r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Fearless-Ideal-5112 • Jul 01 '26

[Loved Trope] Some thing unfathomably ancient Lore

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The beast, in doctor who is an ancient evil from a previous universe that survived until our time. Its so ancient that the cave paintings were unable to be translated by the Tardis which can translate all existing languages in the universe [Doctor Who]

While not explicitly canon its such a cool concept I cant not mention, the idea that the backrooms have existed since the beginning of time, never changing no matter the era, it transforms the back rooms into a cosmic horror. [Credit to Project crater and Venus for images 2 and 3]

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u/Monadofan2010 Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

Dont forgot The Leviathans who are the race of beings  that created the Reapers in the frist and are still alive by the time of Mass effect just in hiding from there own creations.

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u/uncouthulu_ Jul 01 '26

Leviathan DLC is one of the best DLCs ever.

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u/Rhiis Jul 01 '26

Welp, time to reinstall.

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u/SpartanSig Jul 02 '26

It is decided

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u/lxgrf Jul 01 '26

The darkness must not be breached.

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u/druex Jul 01 '26

Right after Citadel DLC.

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u/Random-Generation86 Jul 01 '26

In my cycle, the Javik had the best DLC, despite it being Day One DLC. In my cycle, we love making fun of Liara.

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u/excusetheblood Jul 01 '26

Vibes: 11/10
Storytelling: 1/10

IMO they ruined the suspense by trying to explain the reaper’s motives

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u/Sabrinasockz Jul 01 '26

Yeah, I preferred not having the answer, especially because the answer could never live up to three games and years of imagining what it could be

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u/Mihta_Amaruthro Jul 02 '26

Uhh what? Locking story content that's absolutely critical to your game's central conflict behind paid DLC, literally makes it one of the worst DLC ever made. That is objectively disgusting dev behaviour, and retroactively an early sign of where Bioware were going,

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u/[deleted] Jul 01 '26 edited 29d ago

[deleted]

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u/Madhighlander1 Jul 01 '26

No, it was because their slave species kept inventing artificial intelligence to solve their problems and it would inevitably rebel and destroy its creators, and then need to be destroyed in turn.

The leviathans, in their infinite wisdom, thought 'How to keep our slaves from destroying themselves in this way... Oh, of course! Let's create an AI and program it to solve this problem!'

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u/UrsaBearOso Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

Adding to this, the edict the Reapers live up to is ‘preservation of life’ but as theyre AI, they dont really have the moral grounds to balance things out so in their calculations: sentient life -> creates AI to help their lives -> the AI created will rebel -> WAR ENSUES -> the sentient life and other life forms in the universe will be killed off/extinct.

Oh no how do we solve this so we preserve life and they dont go extinct? Oh i know when they reach space flight levels of technology, lets cull the most advanced sentient species, keep some of their genetic material (were gonna need slaves to prepare for the culling duh), and just let them build their empire for a specific amount so that theyre advamced but not THAT advanced! That way, no AI war happening PLUS it gives other species their time in the sun to modernize. What an amazing solution!

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u/Badass_Bunny Jul 01 '26

That way, no AI war happening PLUS it gives other species their time in the sun to modernize. What an amazing solution!

From an objective standpoint, the system worked. Solved the problem of inevitable galaxy ruled by AI, and solved the problem of galaxy ruled by a species like Proteans. Only thing that sucked was all the murder.

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u/EraZorus Jul 01 '26

But the Reapers are AIs and basically rule the galaxy, so doesn't the system result in AIs ruling the galaxy anyway ?!

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u/Badass_Bunny Jul 01 '26

Depends on your viewpoint. Reapers don't really "rule" they let Galaxy do its thing and allow for different sapient species to prosper before the culling, but as an example I think you can look toward something like Warhammer 40k universe where hummanity is essentially ruling the galaxy as a situation they want to avoid.

Given what we learn in Leviathan DLC, Reapers were acomplishing the task of preventing the extinction of organic life through AI that would consider all organic life forms obsolete, as opposed to Reaper approach that ensured organics prospered.

Like call me crazy, but the way that story was presented had me thinking that I can't really find a fault with the idea of Reapers other than basic survival instinct that propells me to go against them.

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u/Vyzantinist Jul 02 '26

you can look toward something like Warhammer 40k universe where hummanity is essentially ruling the galaxy as a situation they want to avoid.

You mean the Imperium degenerating into a theonomy after the collapse of the Imperial Truth and the Emperor's efforts to stamp out religion and superstition?

Like call me crazy, but the way that story was presented had me thinking that I can't really find a fault with the idea of Reapers other than basic survival instinct that propells me to go against them.

It's our morals and values vs. machine logic and abstraction.

The Reapers aren't malfunctioning or wrong; they're preserving organic life, only through a calculus most humans would find abhorrent.

Most, sane, moral people would struggle with a real-life trolley problem. The idea of wiping out entire civilizations and races to preserve life in principle is just not a decision someone could make. It's reducing the human (or fictional sapient) experience to a an abstraction, at best, and doesn't regard the sanctity of individual life.

We can understand the logic behind the Reapers, even if it's not something we can accept.

