms left behind. I mean I find it odd that we've probably got a dozen or more races in the "current" ME timeline, but apparently when the Protheans were around there was only one?

I think the Protheans discovered the Citadel and the Mass Relays before anyone else in that cycle so I guess that the Protheans destroyed any other aspiring race before they could master space combat in order to maintain that power for themselves. They probably activated every Mass Relay they could find and destroyed every race that could pose as a future risk. The observation post on Mars shows that they were at least studying other species for some such reason and probably didn't destroy Earth and other similar planets because of their future colonization possibilities or maybe early man wasn't considered important enough to destroy but worthy of study.

A massive plot hole that stands out is just how can people recognize you when you alter your appearance. Garrus, Tali, Alenko/Williams, Anderson, Liara and a ton of people from side missions all know who you are even if you change your skin colour, facial shape and your eyes. Obviously a lot of things wouldn't work if no one recognized you but there should have been some sort of explanation for this.

The deserted Reaper seems out of place as well. I find it hard to believe that no one discovered it before that. The system that it is in is named, the planet it is ordbiting has been explored along with it's largest moon. These all have names. It gives of a power signature, it would have been detected. You were in the Hawking Eta in the first game, it isn't a part of the traverse. People would have found it, people would have studied, things would have happened that show of it's discovery. Maybe the evil of the reaper technology made anyone who discovered it to leave it alone but I doubt that would happen. Also, why does Reaper technology make you insane? That seems like magic in a world of attempts at Hard Sc-fi, there probably is a codex entry detailing that, I just missed it.

 

[Duke Nil]

Well this has all probably already been said, but just in case:

1. Well if they have the technology to build/grow a whole new reaper, there's no guarantee that they don't have the tech/power to escape their trap, as I recall the theory that the relay led to a section enclosed by black holes was just that, a theory, we didn't actually know for sure where it led, just that no one ever escaped. Also I don't think they know how to go about destroying a relay, even supernovae have only ever been able to knock them out of orbit.

2. Well I agree the giant robot baby was tacky and stupid, but needing genetic material to reproduce as the explanation for why the reapers perform their genocide/leave every 50000 years cycle thing was awesome, I thought.

3. This is a pretty good point actually, I mean what we did was necessary, there was an immediate threat and we stopped it, but yeah we still just sort of maintained the status quo. There had better be some damn useful shit on that collector base

 

[Altorin]

1. Destroying a mass relay is pretty much impossible... It would literally be like destroying a planet.. and not just making a planet unlivable, or changing its environment ala WMDs, but destroying it to nothing.. like Death Star levels of destruction (of which nothing in ME has been shown to be powerful enough to do.) Not to mention, it probably has automated defenses unlike anything the races can fathom. It may have been tried, and failed.

2. I really don't know.. I actually thought that bit was a bit stupid, but I'm sure it will make sense in the long run. the idea that reapers take whatever form used to create them is silly.. they all look largely the same except the human one, but I'm sure there's a good reason for it that we'll see later.

3. We stopped the collectors from harvesting humans to create a new reaper inside our galaxy. that's pretty much it.

We also finished the Genocide of the Protheans. Oh well...

 

[Volafortis]

1. The Omega 4 Relay
Most of ME2 is spent discussing the suicide mission that is traveling through the Omega 4 Relay. It is the ONLY way to the source of the Collectors and going through it is almost certain death. However...doesn't this work both ways? If I recall, Mass Relays work like giant two-way teleport systems. So as soon as Cerberus learns that the Omega 4 Relay is the source of the Collectors - why don't they just destroy it? If you destroy the Omega 4 Relay, you cut off the Collectors from the rest of the galaxy and isolate them in their homeworld in the galactic core. As the plot says, they can't just fly away from their homeworld because it is surrounded by a large Mass Effect shield that protects it from the black holes and anomalies. They HAVE to use the Omega 4 Relay to travel ANYWHERE in the galaxy. If you destroy it (or disable it if destroying it would be too dangerous), they're stuck. End of story. We win. Why does no one consider this option? If the idea is to save the humans that were abducted, why is the Paragon decision to blow the Collector base to smithereens without rescuing anyone outside of your crew? Also, if the hidden intention of Cerberus was to utilize Collector and thus Reaper technology, why doesn't anyone on the crew consider this as an option?

Cerberus probably doesn't have the firepower to destroy a mass relay, if they can be destroyed while active. I doubt the Citadel fleet could bring one down.

