Mass Effect 2/Tropes G-M

'''Please do not add any character tropes to this page. The Characters page for the entire series can be found here; the Characters page for Mass Effect 2 can be found here.'''

The rest of this list can be found at:


 * Tropes A-F
 * Tropes N-S
 * Tropes T-Z

"Ratch: Ryncol's a local favorite. Don't try to act tough. It'll tear your insides apart. Grunt: He's not joking. Ryncol hits aliens like ground glass."
 * Gameplay and Story Segregation:
 * Combined with Cutscene Power to the Max. Samara is a battle-hardened asari nearly of matriarch age (as in the equivalent of Matriarch Benezia - one of the most powerful biotics known and a boss in Mass Effect 1), Jack can be proven her equal, Garrus is a sniper who held three merc groups at bay simultaneously for a week by himself, Grunt is der Uberkrogan, Miranda is genetically enhanced to be perfect, Thane is a Space Ninja and Mordin can kill with everything that's not nailed down. Yet in gameplay, all of them can be killed relatively easily by most NPCs.
 * And, of course, heat clips. Everything about it, really. It can hold ten times the number of rounds in story.
 * The heat clips are an interesting case. The whole 'guns fire bullets the size of grains of sand and hold thousands of rounds' thing exists for no other reason than to avert this trope in the case of Mass Effect 1's different combat with overheat and cooldown. So when players complained and Bioware decided to go for a more contemporary combat in the sequel, they had no choice but to try and come up with some excuse for why the need to reload is the latest advancement in weapons technology.
 * Also, the Flavor Text about the planets you scan has little to no bearing on your scans, even when it suggests that it might. For example, one planet is described as a geth stronghold and to even approach it in a ship is tantamount to suicide. You can scan and stripmine the planet with no trouble. Another planet is described as having a surface crust so thick that mining is impossible. You can still probe it and take its resources. Handwaved in game with Cerberus tech.
 * There's discrepancy, more than once, between the description of a planet and what you find on the surface, if it's possible to land there. Nearly every planet you can land on has some amount of life and water, sometimes random birdsong, even when the description is all about how inhospitable it is. Maybe it's most notable in a system which has two planets you can't land on, a mention that they're a rare sight, two garden worlds in the same system, even if they're now uninhabitable. Yet a third you can land on is clearly supporting life. If two garden worlds are unusual, what's three?
 * The Codex entries specifically state that particle beams and energy weapons can't be stopped by kinetic barriers, yet when you get to use them they act much like their ballistic counterparts. The reason for this is threefold: one, Shepard is affected by weapons the same as the enemies; two, Shepard only has one health bar in the second game versus the two in the first game, with the health meter only being shown after barriers have been depleted; and three, Insanity difficulty is scary enough without your enemies' heavy weapons being able to completely ignore your defenses.
 * Shepard uses the M8-Avenger assault rifle in many cutscenes regardless if you've replaced its use with another weapon, or if your Shepard's character class can even use assault rifles in gameplay. Likewise, Miranda is shown inspecting her Shuriken machine pistol in a cutscene during the Suicide Mission even if you may have replaced it with another submachinegun.
 * Once the Reaper IFF is installed in the Normandy, the Collectors track down the ship and kidnap the crew. The thing is, depending on when you decide to go get the IFF there can be a delay of several quests before this happens. This means the Collectors can ambush the Normandy while it's sitting right outside the Citadel. Also if you choose not to awaken Grunt, his capsule will still be on the ship.
 * Powers in combat don't match what the Codex tells us at all, on account of game balancing:
 * For ordering a party member to use a tech ability that should fire off a nano-grenade made from their omni-tool's minifacturing module, Shepard needs line of sight on the target, and the attack will instantly land without a projectile traveling the distance. If Shepard uses one of these abilities, the projectile will actually be fired, takes time to reach the target, and can be stopped by obstacles in the way.
 * According to the codex, biotic talents are divided into three categories, not a list of individual abilities with specific names. The three categories are telekinesis, kinetic fields, and spatial distortion; a biotic will usually have a natural talent for one field, but the classes mix and match. Sentinels have Warp (distortion) and Throw (telekinesis), while Vanguards have telekinetic abilities but don't have Throw.
 * Biotics are capable of telekinetically lifting targets into the air to become an easy target, or overloading their neural system and permanently damaging their aiming, or freezing an enemy in place. Enemy biotics will never do this because then the player would die (as anyone who played Mass Effect 1 remembers), even though the above describes about half of the biotic abilities in the game. The only exception to this is Charge, used by a boss in Lair of the Shadow Broker.
 * Minor example in one of the Firewalker missions: why do we have a time limit on this mission? The planet is cold enough to freeze the hammerhead's engine. Why is there a limit on how long we can fly in the hammerhead? The engine will overheat if we push it too long...
 * And re-embarking onto the Normandy from the surface also somehow enables extra cooling systems in the jump jets so the Hammerhead can fly up into the hangar bay.
 * When you're on Haestrom it's said your shields will fry. The only one immune to this is Grunt who uses armor. However Jack, Samara, and adept and vanguard Shepard use barriers instead of shields. They can still get fried by the radiation despite not being generated by electronics and instead by the actual being.
 * Cerberus forks countless billions into Shepard's mission; first by reviving him with Project Lazarus, second by rebuilding the Normandy at twice its size (keep in mind the regular Normandy used to cost as much as 12,000 fighter spacecraft)... but still they won't fork over more than 200,000 credits as your change for the start.
 * Gangsta Style: One of Aria's bodyguards holds his gun this way.
 * Gang Up on the Human: You can be hiding on the opposite side of the room from all of your enemies, doing nothing but regenerating shields, with Jack tossing troopers left and right and Grunt quite literally in their faces, either smashing them in with his fists or blowing them off with his shotgun, and enemies will still ignore them both to try and kill you. Invoked by Harbinger, who orders his troops to 
 * Gargle Blaster: Shepard downs a glass of "uncut batarian ale" and "ryncol", the krogan drink of choice. Ryncol does awful things to anyone that isn't krogan, except for Shepard. Then again, Shepard isn't quite human anymore.