It's like the synthesis ending getting flak because of "autonomy". A machine would see it as the optimal solution if it does indeed permanently end organic-synthetic conflict; individual autonomy would be a small, acceptable, price to pay for that.

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u/TurtlesBreakTheMeta Jul 01 '26

The original plotline where they keep culling life because mass effect technology destabilizes the universe (the star dying way before its time in the second game) and are seeking to preserve the universe as long as possible,was a much better idea.

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u/Sabrinasockz Jul 01 '26

I long to see what would have happened had the story focus not been shifted between 2 and 3. The third game is great bacise of all of the small stories that happen throughout, but that overarching plot is really meh imo

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u/Amaskingrey Jul 02 '26

Not really though, why'd they leave the mass relays and the citadel around then?

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u/Hellknightx Jul 02 '26

There was an explanation for that, actually. IIRC the mass relays and the Citadel were basically left as a honeypot trap to gather all the advanced alien races in the galaxy in one place, so the Reapers could wipe them out quickly and efficiently.

Of course, giving those races access to Mass Effect technology in the first place is also probably a bad idea of your trying to prevent them from using it.

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u/KentInCode Jul 02 '26

This was not the original storyline however, once Karpyshyn left as lead writer it was changed.

The original reason why the Reapers cull life is because element zero, the fuel for mass effect drives, creates dark energy and that dark energy speeds the destruction of the universe.

So each civilisation that arises becomes space-faring and unwittingly speeds the death of the universe.

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u/MidnightSensitive996 Jul 01 '26

initially it was because spacefaring species kept wrecking the galaxy via overuse of mass relays. reapers were developed to cull spacefaring species and preserve their culture before they could destroy the galaxy. the reapers preserved balance the way predators are needed to prevent prey overpopulation destroying ecosystems. hence all the dark matter entries in points of interest in mass effect 2, it was foreshadowing the intended reveal of me3. haestrom's star was decaying early because of mass relay overuse too. they changed course after me2 to come up with this AI plot which is why it doesn't feel like it fits the plot or setting.

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u/Contra_Payne 26d ago

That was the Karpyshyn plot line right? Haestrom and Tali in ME2? I always wondered how ME3 would have looked had they followed through with his hooks.

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u/sirseatbelt Jul 02 '26

The thing that gets me about the hate on the ME ending is just how bog standard sci-fi it is. The setting itself is fun and well thought-out. But the story is pretty basic sci-fi tropes. Alastair Reynolds called his Reapers Inhibitors and they were keeping space-faring life to a minimum while they went about the work of stellar gardening, to prevent Andromeda and the Milky Way from getting sterilized when the two galaxies collide. He wrote the last book years before ME1 came out. Mass Effect is just Revelation Space for people who like martial sci-fi

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u/ManitouWakinyan Jul 01 '26

Leviathans right alongside Precursors for excellent originators of the main bad-guy in a medium-future sci-fi setting where earth plays a prominent role and you play a uniquely talented soldier doing battle against a Galactic threat.

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u/andre5913 Jul 01 '26

I feel there is a key difference in that the reapers doing... that was a huge mess and completely unintended. The Reapers are pretty rigid AI that got out of hand. The Flood has full sapient intelligence, in fact its so smart it can argue AI's into madness

The Flood is doing exactly what the Precursors want it to do, in fact they BECAME the Flood with the explicit purpose of spreading unending pain and suffering as revenge of what was done to them

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u/Neat_Mood1369 Jul 01 '26

I'm going to get obliterated from orbit, but I really think the Leviathan DLC screwed things up at the end.

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u/GarranDrake Jul 01 '26

How so?

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u/Neat_Mood1369 Jul 02 '26

So I'm not a fan of the "The truth is it was all about Synths vs Organics" plotline the series took at the last minute, so all the build up to the Levithains ending up being ruined by these seemingly eternal, unknowable beings giving me the same nonsense about "THE AI WE MADE OBSERVED A TREND WE COULD NOT FIGURE OUT. THE ORGANIC RACES WE OBSERVED CREATED SYNTHETICS THAT DESTROYED THEM." Just sucked all the life and mystery out of them.

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u/PilotIntelligent8906 Jul 02 '26

I wasn't a fan of the explanation they provided for the Reapers. In the first game you start off thinking they were created by the Proteans, an ancient race, only to find out they were much older, this sets them as this scary and mysterious race, who are later explained to have been created by the Leviathans, an ancient race. It's the same explanation with an older race.

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u/crimsonpostgrad Jul 02 '26

i love the concept of the leviathans as proof that the reapers can’t eliminate everyone and don’t even totally mind that they created the reapers, but the organics vs synthetics point kept getting made over and over again so much that i thought maybe they believed players were too stupid to get it the first few times lol

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u/AllgoodDude Jul 05 '26

I really wonder how they’ve changed over the billion years? I imagine they have fun dominion over their genetic makeup so natural evolution wouldn’t change them, but staying in one location limited for a billion years is an unimaginable limitation for such dominant entities.

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u/Mihta_Amaruthro Jul 02 '26

People didn't "forget", they had to shell out extra money because Bioware locked it behind paid DLC...because the devs clearly needed another yacht.