2. The Human Reaper
I...don't get it. Why were they doing this? What purpose does this serve the Reapers? There are presumably hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of Reapers in dark space. While the human Reaper looks badass and made a great end-game boss, it never really made any sense to me. Why are they using organic tissue? Why is that necessary? There wasn't anything organic about Sovereign that I could see. Why does the Reaper take on the image of the race that it conquers? Were all previous races squid-like? Why don't any Reapers look like keepers or Protheans? What did the Collectors plan to do with the human Reaper if it was completed? Stomp around on Earth like Godzilla? Why is it necessary to give it all the weaknesses of a human form - like frail limbs and obvious weak spots? Why is is so small compared to Sovereign? This is more than likely something I missed on my first two play-throughs, but I did not understand the ultimate plot of the Collectors (and thus the Reapers) in Mass Effect 2. Especially since we already saw that one Reaper would be torn to pieces by the united races of the galaxy as in Mass Effect 1.

I'm assuming that this is Reaper reproduction, but its all speculation. All I can say is that this is probably one of the reasons that the Reapers have this 50,000 year cycle.

3. What did we actually accomplish in ME2?
Well...nothing really. This isn't so much a plot hole as it is a plot problem. We stopped the Collectors from making a single additional Reaper that would add ONE to the coming fleet of thousands. We did not stall the actual Reaper fleet in any way, as we did in ME1. We did not expose the threat of the Reapers to the galaxy. We did not defeat any actual Reapers, just a single half-made prototype. We didn't even slow them down, or defeat an agent that was attempting to hasten their arrival. We killed a single Reaper that was not related to the original Reaper threat created in ME1. The game ends with the galaxy in the exact same situation it was in at the beginning. Sure, we learned a few things about Reapers, but we didn't actually do anything to stop or slow their arrival.

You built TONS of connections and alliances in the Terminus systems. In ME1, you had the backing of the races in council space, and that was it. In ME2, you've contacted the geth and formed connections, built stronger connections with the Migrant Fleet, Cerberus, etc...

Also, there's the big collector base worth of tech you might have in ME3.

A lot of stuff happens in ME2, you just don't know exactly where BioWare is going with it yet.

 

[Kavonde]

1. The Omega 4 Relay
Most of ME2 is spent discussing the suicide mission that is traveling through the Omega 4 Relay. It is the ONLY way to the source of the Collectors and going through it is almost certain death. However...doesn't this work both ways? If I recall, Mass Relays work like giant two-way teleport systems. So as soon as Cerberus learns that the Omega 4 Relay is the source of the Collectors - why don't they just destroy it? If you destroy the Omega 4 Relay, you cut off the Collectors from the rest of the galaxy and isolate them in their homeworld in the galactic core. As the plot says, they can't just fly away from their homeworld because it is surrounded by a large Mass Effect shield that protects it from the black holes and anomalies. They HAVE to use the Omega 4 Relay to travel ANYWHERE in the galaxy. If you destroy it (or disable it if destroying it would be too dangerous), they're stuck. End of story. We win. Why does no one consider this option? If the idea is to save the humans that were abducted, why is the Paragon decision to blow the Collector base to smithereens without rescuing anyone outside of your crew? Also, if the hidden intention of Cerberus was to utilize Collector and thus Reaper technology, why doesn't anyone on the crew consider this as an option?

I...uh...wow, seems a bit daft that we missed that, doesn't it?

From the Illusive Man's point of view, obviously he wanted Shepard to end up salvaging the tech. But surely someone on the crew was smart enough to think about this idea. Mordin, definitely. I'm surprised he never got around to hanging a lampshade on it, actually.

Someone else mentioned the Mu Relay and how it survived a supernova, so yeah, actually destroying the relay might be out of the question. But relays CAN be deactivated, or at least become inactive; see the First Contact War for details. And even if no one's sure exactly how to do that, your crew includes a brilliant scientist, a robotic platform for a galactic hive mind, and Tali, who is awesome. They could've figured something out.

Here's another question: why was the Omega Relay red?

3. What did we actually accomplish in ME2?
Well...nothing really. This isn't so much a plot hole as it is a plot problem. We stopped the Collectors from making a single additional Reaper that would add ONE to the coming fleet of thousands. We did not stall the actual Reaper fleet in any way, as we did in ME1. We did not expose the threat of the Reapers to the galaxy. We did not defeat any actual Reapers, just a single half-made prototype. We didn't even slow them down, or defeat an agent that was attempting to hasten their arrival. We killed a single Reaper that was not related to the original Reaper threat created in ME1. The game ends with the galaxy in the exact same situation it was in at the beginning. Sure, we learned a few things about Reapers, but we didn't actually do anything to stop or slow their arrival.

Hey, all the rebels accomplished in The Empire Strikes Back was blowing up a really big Star Destroyer, getting Luke some Jedi skills, and trading Han for his blacker counterpart.

I think the second part of a trilogy like this is more about building the galaxy, introducing a good dose of gray into the black and white dualism, and making the overarching storyline more involving and personal. Mission accomplished, IMO.

EDIT: Also, in response to #2, see the explanation from Internet Kraken that the top poster on this page quoted. I'm thinking that's a hell of an insight, and even if it's not what Bioware's thinking, it makes for a damned interesting story.