"EDI: Cerberus regulations are clear, Mr. Moreau: Personalization does not include grease on my bridge cameras. Joker: It's just mad that all of its footage looks like a dream sequence."
 * Gaussian Guy: Joker mentions this trope in one of the dialogue sequences about how he and EDI are getting along.

"Niftu Cal: I am a great biotic wind who will sweep all before me like a... a great biotic wind!"
 * Gay Option: Yeoman Kelly Chambers, although it's not as developed as the other romance options. It doesn't unlock the Paramour achievement, there's no romance scene, and apparently pursuing it doesn't count as cheating on any significant other from the first game (whose picture never gets turned face-down, at any rate). And there's another asari, but sleeping with her is a very bad idea.
 * Genius Programming: Mass Effect 2 runs much more smoothly on the same PC configuration compared to the previous game despite having better graphics.
 * Get Back Here Boss: in Lair of the Shadow Broker. And it is awesome, in a masochistic sort of way. The Vanguard's Charge really is horribly unfair when it's you who is on the receiving end. What's more unfair is that her version of Charge doesn't need a target (and she can even use Shockwave so that she and the waves are headed towards you at the same time!), while you're stuck looking around, locking onto a target, and clearing a path before you can even consider Charging an opponent. Though it is also quite awesome to pursue  with your own Charge ability as a Vanguard. Especially once the shields and armors are down.
 * Giant Space Flea From Nowhere: (in Liara's downloadable expansion) . Not a bad introduction for a new species, but since, this can come off as a tad jarring..
 * Giving Someone the Pointer Finger: If is Shepard's second squadmate during Tali's loyalty mission, a few additional seconds of cutscene-footage are added where Admiral Korris does this to  at the very beginning of the trial.
 * Glass Cannon:
 * The Hammerhead is nearly a One-Hit-Point Wonder. Good Lord, it wouldn't be quite so frustrating if they'd just let you save at any point during the geth-infested Firewalker missions.
 * This also you when comparing Mass Effect 2 to Mass Effect 1. Removing virtually all defensive abilities but making putting up an offensive that much easier does that.
 * A God Am I: Spoofed with a drugged volus who is convinced that he is a biotic god.

