Collective Denial: Mass Effect Jumped the Shark

After spending a few dozen hours roaming the galaxy recruiting hardened companions willing to join me on a suicide mission in Mass Effect 2, I was expecting far more from the game’s final moments. And it looks like I’m not alone in that reaction, as this new editorial on Gameranx spells out a near-identical sense of disappointment about the ending and the boss that Shepard and crew were forced to do away with.

So, since everyone seems up to speed with the upside of the franchise, let me be the voice of discord within the choir. I will not re-iterate the higher points of the game. Instead let me cut right to the chase. The jumping of the shark. Or rather, the jumping of the giant metal skeleton made of human mush. I’m wondering, does anyone remember the main storyline of Mass Effect 2? The one where the mysterious Collector race abducts human colonists by the thousands? For some sinister purpose? Does anyone remember what that purpose was? Let me remind you.

The big plot reveal of Mass Effect 2 was (spoilers haha) that those pesky Collector guys were abducting humans to turn them into DNA pulp to you guessed it build a human shaped Reaper one of those giant robo squids out of that pulp. Let me tell you my reaction to that big reveal of what Mass Effect 2’s suicide mission and all that buildup of tension was all about. First, I yelled (what is this bullshit?) at the TV. Then I paused the game as the giant Terminator / boss from Contra fight came up. Then, again, I yelled (what IS this bullshit!?) at the TV.

I felt betrayed. Mass Effect 2 had its moments, I won’t deny that. A lot of the side stories which made up almost the entire game were pretty well done in and on themselves. And then that. That was the best the BioWare writers could come up with? Really? This reduced to entire main mission of Mass Effect 2 into one giant pile of utter rubbish. It couldn’t have been worse, had that (Human Reaper) sported a big, red clown nose. That shot one-hit-kill attacks.

First of all, having a human shaped Reaper didn’t make any sense. Somewhere around that point the Normandy people find out that Reapers apparently take the forms of the lifeforms they kill or something along those lines. Which begs the question then, why all reapers in the franchise are massive metal squids that all look the same. But also, this flew into the face of the Reapers as a cold machine intelligence indifferent to all organic life standing in their way. Why would they have to resort to such cheap scare tactics when it was pretty clear that there never could be anything those puny organics could possibly come up with to challenge them?