 

[Gather]

Random thing Internet Kraken; if they tried to get a "Dominant" race going and the Rachni were somehow forced into combat through unknown means wouldn't that mean the Reapers were actually trying to get a dominent race going?

When the Krogans destroyed the Rachni, the reapers concentrated their efforts on them. Seeing that race as a possible choice for ascension. Then came the death and decay for an attempt at being a dominant race (And/or trying to get the numbers to make a Reaper). They lost through the genophage and the Harbringer called the Krogan Species "failed potential" or something along those lines

 

[AcacianLeaves]

Whoa. This thread received more replies than expected. I am more or less incapable of answering all of them, so I'll try to respond to the most popular explanations for the plot holes. This will be a deadly wall of text. I am sorry. I'll break my replies up into 3 posts (one for each point) to make it easier to read.

First, the Omega 4 Relay.

The relays don't warp you to other relays, they warp you to a place in a different nebula.

(breaths in a large amount of air)
WROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG!
Why dont we destroy Omega 4 and stop Collectors coming in? Probably because Omega 4, for them, is NOT a way in. Its a way for them to RETURN. Relays do not, i repeat, DO NOT teleport you from one to another. They accelerate you to a certain speed, for a certain time, in a certain direction.

A lot of people said this. But I seem to remember reading in the codex that Mass Relays are a system that requires two corresponding Relays in order to function properly, forming a network. From the Mass Effect Wiki:

Mass relays function by creating a virtually mass-free 'corridor' of space-time between each other. This can propel a starship across enormous distances that would take centuries to traverse, even at FTL speeds. Before a vessel can travel, the relay must be given the amount of mass to transit by the ship's pilot before it is moved into the approach corridor. In Mass Effect: Revelation, when a relay was activated, it moved to align itself with the corresponding relay before propelling the ship across space.

There are two kinds of mass relay, primary and secondary. Primary relays can send a ship hundreds of light years but only link to one other relay, its 'partner'. Secondary relays can link to any other relay over shorter distances

According to the codex, Mass Relays are linked to one another. I interpret this to mean that you cannot jump from one relay unless it has a corresponding relay to align with.

The Collectors would still be able to launch themselves out with FTL to the nearest other mass relay, because of course they have other avenues of escape then just A mass relay. Their base is able to withstand the horrific power of blackholes and exploding suns.

Interesting theory, but as stated above In the quote from the Mass Effect Wiki (which is taken almost directly from the in-game codex) it would take centuries to travel the distances from one relay to the other. Also, the Collector base is able to exist in the galactic core due to its mass effect field. Would that field work at FTL speeds? If it did not, they would be unprotected and the black holes and unknown anomalies would tear their base to dust, even at FTL speeds.

1.) Remember the Mu Relay? That got hit by a super nova. It survived. We can't just blow up relays whenever we feel like it.

Cerberus probably doesn't have the firepower to destroy a mass relay, if they can be destroyed while active. I doubt the Citadel fleet could bring one down.

I do like the 'Mass Relays are indestructible' reasoning, although they look vulnerable enough to me. If this is the case, it would be nice to get a clearer in game explanation of this. I'm just saying, why doesn't anyone suggest this? Why is everyone just like, 'Suicide mission? SURE! Why even discuss alternatives?' I just think someone would think, logically, 'Why don't we just blow this damn thing to kingdom come and let the Collectors rot?' Even if it was part of the Illusive Man's plan all along to capture their tech, why doesn't anyone from the crew make this suggestion, if only so that it can be shot down as impossible or just a bad idea. I can see how an explanation COULD exist, but none was ever really given in the game for what I thought was a pretty obvious solution to the whole problem. Also you wouldn't have to reduce it to dust or explode the whole thing, just blow it up enough so it doesn't work anymore.

1: We needed to find out what the Collectors were up to. The Illusive Man, in particular, wanted to use the Collector technology for his own war efforts against the Reapers. Cutting the Collectors off from the rest of the galaxy would have removed them as a threat, but the Reapers are still coming and we needed information

I like this as a reason for not just bombing it and forgetting about it the best, but I still would have liked it if someone just suggested it. As a Paragon reason, anyway, gathering more information about the threat makes good sense.

 

[AcacianLeaves]

Next, the Human Reaper.

In short; Reapers wanted to create a Human Reaper for cultural reasons, not military strength.
And I don't think this Reaper was a backup plan for Sovereign. It was still far from completion when you encountered it, and apparently the Collectors have been harvesting since before Sovereign died. Harbinger has some other way of reaching the galaxy. I don't think the human Reaper would have attacked the Citadel.

I love your theories about why the Reapers have been doing this 'cycle of extinction'. Although I tend to think it's something much more simplistic. Obviously they were created by someone, perhaps when they first existed there was only one of them. Maybe they made this weapon to fight against impossible odds of an invading race, and used the genetic material of their fallen enemies to create a Reaper as a superweapon and a source of fuel. Perhaps this superweapon had a code written into it that it must destroy and thus absorb the rest of the enemy race, and reproduce itself to increase the strength of its creators. If such an AI went rogue and killed its creators, it would still have that original code. It would evolve and adapt to carry out the purpose of its written code, to absorb all intelligent space faring life it encountered, and use that life to reproduce. Think Vger from Star Trek the movie.