"Mordin: (dying) Tell them... I held the line..."
 * Go for the Eye:
 * This is also what Tali tells her pet combat drone to do (go for the optics)! This is part of a complex series of Shout-Out to Baldur's Gate 2: Tali's drone (Chiktikka Vas Paus) is named after Chiktikka Fastpaws, the raccoon familiar of the Gnomish god Aerie of Baldur's Gate worships (and whom she often mentions when given orders). From the same game, Minsc has a hamster named Boo, and one of his war cry is screaming to Boo to "Go For the Eyes".
 * Golden Ending: and having your whole squad survive the Suicide Mission. To get it, you must walk the...
 * Golden Path:
 * Gone Horribly Right/Gone Horribly Wrong: As a rule of thumb, Cerberus experiments never end well.
 * Good Cop, Bad Cop: When you and Thane are about to interrogate Elias Kelham in Thane's loyalty mission, you get the option of telling Thane which of these he should be (or just playing it by ear). Presumably, Shepard will then be the other, but you can jump off the rails, naturally, and have them both be "bad cop" or "good cop".
 * Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: The Illusive Man smokes at least four a day. A batarian merc repairing a gunship lights up when spoken to. The smoke bothers Shepard, who can electrocute him and make the boss fight easier.
 * Gray and Grey Morality: The decision to either at the end of  loyalty mission.
 * Guest Star Party Member: Liara during Lair of the Shadow Broker. She's treated as a full fledged party member (she replaces one of your companions, and has her own skill set along with Stasis as her loyalty power (which Shepard can learn as a bonus skill)), but ONLY during the DLC. Wilson in the intro level qualify as well. Interestingly, they're both Engineers.
 * Guide Dang It: Averted in one major case. If you decide to follow the Prima game guide to the letter, you're in for a rude shock during the suicide mission. That's because the guide recommends that, after, you spend as much time as you need to finish up missions, recruit members, and mine resources. What the book doesn't tell you is.
 * Gunship Rescue: Archangel's recruitment mission, Samara's recruitment mission, and Kasumi's loyalty mission put you on the side of this trope usually reserved for bad guys.
 * Guns in Church: Justified, somewhat; you are a Spectre/former Spectre, and numerous events prove that you are not safe from attack anywhere you go, so it makes sense for your party to walk around fully armed and armoured at all times. Unlike the first game, however, you cannot draw your guns outside of combat.
 * Hand Cannon:
 * The M-6 Carnifex Hand Cannon. Its damage is miles above your other pistol option, but it has much more kick and a smaller clip.
 * There is also the downloadbale M-5 Phalanx, a high-power game pistol. According to the description, it was designed to have as much stopping power as a standard rifle. It's even more useful with a higher clip, damage and accuracy rating.
 * Happiness in Slavery: "Indentured servitude" on Illium, though the servants are usually treated right and the one slave broker you run into genuinely cares about the Quarian she's dealing with. One of the side quests deals with this, and a morally "right" decision isn't clear.
 * Hard Mode Perks: The Geth Pulse Rifle, which you can only get by completing Tali's recruitment mission on Hardcore or Insanity. It pierces shields easier.
 * Heel Face Brainwashing: loyalty mission, where you have to decide on.
 * Heel Face Turn: For certain values of Heel and Face. Paragon Shepard inspires Miranda to quit Cerberus and join him/her in blowing up the Collector Base.
 * Henchmen Race:.
 * Hero-Killer: The Collectors take this quite literally. There's a reason the final battle against them is a Suicide Mission.
 * The Hero Dies: For most series, this would be a shocking twist. Mass Effect? This was literally the first detail revealed about the second game. The fact that the same thing could happen if you royally screwed up the final mission was also made clear, both in-game and in much of the promotional material.
 * Heroes Unlimited: The entire point.
 * Heroic Fire Rescue: In Zaeed's loyalty mission, Shepard has to choose between running into a burning refinery in order to turn on the fire suppression systems and rescue the workers, or pursue the man Zaeed has wanted revenge on for twenty years and ignore the workers.
 * Hidden Depths: The dossiers in Lair of the Shadow Broker have a variety of insights into your crew (and a few NPCs).
 * Hide Your Lesbians:
 * Unfortunately, despite an already-present sort-of Gay Option in the first game, and an initial promise from BioWare of additional options in the sequel, Mass Effect 2 manages to obscure the possibility of homosexuality quite completely. Even though your relationship with Liara from the first game carries over (provided you romanced her), the closest the sequel comes to actually having a Gay Option is some light flirting with yeoman Kelly Chambers.
 * Provided, things can go a little further: after the endgame, you can choose to continue roaming the galaxy. If you've been chatting Kelly up throughout the game, you're able to invite her up to your quarters for a lap dance and a bit of a cuddle.
 * There is actually a second, more fleshed-out Gay Option (sort of). On Samara's loyalty mission, you can choose to kill Samara and have her daughter Morinth take her place. The fact that you return from a mission with the woman you were supposed to kill is hand-waved by explaining that Morinth can perfectly mimic Samara's speech patterns, actions, and powers. Morinth will then show an interest in mating with Shepard, but only after the suicide mission. Assuming both characters survive said mission, the player is given the option to take Morinth up on her offer. Doing so will have three unfortunate side effects, however: first, you'll have to see her creepy sex face, second, you will die from ecstasy overload, and third, you still won't get the Paramour achievement.
 * High Altitude Interrogation: During Thane's recruitment mission, Shepard happens upon a poor mook, standing too close to a window, in a skyscraper. Shepard asks about Thane, threatening to throw the guy out the window. Subverted in that the mook doesn't have vital information necessary for you to continue the mission, and a Renegade Shepard knows it.
 * Highly-Visible Ninja: For a shadowy organization that is wanted by the Alliance and the Citadel, Cerberus sure likes to decorate their ships, facilities and uniforms with their logo.
 * Hiroshima as a Unit of Measure: Used to drive home just how powerful dreadnoughts' main weapons are.
 * Hoist By Their Own Petard:
 * Shows up in loyalty mission:.
 * Also apparently a favorite of during his time as Archangel on Omega according to.
 * Shepard can dish this out with the "Collector Assault Rifle", a captured Reaper-derived weapon, which is very effective at killing Collectors. The irony of using the Reaper's own weapons against them is particularly poignant if in the final battle you use this weapon to take down.
 * Hold the Line:
 * Used during the Suicide Mission. Shepard takes the usual two squadmembers to the final boss, and the rest of the party stays behind to keep the Collectors from following.
 * Shepard can dish this out with the "Collector Assault Rifle", a captured Reaper-derived weapon, which is very effective at killing Collectors. The irony of using the Reaper's own weapons against them is particularly poignant if in the final battle you use this weapon to take down.
 * Hold the Line:
 * Used during the Suicide Mission. Shepard takes the usual two squadmembers to the final boss, and the rest of the party stays behind to keep the Collectors from following.

