But they were in charge of keeping track of all their body parts that rotted off.

Okay, does EA have evidence to support that the world is going to end in 2012? They're launching pretty much every major title they have in the works next year now!

Nah, that is just how EA does business.

Not usually to this degree. I can't actually remember the last year that a major publisher was planning to release the sheer number of legit AAA type titles in one year as EA is set to put out right now in 2011.

The more I think about it, the more disappointing this gets for me. It's like they've forgotten what the Reapers are meant to be, what their motivations are, what they're really capable of. It seems like lots of them invading Earth really dumbs them down and turns them into monsters of the week.

Still, doesn't beat Harbinger's massive retardedness taunting you with sexual innuendos... or three-eyed mega baby reapers. I was kinda hoping to have the option to let ourselves getting reaped to smitheroons since they're our "Salvation through destruction" (and let new civilizations rise and prosper) but turns out they're just assholes screwing around.

I think that actually could have worked. Imagine it. They're so used to getting their way, having their beliefs realized by destroying everything and then seeing the universe become advanced again. Then along comes someone from a race of people who are new to these Reapers, and basically just one dude totally wrecks their shit. So in their confusion and fear they try to appease the humans by creating a Reaper in their image, to try to show them they're really helping the universe. That complete misunderstanding of humanity would be an alien concept, it would be a great analogy to them being like gods, it would actually add depth to the Reapers, it would be something new, and kind of freaky.

But no. It comes out of nowhere and it's retarded as shit.

Begs the question though that if they create a new reaper based on a species they would deem worthy enough than were previously only squids awesome enough to defy the Reapers? I mean they look like squids...
If you look at the size of sovereign for instance then that Terminator baby is incredibly small in comparison... maybe it was supposed to be the pilot of a new squidship? Or they wanted to let it loose on Japans shores, I don't know.

The whole abduction and processign thing reminded me of Prey... no it's exactly like it. They process flesh and tissue to keep the sphere rolling, the implications and meaning were further explained though. Maybe they'll do that in ME3, but at this point it doesn't hold much bearing... I really don't see what it would matter if they get all offensive.

What would have been excellent is for the reapers to actually help humanity attain a higher form of existence, consciousness because of its worthiness in the eyes of the reapers. The path to achieve this would seem gruesome to some but you would be able to understand their motives, kinda the nice evil guys or something like that. The Tuurngait from Penumbra would come to mind.

The ME3 reveal shows the Reapers blowing stuff up on Earth. It's quite possible that they need some ground troops for invasions like this.

I see what we're getting at, EPIC redefined! (all credits for the Arnold Reaper go to Badspot)

That's exactly what it was. The Devs said what you saw at the end of ME2 was just the brain core a Reaper would be built around. It's implied that at the heart of every Reaper squid is an embryo that resembles the species it was created from.

They should have explained this in-game. It would have made the ending much less cheesy...

Pretty obvious the devs would agree with you, it was a mistake on their part. Sometimes less is more and during development they probably thought a long explanation there would slow the ending down. As it stands though Shepard could simply have got a vision like he did in ME1 which would have done enough.

Why didn't we see something like that in that derelict reaper orbiting that dwarf planet then? And more importantly why does the illusive man just mention it like that out of the blue? Ok forget that one.
We learn the protheans didn't really stand a fight against the reapers (even though they were far more advanced than anyone in the new galaxy), so they got to live as slaves to the reaper Gods. So, by this logic in the cycles before there must have been quite a few species that could stand against the reapers as such they were picked to live among them? As an abomination of themselves stuck inside a giant squid? Makes sense.
That would mean that the people getting processed actually would have lived on forever inside that phoetus and destroying it was actually the worst decision ever made by Shepard... if that was the case why didn't they just spoke about it to shepard?
Also their contrived relationship with Shepard: they don't hesitate killing him/her off, just to be hopeful afterwards to recover at least something of his/her body. The next time round they take great care to capture him/her, then they just want to finish him/her off again. Those squids don't no what they're doing.

You just hit the nail on the head with that! That's the biggest complaint about the game I have. The devs went out of their way stating the game is about Shepard, it's Shepard's story. That IS BLATANTLY WRONG! He/she gets to do... NOTHING. His/her character also doesn't evolve throughout the "plot", he/she has no arc, he/she is just a puppet. In ME1 he/she had that prothean cypher, it made him/her special. He/she could do things no one else could do. Liara was particularly fond of it...
Why was that never put to good use? (except that one vision he got on that sidemission)
I mean you could have switched that Shepard fanboy with Shepard, wouldn't have made a difference. Really...

Regarding the derelict Reaper the 'pilot' of that was clearly dead, only the 'ship' remained. Agreed though that would have been the perfect place to show a corpse of some kind that would have then clued the player in on the true nature of the Reapers. Like I said an oversight and mistake by the Dev's IMO.

As for the Human reaper I highly doubt anyone lived on in the embryo. Harbinger was being literal when saying they would live on, what he meant was a new Reaper would be born so elements of humanity would be incorporated into the Reapers but the ones who made it were nothing but genetic goo. It was an abomination that did kill hundreds of thousands of humans to create so Shepard did the right thing. I can't imagine Paragon or Renegade Shep letting that thing live.