Nick, Chip, and Kurabara are back this week to talk about their encounter with the Collectors aboard the Collector Ship, and all the surprising reveals they learned along the way. First, Nick complains that five missions after Horizon, you HAVE to meet with the Illusive Man whether you want to or not, and talks about how he was in the middle of doing missions on Illium when he got pulled away for this mandatory meeting.

Then, after recapping the mission, the guys get into discussing the nature of the Collectors. Then they talk about how obvious it was that this should was a trap. Kura asks about the construction of the ship which Nick compares to a mudwasp structure. Chip compares the Collectors to the Keepers given their buglike nature.

Then they get into the fact that the Collectors are effectively husk Protheans, having been genetically modified by the Reapers through the ages since the Prothean extinction. The guys try to parse out how the Collectors evolved from the Protheans yet the Collector ship matches neither Reaper technology nor the Prothean architecture from Mass Effect 1.

Kura brings up the creepy nature of the pods in the ship and compares It to a horror movie. This transitions into Nick asking if Bioware has an M. Night Shamyalan problem by comparing the twists from each of the various games and how the big twist in each game seems to be less impactful as they progress.

They talk about the history of the Collector Ship, having blown up the first Normandy and then been chased off of Horizon. Kura asks about the size of the ship given it was supposed to be able to abduct the population of Earth. The squad tries to do some math to figure out how big the ship needs to be to abduct everyone. This leads to the theory that the Collectors would have to liquefy several of their victims to reduce storage space.

They also talk about the betrayal by the Illusive Man, that he knew it was sending Shepard into a trap.

Chip brings up the weapon specialization skill that becomes available after the mission.

They then talk about the next mission, which is to get a Reaper IFF from a derelict reaper.

Finally, they talk about two side quests. First is the one to get some encrypted data from Eclipse mercs, and then Shepard has to solve a puzzle.

Thank you for listening to Squad Goals - A Mass Effect Legendary Edition Podcast! Please send any comments or questions to [email protected] or @squadgoalsN7 on twitter.

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