"Mordin: Biotic abilities, intelligence levels. Can look at random asari, krogan, make reasonable guess. Humans too variable to judge."
 * Also in the Arrival Downloadable Content Pack, . Slightly subverted in that.
 * Holographic Terminal: All over the place, literally.
 * Homage: The mission aboard the derelict Reaper is a big one to H.P. Lovecraft, complete with references to strange geometries and dreaming dead gods.
 * The Geth space station you board during Legion's loyalty mission is just like the interior of a Borg Cube.
 * Hopeless Boss Fight: In the Arrival DLC..
 * Hospitality for Heroes: Invoked. Shepherd can convince a bar-tender to throw a round of drinks on the house to get another character's attention.
 * Hotter and Sexier: Goes hand-in-hand with the Darker and Edgier nature of the game. While the sex itself is fairly tame, Shepard can get into the pants of more than half of his/her crew, sex is mentioned much more often, the turian and quarian couple talking about sexual matters, Fornax, the ardat-yakshi, etc.
 * Hover Tank: The M-44 Hammerhead.
 * Huge Holographic Head: Donovan Hock is apparently fond of this mode of communication, and acts appropriately.
 * Humans Are Special: Subverted. The Reapers have taken a special interest in humans thanks to Shepard, whose actions made them... interested in human DNA, in much the same way.
 * Played straight in several conversations with Mordin, who explains that one of the things that sets humans apart from other sentient races in the galaxy is their large genetic diversity.

"Samara: You are more individualistic than any species I have encountered. If three humans are in a room, there will be six opinions."
 * Samara also feels humans are especially diverse.

"And now Garrus is doing a lot more than calibrating the Normandy’s guns!"
 * Humongous Mecha: The largest geth units you fight can reach up to fifteen feet tall, and the YMIR mechs are just as huge..
 * Idiosyncratic Wipes: The Lazarus Project cutscene.
 * Idiot Ball:
 * The Purgatory Warden who... betrays Shepard (strike 1), by ordering him/her into a cell without any backup present (strike 2), after allowing him/her to keep his/her guns (strike 3, yer outta there).
 * If you get Morinth, whatever you do, don't have sex with her. Shep and Morinth even discuss how she kills anyone who has sex with her. She says Shep is probably "different". His/her option to turn her down is "No thanks, I'd rather live." Presumably, Bioware assumed most players would try it out of curiosity (or as penance for having recruited her in the first place).
 * If My Calculations Are Correct: the superstructure....
 * If You Know What I Mean: During Lair of the Shadow Broker, if you romance Liara in the first game, but romanced Garrus in the sequel and then confront her about your relationship she delivers this line:

"Game Salesman: Those asari-hanar porn games they sell in Shin Akiba are really nasty."
 * Ill Girl: A quarian in the Illium bar expresses irritation with how everyone she dates thinks "Oooh, a quarian, she's vulnerable, she could get sick!".
 * The Immodest Orgasm: Heard at one point when Joker neglects to redirect his entertainment to his earpiece.
 * Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Not upgrading the Normandy's weapons systems results in during the trip through the Omega-4 relay. Not long before, the Nonstandard Game Over during  involves.
 * Incendiary Exponent:
 * Not quite, but in one scene (on Omega, if you choose to represent Patriarch and confront his enemies), Shepard seemingly ducks under a stream of fire from a flamethrower to roundhouse kick an armoured krogan in the face.
 * Pyro mercs. Light you up and lay on the hurt... unless you use Overload or Incinerate on them, or shoot the tank on their back. Pops like a fiery pimple in that case.
 * Through Zaeed's DLC, you can exact your revenge using the Firestorm heavy weapon.
 * Infallible Babble: Just to see if players were paying attention during Samara's recruitment mission, Bioware snuck a crucial clue about an encounter later in the same level..
 * Infant Immortality: Averted hard. Not explicit but a good bit of Fridge Horror. In a letter that is sent to you by one of the survivors of the Horizon attack, it is mentioned children were abducted as well as adults. Given what happened to the other colonists they are either dead . The latter is terrifying when it happens to adults but the thought of it happening to children is a whole 'nother level of depravity.
 * Infinity+1 Sword: The Widow Sniper Rifle (Soldier, Infiltrator), the Claymore shotgun (Soldier, Vanguard) and the Revenant Light Machine Gun (Soldier), which can be picked up halfway through the game. The other classes (Adept, Sentinel, Engineer) get to choose between Assault Rifle, Shotgun, or Sniper Rifle training. No uber weapons though.
 * Insistent Terminology: They're not slaves, they're indentured servants!
 * Instant Plastic Surgery: This is the in-universe excuse for Shepard's appearance if you change it between the first game and this one; s/he died in the interim and had to be completely rebuilt.
 * Instant Win Condition: Some battles simply require you to kill one enemy. None of the others matter, and since you don't get exp for killing things this time around, there's no reason to.
 * Insult Friendly Fire: Shepard pep-talking a krogan that he should not be a "whiny quarian with a tummy ache" when our favorite quarian Tali is standing right behind him.
 * Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence: On Haestrom, surmounting a fallen pillar a little taller than Shepard him/herself requires gathering and applying demolition charges from behind an enemy swarm. Apparently giving a leg up is lost technology by the 22nd century. Shows up in other places, too.
 * Interface Screw:
 * Enemy flashbang grenades cause a temporary afterimage to overlap the screen. Also, getting drunk causes the screen to go blurry and wobble randomly.
 * When a rocket or other concussive blast goes off near Shepherd, the sound becomes muted for several seconds while your ears recover.
 * When you're near death, a bunch of red blood and vein-like art is displayed all over the screen, making it very hard to see things like crates and other waist-high objects you can duck behind to get out of the gunfire. Oh, and your sound gets muffled to nearly the point you can't hear anything but heartbeat.
 * During Grunt's loyalty mission (his Rite of Passage), every time the Thresher Maw bursts from the ground, the entire screen vibrates, with some of the HUD elements even moving out of frame.
 * Near the end of the Overlord DLC, the rogue VI will do this a few times with the doors. One instance has you interacting with a green-marked door only to have the other red-marked door open instead; another appears to require a security bypass but will immediately open once you approach. The last of these gags has the green "Open" icon on the door actually move to another door.
 * Interface Spoiler:
 * is addressed by the names in the subtitles upon your first meeting, then reverts to the next time you speak.
 * More specifically, you can find an upgrade for " shields" before you ever meet or recruit . It tries to be coy by saying it upgrades "party members who use shield technology", but it's hardly fooling anyone.
 * Also, one of the DLC packs available on the Cerberus Network explicitly notes that it is an alternate costume for.
 * There's also one at the beginning. The identity of your rescuers is initially unknown and Jacob makes a big point of telling you that it's Cerberus. Except that each of the five or so computers that you can interact with prior to that point is named something like 'Cerberus Laptop'.
 * A minor but noticeable one: near the beginning of the mission on board, you find a log from the chief researcher, talking about how the crew is nervous and that he shares their sentiments. As the log finishes,.
 * As any player will quickly learn, if you can see a planet's moon on the Galaxy Map, odds are very good that there will be a mission on it.
 * Internet Backdraft: In-universe. The geth invoked one by starting a fictional meme to study organic reactions.
 * Interrupting Meme: Mass Effect fans seem to have trouble posting anything without attracting Harbinger's "ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL" line.
 * Interspecies Romance: Both for the player and amongst background characters, and in a little more widespread of a fashion than in Mass Effect 1.
 * On Illium, an asari planet, you naturally run across a number of asari/other race couples and the results of such pairings. This includes a salarian talking with his lover's daughter (by a past salarian lover), an asari who is afraid of commitment from her poetry-spouting krogan boyfriend because she's worried if he may just be after children, and a pair of talking asari where one wonders if her associate's ruthlessness may be due to her batarian father (the batarian-asari gets offended at this and angrily proclaims her father was an excellent caretaker).
 * The salarian Mordin mentions he's been hit on by several other species: as well as the expected asari, turians regard his skin tone as attractive, and a specific type of krogan "sexual deviant" finds the flexibility of salarians (due to the abundance of cartilage in their skeletons) exciting.
 * The xenophilic pornography magazine "Fornax" was able to upgrade to five-sensory input due to sheer weight of buyers within a year of being produced: as well as asari, the basic issue routinely features both genders of quarians, batarians, drell and... volus. Yes, as in the enviro-suited pig/dwarf aliens. Smaller "niche" branches of Fornax include Genit-Elcor and Krogasm.
 * The game vendor on Citadel mentions the existence of pornographic games.

"Bailey: Spending a year dead is a popular tax dodge."
 * Of the three Paramours for female Shepard, two are aliens: the drell Thane and the turian Garrus. Male Shepard though only gets one xeno-romance: the quarian Tali'Zorah.
 * On Tuchanka, if you during Grunt's Loyalty quest, on your way out EDI will remark that there are several breeding requests for Grunt and one for Shepard.
 * Grunt, of course, thinks this is hilarious.
 * Intimidating Revenue Service: One of the things Shepard has to do upon returning to the Citadel is go through the intergalactic IRS. S/he opts instead to fudge the system because even Spectres can't make the IRS any less painful.