Anyway, if they weren't building this Reaper to attack the Citadel or hasten their invasion, why build it now? Why not wait until they've invaded and thus have easy access to the millions of humans, instead of having to rely on the Collectors. Obviously they have the patience of a machine, there's no reason for them to be in a hurry to create a new Reaper, unless they were going to use it for something like attacking the Citadel.

2. Well I agree the giant robot baby was tacky and stupid, but needing genetic material to reproduce as the explanation for why the reapers perform their genocide/leave every 50000 years cycle thing was awesome, I thought.

I thought so too, I actually did not see that coming and it helps me to do a lot of fanboy theorizing as to why they were doing this.

Okay, first of all, we didn't see any organic parts of Sovereign. However, we hardly saw the intimate details of that and the derelict Reaper you visit in ME2. Given the size difference between the Human Reaper and Sovereign, I think it's reasonable to assume that what we saw was the core. EDI does say that it would likely take millions more humans to fully 'grow' that Reaper to maturity, presumably gaining itself the squid-like shell of its kin.

I like the theory that the Reapers have a shell that gives them the squid-like appearance, but it still begs the question as to why the make the core (presumably the most vulnerable part) shaped like a sapient species. Why do that at all? Wouldn't a big spherical super-armored tank make more sense? I suspect there is a reason for this, and I suspect that reason is cultural rather than logical. It's not something a machine would do, a machine would make the core into the most logically defensible shape - which is not a human.

It did make for a pretty sweet boss fight though, I have to admit that. It wasn't until I defeated it that I was like, "Wait, what?"

 

[apocalips07]

On the omega 4 relay the game never states that the relays can be damaged so maybe they can't. I know its kinda lame.
On the human reaper I assumed that that was how the reapers reproduced so they were probably trying to replace Sovren, and if you watch, I think it's after the credits, they show a whole fleet of reapers and they all look different.

 

[AcacianLeaves]

Finally, on what we accomplished and the overall story arc in ME2.

What we accomplished in ME2 was, without question, the saving of millions of human lives being harvested by the collectors. That is a worthy goal in itself. We also stopped the creation of a new Reaper within the galaxy that could have (though there is no confirmation) had some effect on the speed with which the full Reaper fleet could return, one way or another. We just don't know. Certainly there can't really be much question that we "accomplished" something worthwhile and that the current arc of the overall story was well wrapped up.

Remember that datapad at the end? The one with all the data on Harbinger on it? Yeah, I'm pretty sure that was important. And we stopped another Reaper plan. I don;t see what the problem is.

It is true that we did save the lives of, presumably, all the humans on Earth. So the plot of ME2 is wrapped up. And yes, that datapad will surely come in handy later on. But this had very little relationship with the overall story and the threat that they're presenting with the Reapers.

I suppose the second and third entries in a series are usually connected more closely than with the first as a rule of thumb. Was much accomplished in Halo 2? Modern Warefare 2? Assassin's Creed 2? All second installments have cliffhangers, because they lead directly into the next.

Well yes, but think about the plots of those games. You don't resolve the whole issue or stop the overall threat, but you're still fighting to stop that same threat from the first installment (wouldn't know about MW2).

My main problem here is that within the second game they introduced an entirely new threat, and we defeat that entirely new threat. It was only ostensibly related to the original threat presented in ME1, and at the end of the game the threat that was still present at the end of ME1 is still exactly as present as it was there. Obviously I don't know how ME3 will turn out, but if we removed the entire plot of ME2 (the collectors and harvesting humans), how much would we need to remember for ME3? That we got a datapad at the end?

That would be like if in The Empire Strikes Back the main villains were the crime lords of the galaxy (who were being secretly funded by the Empire), and by the end of the movie Luke had defeated the crime lords. Yeah, he made an impact on the galaxy, saved a bunch of people, and upset the plans of the Empire, but he did nothing to the Empire itself.

 

[AcacianLeaves]

One possible reason for this is the reapers fighting a war or preparing for a war with another powerful species. Perhaps they create new and varied Reapers in order to have a diverse army capable enough to destroy this other group. The Reapers may also cleanse the galaxy to stop civilization from discovering a means to journey to other galaxies, maintaining some level of peace. Perhaps they reasoned that killing all advanced life every 50,000 years is better than setting them free and allowing the universe to burn. Just a theory though, guess I have to wait until Mass Effect 3.

