Basically the one concept that the whole Mass Effect trilogy centers around, they are the main villains, they are the underlying threat of the whole game. Most of the game, your main character stands there shouting "We need to fucking do something about those cockslapping reapers you morons!" at everyone who doesn't really want to pretend they exist.
First we should probably talk for a little bit about what lovecraftian horrors actually are.
H.P. Lovecraft was an early-20th century author who wrote weird horror fiction. His favourite topic was unknowable cosmic monstrosities, which is something that countless writers have completely failed to capture ever since then.
See, these cosmic horrors aren't just big, ugly, and dangerous enemies. They are beings entirely beyond the comprehensions of mere humans. It's not that you don't at the moment know where they came from or what they are, it's that they are beyond those concepts altogether. What are they like? They warp reality by simply existing!
A human being cannot even begin to fathom the nature of these horrors. In fact, even getting a tiny little glimpse at what they are will instantly drive you completely insane.
How old are they? You're not getting the point; they don't fit into the concept of time. The whole idea of "time" might just be a notion in the smallest dreams of one of these entities.
They are not enemies. They are not invaders. They don't come to kill us or turn us into slaves. They don't give half a thimbleful of jizz about us. It's like if the transdimensional omnipotent Q from Star Trek were to be said to be "enemies" with a single bacterium. One is so far beyond the other that the latter couldn't even describe the very simplest qualities of the former.
But writers, especially for video games, just can't seem to grasp that. To them, lovecraftian horrors are just big, dangerous monsters with scary voices.
And the influences from Lovecraft in Mass Effect are really obvious. The reapers are huge metallic monsters, modeled after cuttlefish, tentacles and all, that are so powerful that no ship in the galaxy can even hope to stand up to one. When encountered face to face, they speak with deep, rumbly voices and go on and on about how they are "beyond your comprehension" and shit.
Yet, those morons in the writer's office just didn't get it, because the reapers are in no way "beyond your comprehension".
In fact, they are very much within our comprehension; we know roughly when they were created, who created them, why they were created, why they harvest the galaxy every 50'000 years, how they procreate, and the code for their luggage(it's 12345).
This is bullshit.
Hell, they talk to the regular mortals. They speak to them, mock them, try to scare them, give them hints to their motivations. They communicate with them as equals.
"But" I hear you interject, clearly not understanding what a blog post is, "they don't treat them as equals, they constantly drone on about how they are superior".
Well, what they say isn't the problem, it's how they do it. The reapers intentionally speak in the language of the mortal they're speaking to. They speak, then pause to allow the other party to answer. They never interrupt the other party even when they clearly think they are absolutely wrong. Heck, Sovereign, the first reaper encountered, even makes a point out of saying he's terminating the conversation when he doesn't want to talk anymore, as opposed to just shutting up and terminating the link.
All those things are signs of politeness. They treat humans as equals in conversation, no matter what they pretend to do. I regularly speak to customers at work who show considerably less respect in a conversation than that supposed cosmic horror does!
After all this, the idiots pretending to be writers try to shoehorn in that concept I mentioned about these monstrosities warping reality around them. Except the effect they have is that their mere presence makes people around them gradually agree with them without realizing it.
Yeah...that's not really the same thing, is it? That doesn't make you a transdimensional horror, that makes you a politician.
And here's the killing blow, literally: They can be killed.
Yup, these things claiming to be beyond the understanding of mere mortals and who have neither beginning nor end...can be killed.
But what kind of magnificent device must one use to even hope to injure such a being? Guns. Just lots of big guns. Shoot at it a lot with really big guns and it dies.
Are you fucking shitting me?
"B-b-but" the voices in my head whine, "maybe the writers didn't want to create proper cosmic horrors, and just wanted to take some inspiration from Lovecraft!"
*places head firmly in palms* *where I found palms in this climate is a question for another day*
Let's say you created a superhero. You call him Man-bat, give him a brooding personality, a batcave, and dress him all in black. Then you have him exclusively pick fights with people in the open street in daylight.
At that stage, you might whinge all you like about how you "Wasn't trying to copy Batman...", but we all know damn well that you were, and you completely missed the point of Batman.