"Harbinger: Shepard, you have become an annoyance."
 * Intrigued by Humanity: The Reapers are now very interested in Humanity, due to Shepard defeating Sovereign.
 * Inventor of the Mundane: If you ask EDI where Cerberus gets funding from, Joker says that the Illusive Man invented the paper clip. EDI helpfully clarifies, "That is a joke".
 * Invisibility Cloak: Developed by the geth and stolen by Cerberus. The Infiltrator class and Kasumi can use the cloak, one because they're working with Cerberus, the other because she's a master thief.
 * Ironic Name (with a twist of Genius Bonus): Cerberus. In Greek mythology, Kerberos was the guardian hound of Hades. His job was to keep the dead in their place.
 * It Got Worse: The ending shows.
 * It Has Been an Honor: A minor instance. Appears in a note left by the security chief of the Hahne-Kedar production facility in a sidequest.
 * It's a Small World After All: Just about everyone you met in the first game shows up in the second. In a galaxy of a trillion sentients, particularly jarring.
 * It's Personal: As a result of Shepard killing Sovereign in the first game, the Reapers are not only aware of who Shepard is, but now explicity state that they are going after Shepard directly.
 * The Reaper's facade of claiming indifference towards Shepard's actions begins to slip in Arrival.

"Shepard: I prefer obscure music. Morinth: How obscure? Shepard: If you've heard of it, it's already too mainstream for me."
 * It's Popular, Now It Sucks: During the pickup talk with Morinth:

"Shepard: Just once I'd like to ask someone for help and hear them say "Sure. Let's go. Right now. No strings attached.""
 * Jack of All Stats: Sentinels. Moderately good at tech, biotics and combat (thanks to Tech Armor), but not exceptional at any of them. Sentinels also have no real weaknesses, and can be powerhouses if played well.
 * Jerkass: Many characters more than qualify as this.
 * Jerkass Has a Point: Allowing Cerberus to claim the is the Renegade ending, and most of the Normandy crew will criticize Shepard's decision if he/she does so. This has caused a bit of a division in the fan base. Many sympathize with the Illusive Man, who although personally untrustworthy, was correct in stating that no additional lives would be lost by sparing the base, and that the hyper-advanced Collector technology could be used to fight the Reapers.
 * Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: In Jacob's loyalty mission, forced his shipwrecked crew to eat the local plant-life, which contained substances that caused mental degradation, and reserved the "clean" food from the ship for the officers. He rationalizes this to the crew that they are the ones who have the technical skill to repair the distress beacon. It takes them a year to fix, so if they hadn't made that choice, all of them would have been reduced to the mental level of children when the food ran out... but then all of the other officers have "accidents" in the space of a week, and he sat on the beacon for nine years, enjoying the company of his female crewmembers until the "clean" food did run out.
 * Just Friends: On Illium, you bump into a quarian and a turian talking after work. The quarian is complaining about her boyfriend while the turian is clearly smitten and trying to drop hints that he's the right guy for her. Sadly, she doesn't seem to be aware of any of his increasingly desperate hints. He is popularly referred to as "Friend-Zone Turian" on the internet.
 * Kangaroo Court: The Admiralty Board of the Migrant Fleet, at least in the case of Tali's trial. Nonetheless, Shepard can get her off the hook in multiple ways.
 * Kill All Humans: The Reapers' goal, along with the other sentient races. Humanity, however, is top of their list owing to Shepard's actions and.
 * Killed Mid-Sentence: The point of most Renegade interrupts, often with a Bond One-Liner attached.
 * Kill'Em All: The worst possible ending. Only survive.
 * Kill Him Already: Shepard and various party members can skip the angst and just get on with at several points. Or they can play the angst straight too.
 * Kill It with Fire:
 * Incendiary ammo is useful for taking down armor and enemies that regenerate health, mainly krogan. Incendiary grenades and the Incinerate power are also available.
 * Zaeed's DLC adds the M451 Firestorm, a nasty flamethrower. A situational weapon for most characters, unless you're a Vanguard: in that case, it can be the perfect complement for the Vanguard's peculiar way to deal with hostiles.
 * This is also how Zaeed ends his loyalty mission, by ejecting a thermal clip on a puddle of gasoline, setting his target on fire.
 * Kill It with Ice: Similarly, Cryo Ammo, Cryo Blast and the M622 Avalanche heavy weapon are good for getting enemies to hold still for a few second while you finish pumping rounds into them.
 * Klingon Promotion:
 * Also, on Tuchanka, the Krogan scientist Fortack recieved his title by killing his predecessor.
 * Knight Templar:
 * The asari Justicars to a degree, although they can work within their code for a less extreme solution. As a bonus, if you talk to Samara and ask about the justicars, she equates them with human knights errant or Samurai.
 * There's also the Illusive Man.
 * Knuckle-Cracking: Invoked by Shepard to extract information from a volus on Illium. To the surprise of no one, he quickly gives up the info once Shepard made it clear how much s/he wanted it. The same thing happens to a elcor on Omega.
 * Lampshade Hanging:
 * Despite being a starship flying through space, the Normandy is seen maneuvering as if it were an atmospheric fighter jet. This is lampshaded when Joker says, "It takes skill to bank like that in a vacuum... don't think that it doesn't!".
 * In one of the DLCs, you visit the final resting place of . Among the wreckage, you find... the Mako rover, pretty much intact... and stuck in the level geometry, of course.
 * When you first meet Mordin, he wants you to help him distribute the plague cure before he joins you. One of Shepard's responses is to lament how nobody ever just tells him they'll join right away.
 * In one of the DLCs, you visit the final resting place of . Among the wreckage, you find... the Mako rover, pretty much intact... and stuck in the level geometry, of course.
 * When you first meet Mordin, he wants you to help him distribute the plague cure before he joins you. One of Shepard's responses is to lament how nobody ever just tells him they'll join right away.