This gets my gears turning. Perhaps the Reapers are a weapon constructed by a race in a neighboring galaxy, meant to keep life in the Milky Way in check? Perhaps they are the remnants of a 60 million year old war that a neighboring galaxy had with an advanced race in the Milky Way, and as a means of winning that war and ensuring peace - the neighboring galaxy constructed the Reapers. Now they exist to make sure that sapient life never leaves the Milky Way.

I like it.

 

[Spoonius]

My main problem here is that within the second game they introduced an entirely new threat, and we defeat that entirely new threat. It was only ostensibly related to the original threat presented in ME1, and at the end of the game the threat that was still present at the end of ME1 is still exactly as present as it was there. Obviously I don't know how ME3 will turn out, but if we removed the entire plot of ME2 (the collectors and harvesting humans), how much would we need to remember for ME3? That we got a datapad at the end?

Yes, but throughout ME2 we've been learning more and more about the Reapers and their methods, physiology and general existence. We've been provided insights that will be useful in ME3 when the shit hits the galactic fan; we've also taken down the embryonic Reaper, the Collectors and their base of operations (well, I chose to destroy the base anyway), and in doing so, wiped out the Reapers ability to influence the galaxy without direct interference, which would instantly alert everybody to the threat. Remember, however dangerous a threat the Reapers are, they're powerless to do anything unless they can reach the Milky Way. As a result of ME2, they can't do that without uniting everybody against them, and thanks to Shephard's efforts in ME1, they can't directly attack the Citadel to wipe out galactic leadership. Their only remaining option is a frontal assault on the Milky Way, against the united galactic community.


Oh, and here are some of my theories on the nature of the Reaper threat:



I get the feeling that the Reapers are collecting humans for a much greater purpose than reproduction. As already mentioned, they're basically immmortal, and the inclusion of organic material in their makeup could probably be bypassed by such a technologically-evolved race. I was always confused as to why Reapers were half-organic and not fully synthetic... why the hell do they need to incorporate organic components at all? All we have to go by that this is Reaper reproduction is EDI's suggestion; instead of automatically assumming that this is the method by which Reapers reproduce, and that the end-boss is an embryonic Reaper "core", wouldn't it be logical to guess that the Human-looking thing is something entirely different? It'd be typical of Bioware if they deliberately misled us into thinking they were reproducing.



Harbinger's line at the end was: "We are your salvation through destruction."



Does that mean that the Reapers might actually believe that they're ensuring the survival of various species by storing "backup" genetic material? The massive amount of matter contained within each Reaper (millions of humans were to be harvested) is easily enough to maintain and/or reconstruct numerous viable genepools of the species from which it was created, and the Reapers' survivability and sheer power would ensure that the precious organic cargo within each of them would be protected from external harm, even against forces originating from beyond the galactic border. Maybe they're nothing but gigantic, armoured, well-armed, self-aware gene-storage facilities for some unknown, even higher power...



Or a second possibility; maybe they're a race of 'hunters'? Maybe, each 50 000 years, they emerge to kill and recover genetic material from all intelligent life in the galaxy? This, to me, seems plausible; modern-day hunters and poachers stalk animals through the wild; sometimes when they make a significant kill, they hang the animal's severed head up on thir wall as a trophy. Maybe this is the Reaper equivelent. Once they have their trophy (a construct in the image of the hunted intelligent species used to create it, and containing a massive sample of their collective genetic material) they begin to eradicate all traces of intelligent life. This ensures that when they wake after 50 millenia for their next hunt, the galaxy will be populated by completely new intelligent life forms to stalk, all prey for the God-like Reaper fleet. Remember, the more dangerous the hunt, the greater the thrill; it might explain why they only attack intelligent, spacefaring civilisations, as these would be the only prey with the ability to fight back.



Maybe it's even a kind of test; they could be searching for a new species that is adaptable and strong enough to fight back and reist their hunt. Perhaps they are searching for the "perfect organic race", or an "evolutional prodigy"... after all, Sovereign itself stated that the mass relays had initially been created with the sole purpose of forcing new civilisations down the paths the Reapers had intended... who's to say what they were trying to achieve by doing that? It could be an experiment on a galactic scale; when a scientist returns to his project only to find it a complete failure, he/she disposes of it and begins again. According to Sovereign, intelligent life "was an accident". Maybe 'life' is just the Reaper equivelent of 'penicillin', one of the most important medical developments in recent history (and also discovered by accident). Maybe the Reapers CREATED life, and are researching its origins or development, disposing of "failed" species every 50 000 years so that they can repeat their galactic experiment with new variables...



Or maybe they're just cold-hearted, psychopathic, genocidal, mechanical bastards who want to kill everything with a pulse out of sheer spite. Don't forget that possibility.



I also liked the theories that suggested:
(1) the Reapers might be the creations of another species that exists beyond the Milky Way, and are designed to prevent life from 'ascending' past a certain evolutionary point to rival their power, and...
(2) that Reapers are 'avatars' of every prodigal spacefaring species that has ever existed, and that their interest in Shephard was as a representative of humankind when converted to Reaper form. Maybe the first ever spacefaring race originally created the Reapers, and Harbinger, who leads the Reaper fleet, is their representative...