The reapers in the first game are presented as basically machine gods, which periodically murdered all civilized species for some unknown reason. Don't fuckin' come to me claiming they weren't trying to copy Lovecraft's monstrosities.
Fact is, though, that even though the first game treats them with more reverence than the last one, it still fails, because it still communicates with mortals, and is killed in the end by shooting at it.
So, clearly, EA's writers are absolute hacks.
A human being cannot even begin to fathom the nature of these horrors. In fact, even getting a tiny little glimpse at what they are will instantly drive you completely insane.
How old are they? You're not getting the point; they don't fit into the concept of time. The whole idea of "time" might just be a notion in the smallest dreams of one of these entities.
They are not enemies. They are not invaders. They don't come to kill us or turn us into slaves. They don't give half a thimbleful of jizz about us. It's like if the transdimensional omnipotent Q from Star Trek were to be said to be "enemies" with a single bacterium. One is so far beyond the other that the latter couldn't even describe the very simplest qualities of the former.
But writers, especially for video games, just can't seem to grasp that. To them, lovecraftian horrors are just big, dangerous monsters with scary voices.
And the influences from Lovecraft in Mass Effect are really obvious. The reapers are huge metallic monsters, modeled after cuttlefish, tentacles and all, that are so powerful that no ship in the galaxy can even hope to stand up to one. When encountered face to face, they speak with deep, rumbly voices and go on and on about how they are "beyond your comprehension" and shit.
Yet, those morons in the writer's office just didn't get it, because the reapers are in no way "beyond your comprehension".
In fact, they are very much within our comprehension; we know roughly when they were created, who created them, why they were created, why they harvest the galaxy every 50'000 years, how they procreate, and the code for their luggage(it's 12345).
This is bullshit.
Hell, they talk to the regular mortals. They speak to them, mock them, try to scare them, give them hints to their motivations. They communicate with them as equals.
"But" I hear you interject, clearly not understanding what a blog post is, "they don't treat them as equals, they constantly drone on about how they are superior".
Well, what they say isn't the problem, it's how they do it. The reapers intentionally speak in the language of the mortal they're speaking to. They speak, then pause to allow the other party to answer. They never interrupt the other party even when they clearly think they are absolutely wrong. Heck, Sovereign, the first reaper encountered, even makes a point out of saying he's terminating the conversation when he doesn't want to talk anymore, as opposed to just shutting up and terminating the link.
All those things are signs of politeness. They treat humans as equals in conversation, no matter what they pretend to do. I regularly speak to customers at work who show considerably less respect in a conversation than that supposed cosmic horror does!
After all this, the idiots pretending to be writers try to shoehorn in that concept I mentioned about these monstrosities warping reality around them. Except the effect they have is that their mere presence makes people around them gradually agree with them without realizing it.
Yeah...that's not really the same thing, is it? That doesn't make you a transdimensional horror, that makes you a politician.
And here's the killing blow, literally: They can be killed.
Yup, these things claiming to be beyond the understanding of mere mortals and who have neither beginning nor end...can be killed.
But what kind of magnificent device must one use to even hope to injure such a being? Guns. Just lots of big guns. Shoot at it a lot with really big guns and it dies.
Are you fucking shitting me?
"B-b-but" the voices in my head whine, "maybe the writers didn't want to create proper cosmic horrors, and just wanted to take some inspiration from Lovecraft!"
*places head firmly in palms* *where I found palms in this climate is a question for another day*
Let's say you created a superhero. You call him Man-bat, give him a brooding personality, a batcave, and dress him all in black. Then you have him exclusively pick fights with people in the open street in daylight.
At that stage, you might whinge all you like about how you "Wasn't trying to copy Batman...", but we all know damn well that you were, and you completely missed the point of Batman.
The reapers in the first game are presented as basically machine gods, which periodically murdered all civilized species for some unknown reason. Don't fuckin' come to me claiming they weren't trying to copy Lovecraft's monstrosities.
Fact is, though, that even though the first game treats them with more reverence than the last one, it still fails, because it still communicates with mortals, and is killed in the end by shooting at it.
So, clearly, EA's writers are absolute hacks.
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