"Saronis salesman: You'd be amazed at how many people think light travels faster through expensive fiber optics than through cheap ones."
 * Ironically, if you have the DLC for Zaeed, you meet him right outside the airlock after landing on Omega, and he pretty much says just that.
 * The salarian salesman for Saronis Applcations hangs a lampshade over Monster Cable and other similar overpriced wiring products.

"Shepard: Remember the old days, when you could just slap Omni-gel on everything? Liara: That security upgrade made a lot of people unhappy."
 * In the Shadow Broker Mission:

"Mordin: Different species react differently to stress. Aware you have come by a great deal. Have had other species become attracted to me before. Awkward. Not interested. Commander Shepard: You've had members of another species make a pass at you? Mordin: Constantly. Very awkward. Skin tone apparently attractive by turian standards. Subset of krogan deviants enjoys salarian flexibility. More cartilage than skeletal structure. Asari offers... intriguing, actually. Wonder why. Trans-species pheromones unlikely to work. * inhales* Must be neurochemical."
 * In the same mission, during car chase if you are doing badly (colliding with other vehicles) she will remark, that it still beats riding in Mako.
 * The Rodam Expeditions store on the Citadel has a subtle one on a pattern in the game: there is a human and a turian there discussing whether assault rifles or shotguns are superior, the human prefering an assault rifle while the turian believes he should get a shotgun, and they express interest in joining the Blue Suns. The basic Blue Suns Trooper enemy are assault-rifle toting humans and shotgun-wielding turians.
 * The Lancer: In.
 * Landfill Beyond the Stars: A justified case, since space travel really is pretty cheap, and the planet (Korlus) is only for spaceships that broke down in the vicinity of a mass relay in the first place.
 * Large Ham Title: Fortack THE LORD HIGH RESEARCHER!
 * Leaning on the Fourth Wall: An invocation of this trope occurs during one of Shepard's initial conversations with Miranda on the Normandy. Their talk seems simple enough at first, but then Shepard remarks on how Miranda was "designed to beperfect". Sure enough, the commander is leaning on the nearby bulkhead during this scene.
 * If Shepard is not involved romantically, Mordin gives the following response to constant asking about him. Quite aware of how romance subplot begins:

"Shepard: (dully) Charge."
 * Leave Behind a Pistol: The Renegade conclusion to Jacob's loyalty mission.
 * Leave the Two Lovebirds Alone: At the end of the Lair of the Shadow Broker DLC, Feron will volunteer to check the base's systems and excuse himself, along with your other party member (despite the fact that he only just got out of the torture chair).
 * Leeroy Jenkins:
 * squad during the Freedom's Progress mission..
 * There's also the young merc wannabe on Omega who tries to join the group taking on Archangel... he even looks and sounds quite similar to Jenkins. Unless Shepard prevents him from signing up, he vaults over the wall and instantly gets one between the eyes.
 * The high-on-powder Niftu Cal, the Biotic God, will charge a bunch of well-armed mercs provided you don't take him out gently:

"Tali: That damn data had better be worth it."
 * Leitmotif: "The Normandy Reborn", which shows up whenever the Normandy does something incredibly awesome.
 * Lethally Expensive: Shepard recruits Tali after rescuing her from an important surveying mission gone south. Tali's entire squad (aside from herself and possibly one other soldier) is lost getting the data, which concerns a star destabilizing much faster than it ought to be.

"EDI: Really, Commander? Beat Probing Uranus..."
 * Let's Split Up, Gang: Part of the final mission. Whether the "goes horribly wrong" part gets played straight is entirely up to you.
 * Light and Mirrors Puzzle: Present at one point.
 * Lightning Gun: The Arc Projector heavy weapon. Like most other things, much work was put into making such a gun actually work and not just Handwaved.
 * Like an Old Married Couple: Joker and EDI. Also, surprisingly enough, Shepard and Liara argue a lot like this in Lair of the Shadow Broker.
 * Limited Sound Effects:
 * If you've offered celebrity endorsements to every shop on the Citadel: "I'm Commander Shepard, and this is my favorite store on the Citadel!"
 * "LAUNCHING PROBE!"/"PROBE LAUNCHED!" during resource mini game. So worth it when you get to the solar system and try to probe Uranus.