 

[Therumancer]

Now the plot hole that kind of annoys me in Mass Effect, is the entire Prothean thing. I guess they decided the previous cycle of the galaxy only had one species for the sake of simplicity, but I find it hard to believe. Even if the Protheans were the best, I would have expected there to be remnants from dozens of sentinent life forms left behind. I mean I find it odd that we've probably got a dozen or more races in the "current" ME timeline, but apparently when the Protheans were around there was only one?

I think the Protheans discovered the Citadel and the Mass Relays before anyone else in that cycle so I guess that the Protheans destroyed any other aspiring race before they could master space combat in order to maintain that power for themselves. They probably activated every Mass Relay they could find and destroyed every race that could pose as a future risk. The observation post on Mars shows that they were at least studying other species for some such reason and probably didn't destroy Earth and other similar planets because of their future colonization possibilities or maybe early man wasn't considered important enough to destroy but worthy of study.

A massive plot hole that stands out is just how can people recognize you when you alter your appearance. Garrus, Tali, Alenko/Williams, Anderson, Liara and a ton of people from side missions all know who you are even if you change your skin colour, facial shape and your eyes. Obviously a lot of things wouldn't work if no one recognized you but there should have been some sort of explanation for this.

The deserted Reaper seems out of place as well. I find it hard to believe that no one discovered it before that. The system that it is in is named, the planet it is ordbiting has been explored along with it's largest moon. These all have names. It gives of a power signature, it would have been detected. You were in the Hawking Eta in the first game, it isn't a part of the traverse. People would have found it, people would have studied, things would have happened that show of it's discovery. Maybe the evil of the reaper technology made anyone who discovered it to leave it alone but I doubt that would happen. Also, why does Reaper technology make you insane? That seems like magic in a world of attempts at Hard Sc-fi, there probably is a codex entry detailing that, I just missed it.[/quote]


Well I'd say the cosmetic editing thing is not supposed to be literal plastic surgery to change your apperance, but rather a chance to "fix" an apperance you messed up in the previous game and take advantage of new options. I think the idea is supposed to be that Shepard always looked that way. A "retcon" so to speak.

I also do not think Mass Effect was going for "Hard Science Fiction" it's pure space fantasy as none of the technology is really explained. At least not to the extent of what I consider to be real science fiction, like how someone like Piers Anthony could write pages explaining the exact principles on which something worked, or why a specific shape was being used for spacecraft, or whatever.

Irregardless of whether you use implants or not, the whole "oh well, it's not magic or psionics, we manupulate Dark Matter with our brains!" explaination is kind of ridiculous. Mass Effect does include the whole "biotics" thing as a work around.

As far as the Reapers, I get the impression that they employ some kind of brainwashing technology, sort of like a "mind control ray" created by a scientist in a comic book, but emitted internally as an invisible field, with gradual effects. Either that or they are using psionics of some sort. Being a mechanical race does not nessicarly omit the possibility of psionic powers, the robots in Issac Asimov's "Foundation" for example had ridiculousl powerful psionic abillities they developed by the very end of the series (this is part of a surprise reveal in the finale of Foundation).

As far as The Reaper not being discovered, I am guessing Cerberus found it first and hid it. Or they are using the logic that the ship was well concealed in an astroid belt, etc.. which is a common place to hide stuff in sci-fi/fantasy. The power signature probably being so faint that it wasn't detectable unless they knew what to look for.

Consider for example that I'd imagine you'd have to filter solar system wide sensors to avoid picking up every piece of space junk with some residual power. This is an issue in some science fiction series. It's also noteworthy that astroids and such are typically presented as being barriers to this kind of thing.

Besides which I believe it was mentioned that this Reaper had gotten stuck in a gravity well, which probably means that few people went into that area unless they had bloody good reason, so nobody was really exploring it.

 

[RYjet911]

So, after the Prothean Reaper failed the Reapers tried to find a species that would be a good target. They chose humans. There could be many reasons for this. Mordin often spoke of how Humans were one of the most diverse races in the galaxy. This was also pointed out my several other races too. The reprosecutions of this is that Humans are often used as test subjects, as shown once again in Mordins mission. This may be why they are compatible with Reapers. There is also point that Soveriegn was stopped mainly by one human Specter and the Alliance fleet. Maybe the Reapers see humans as the strongest race.

That's a very good point. Considering it was largely due to human influence that Sovereign was destroyed, and that Shepard took out its most powerful, loyal minion, Saren, they may have wanted to remodel themselves on human physiology, to make themselves more powerful. The reapers so far (At the end of ME2 especially when there's loads of them visible) all look pretty squid-like, so perhaps that was the strongest race they've encountered until humanity arrived. Like one character says, they might not know fear, but Shepard greatly assisted in killing one, and they must at least respect that.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Anyway, if they weren't building this Reaper to attack the Citadel or hasten their invasion, why build it now? Why not wait until they've invaded and thus have easy access to the millions of humans, instead of having to rely on the Collectors. Obviously they have the patience of a machine, there's no reason for them to be in a hurry to create a new Reaper, unless they were going to use it for something like attacking the Citadel.

Well why not begin the construction now? The Alliance was severely weakened after the battle again Sovereign, so mobilizing the Collectors to begin construction seems like a logical move. Collector technology was so advanced that they were able to kidnap humans without any interference. There really isn't any reason to wait.

Harbinger also may have been trying to lure Shepard out of hiding. He probably knew that someone had collected Shepard's body, and given the Reapers immense knowledge he also probably knew that he could be resurrected. By targeting human colonies Harbinger aimed to grab Shepard's attention and then capture him.

And I don't think the Human Reaper was meant to attack the Citadel because the plan seems impractical. The Human Reaper had been in construction for over 2 years and it was still only a larva. To build its strength to be equal to or surpass Sovereign would probably have many more years, and I imagine the Reaper fleet will arrive earlier than that. I also don't see why having the Human Reaper attack the Citadel would be any more successful than Sovereign's plan. Sovereign had a sleeper agent ready to hand over control of the Citadel to him. This gave Sovereign a huge advantage right from the start. The Collectors also seem to specialize in ambush rather than direct assaults. I doubt a combined force of the Collectors, the remaining heretic Geth, and the Human Reaper would be able to take out the Citadel.

I also think that the assumption that the Reapers are cold, emotionless being is inaccurate. Both Harbinger and Sovereign seem to have hubris, with it being blatantly evident in the latter. Harbinger also appears to express irrational anger at the end of the game. He accused the Collector general of failing when he was the one with "direct control", implying that he was incredibly frustrated at the moment. So I don't think the Reapers have infinite patience, especially not after their flawless plans have been ruined twice now.

I like the theory that the Reapers have a shell that gives them the squid-like appearance, but it still begs the question as to why the make the core (presumably the most vulnerable part) shaped like a sapient species. Why do that at all? Wouldn't a big spherical super-armored tank make more sense? I suspect there is a reason for this, and I suspect that reason is cultural rather than logical. It's not something a machine would do, a machine would make the core into the most logically defensible shape - which is not a human.

I don't remember correctly, but I believe dialogue in the game suggested that the Reapers don't have control over what shape the Reaper is built in. Though it could also be for cultural reasons.

 

[m0rdin]

1. The Omega 4 Relay
Most of ME2 is spent discussing the suicide mission that is traveling through the Omega 4 Relay. It is the ONLY way to the source of the Collectors and going through it is almost certain death. However...doesn't this work both ways? If I recall, Mass Relays work like giant two-way teleport systems. So as soon as Cerberus learns that the Omega 4 Relay is the source of the Collectors - why don't they just destroy it? If you destroy the Omega 4 Relay, you cut off the Collectors from the rest of the galaxy and isolate them in their homeworld in the galactic core. As the plot says, they can't just fly away from their homeworld because it is surrounded by a large Mass Effect shield that protects it from the black holes and anomalies. They HAVE to use the Omega 4 Relay to travel ANYWHERE in the galaxy. If you destroy it (or disable it if destroying it would be too dangerous), they're stuck. End of story. We win. Why does no one consider this option? If the idea is to save the humans that were abducted, why is the Paragon decision to blow the Collector base to smithereens without rescuing anyone outside of your crew? Also, if the hidden intention of Cerberus was to utilize Collector and thus Reaper technology, why doesn't anyone on the crew consider this as an option?

The following is an abstract illustration of the Mass-Relay-Network not including the differences between primary and secondary relays:

[http://www.abload.de/image.php?img=relay-networko6nv.jpg]
The Network is in a built in a way that encourages finding a way to the citadell starting at every system that has a relay next to it. On the other side many relays have never been used by current civilisation and since the network widens with every relay you use to get away from the citadel known space is only a real small part of all systems you can travel to via the relay-network.
So, who says that it is not in fact the following situation?:

[http://www.abload.de/image.php?img=relay-networko5wc.jpg]
There could be a second relay next to the collector base that connects to some place in the universe no citadell-species has ever been at. But because of the structure of the network and the fact that the Collectors have access to Reaper Knowledge such as a map of the whole network they could be back in Citadell space within weeks.
What if the relay inside the galactic core was in fact a secondary relay that could link to dozens of relays in every location in some radius around the core?

If they destroyed the Omega-IV-Relay the only thing they did for sure was cut of their access to the collector-base and nothing else.

By the way: I think it is practically possible to destroy a relay. At least they could destroy Sovereign and in contrast to a relay that thing fired back.

2. The Human Reaper
I...don't get it. Why were they doing this? What purpose does this serve the Reapers? There are presumably hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of Reapers in dark space. While the human Reaper looks badass and made a great end-game boss, it never really made any sense to me. Why are they using organic tissue? Why is that necessary? There wasn't anything organic about Sovereign that I could see. Why does the Reaper take on the image of the race that it conquers? Were all previous races squid-like? Why don't any Reapers look like keepers or Protheans? What did the Collectors plan to do with the human Reaper if it was completed? Stomp around on Earth like Godzilla? Why is it necessary to give it all the weaknesses of a human form - like frail limbs and obvious weak spots? Why is is so small compared to Sovereign? This is more than likely something I missed on my first two play-throughs, but I did not understand the ultimate plot of the Collectors (and thus the Reapers) in Mass Effect 2. Especially since we already saw that one Reaper would be torn to pieces by the united races of the galaxy as in Mass Effect 1.

One can argue about the design of the Human Reaper. I myself think that it was pretty shitty. I think the design was only chosen because it made a good endboss. - But the fact that it was a human reaper (no matter how it looks) revealed a lot about the Reapers and their intentions. The first thing is, that the Reapers are definitely no machines. They are hybrids between organics and anorganics. That says, that reapers are no entities that make up their decicions by simply calulating all variables. They are no cold, heartless machines.
As Harbinger (a Reaper) says it, the Reapers see this hybrid form of existence superior to any other. ("We are your genetic destiny.") - That may lead to a variety of motives that somehow intertwine.

3. What did we actually accomplish in ME2?
Well...nothing really. This isn't so much a plot hole as it is a plot problem. We stopped the Collectors from making a single additional Reaper that would add ONE to the coming fleet of thousands. We did not stall the actual Reaper fleet in any way, as we did in ME1. We did not expose the threat of the Reapers to the galaxy. We did not defeat any actual Reapers, just a single half-made prototype. We didn't even slow them down, or defeat an agent that was attempting to hasten their arrival. We killed a single Reaper that was not related to the original Reaper threat created in ME1. The game ends with the galaxy in the exact same situation it was in at the beginning. Sure, we learned a few things about Reapers, but we didn't actually do anything to stop or slow their arrival.

Some more repition of known facts:
The bulk (as far as we know, all except Sovereign) of the Reaper Forces is trapped in Darkspace. The only way out of there is some Mass Relay next to the ReaperForces that leads to the Citadel. Dark Space is some place outside the galaxy that my be millions of lightyears away from anything.

The only way out of Darkspace is through the Citadell that is a sleeping Mass Relay. The Citadel can be activated through a signal given to the keepers that activate the Relay. This signal can only be given by someone that can somehow get close to the citadell. For that purpose Sovereign had been left behind by the Reapers after the Protheans were assimilated. But since the Protheans somehow changed the keepers to not react to Sovereigns signal the Reapers had to find another way. That way was Sovereign being found by some Batarian that was indoctrinated whom hired some human AI-expert whom had his own researchbase destroyed which caused interest in the Alliance and the Council that sent a Spectre named Saren (and his trainee, named Anderson) who finally and secretly took Sovereign himself. That lead to the actions of Mass Effect 1 where Sovereign was destroyed in the end.
At that point the Reapers had to make up another plan in order to have the circle continue. Because they planned for the eventuallity they spared some Protheans and made them Collectors. Now, even if the Collectors have some Reaper-Technology they are far too few (opposed to the heretics) to claim a serious threat to Council Forces. That's why the Collectors try to assemble a new Reaper, that could have another shot at trying to accomplish what Sovereign did. They build this reaper not to be the ultimate fighting machine but for it's skills in indoctrination with which the new reaper could recruit a new army to attack the citadell.

Long story short: The human Reaper was built to enable the Reapers to come back.

So convince me that these are not actually plot holes/problems, or tell me some plot holes that you may have discovered. As I said I am a Mass Effect fanboy, so I'd really like someone to come in and tell me it's alright and that these plot holes have logical and reasonable explanations to them.

I hope, that it's done.

 

[RickDarko]

You are saying " The human reaper was needed to open the "portal" that allow the reapers enter and destroy everything. Why ? casue Sovereign failed.

Now consider this, "the reapers are your genetic destiny", that means something, right?
Maybe the reapers are not simple monsters that show up every 50 thousands years to blow everything up. In ME1 the reapers are represented as gods, so, to put things simple, The gods return every 50 thousands years to check on the children left behind. Analize this " The reapers return", So Sovereign is the one reaper in charge to make sure the reapers return, that dont make sense, the reapers should be capable of returning whithout any help, and in any case, why left behind a simple reaper to be defeated. Thats stupid. The reapers have to return the same way the leave.
To continue, the reapers return to check their childs, if they like what they see, the child live, if they dont, the child die... it is a posibility.
2) There is no way to stop the reapers, that is clear, so how is this going to end ? If the reapers can not be stopped what are we doing then? Thats is the big question mark.