"Al-Jilani: Great, bullrushed on my own show!"
 * If you do something to enemies (such as set them on fire), they will let out a scream that goes on for about thirty seconds before they shut up. If you let them live that long.
 * Assuming control. Shepard, if I must tear you apart, I will. This hurts you. During combat, Boss in Mook Clothing Big Bad Harbinger is painfully able to spray comments about you and your teammates at about the same rate as his weapon.
 * Ironically, harbinger's actually got almost 9 full minutes of one-liners recorded for combat dialogue, but the majority of his phrases are only heard very rarely, while the more generic "NEUTRALIZE COMMANDER SHEPARD" types are repeated ad nauseum.
 * The screams of the VI during the Overlord DLC seems designed to make you jump out of your seat and tear off your headphones. During the trek through the inert geth ship, the designers go out of their way to blurt out the noise at just the right time to scare the crap out of the player... they even lampshade it with a crew log about Halloween.
 * And this time, instead of the enemies using the same lines over and over and over and over, it's your teammates. But they are right though: gravity is one mean mother.
 * Also, teammates love wandering into your Line of Fire and then complaining about it.
 * Limited Wardrobe: Each of your companions only has one outfit and possible colour variation after their loyalty mission. In situations that warrant it, they get some sort of minimalistic breathing apparatus, but no other protection. It can be slightly goofy to see Jack going into near-vacuum almost topless. However, there now exists DLC that add a few new outfits for them.
 * Literally Shattered Lives: The fate of anything killed while under the effect of cold-based weaponry.
 * Literary Allusion Title: Some of the mission titles, mostly from Luke:
 * Miranda's loyalty mission: The Prodigal (Luke 15:11-32).
 * Legion's loyalty mission: A House Divided (Luke 11:17).
 * Legion's name: "My name is Legion, for we are many." (Mark 5:9, also appears in Luke).
 * Load-Bearing Boss: Subverted. Most bosses of this kind in both games are usually fought after things have started blowing up, usually as the result of a button you just pushed. So the explosion of the building you're in immediately after the fight has nothing to do with the krogan you just killed..
 * Loads and Loads of Characters: Assuming you have the "free" (with new purchase of the game) DLC, there are 11 possible party members and one Palette Swap . And that's not even counting Kasumi Goto, the (temporary) reappearance of Mass Effect 1 squad members, guest party members such as the quarian marine from Tali's recruitment mission, or the numerous recurring NPCs, both good and bad.
 * Loads and Loads of Loading: Due to the massive player complaints about the first game, the second one no longer tries to disguise its loading behind implausibly slow elevators, but uses obvious loading screens with stylized animations of the transition taking place (airlock, shuttle ride, etc). This would be fine, except the game will wait until the video is finished to start play, regardless of actual loading, and loads tend to be quicker than the video on a PC (Replacing the video with a short one is possible to avoid this).
 * Lock and Load Montage: During Kasumi's loyalty mission, as you prepare to enter the vault.
 * Looks Like Orlok: The vorcha. Seriously, there is nothing good to say about that race.
 * Losing the Team Spirit: The sequel makes it painfully clear that without Shepard, the crew of the Normandy cannot function and will break apart. The Council actively trying to discredit him/her probably didn't help, though.
 * Even those who weren't on the Normandy went through this. Conversations with Jacob, Ken and Gabby reveal they all left the Alliance and joined Cerberus due to The Council discrediting Shepard. In Ken's case, he mentions if he hadn't have left, he'd probably have been court-martialed for gross insubordination because he was very vocal in his support for Shepard.
 * Lost Forever: Played straight with any of the upgrades you find during recruitment and loyalty missions. Didn't pick up that shiny new sniper rifle? Sucks to be you. Didn't get that damage upgrade? No dice.
 * Also used with some promotional items. Three helmet pieces were available with codes on Dr. Pepper bottles, but there were universal codes that people could use to get them instead. As of June 2010 though, these codes no longer work, so some people are unable to get these pieces. The fact that one piece of promotional armor is available as DLC and a promotional weapon also will be means that, hopefully, these items will be able to be purchased later.
 * Garrus, in an odd sense. If you never recruited him in the first game, you can't romance him.
 * Speaking of romance, every new romance option in this game is only available in this game. It will carry over to Mass Effect 3 if you start it here, but if you didn't, you can't start a new one with them later.
 * Low Culture, High Tech: The krogan uplift.
 * Ludicrous Gibs: Try shooting a flamethrower-toting enemy's fuel tank. Or Overloading it.
 * Also try to finish off Ymir mechs with a headshot. KABOOM.
 * Lured into a Trap: Picking up Subject Zero from Purgatory turns into a trap laid by Warden Kuril to imprison Shepard and sell him/her to the highest bidder.
 * Made of Explodium: If you finish off an YMIR mech with a headshot, it overloads and explodes like a shot from the Cain heavy weapon. It will take out anything not behind cover, including other YMIR.
 * Made of Plasticine: Husks. Anything strong enough to knock them off their feet will make them explode. Including rifle butts.
 * Magic From Technology: The ingame lore has a perfectly logical explanation as to why biotics fight like sorcerers, train like sorcerers, look like sorcerers but are really just mortals infected with element zero which reacts to neural electrical pulses by creating antigravity fields.
 * Male Gaze: Featured prominently in just about every conversation with Miranda. One particularly memorable instance of this is when she asks for your help regarding her sister. When she's done talking, and you're about to choose what to say next, the camera is focused primarily on Miranda's rear in the foreground. It's almost as though the game is encouraging you to take your time in furthering the dialogue.
 * There's also the pre-mission conversation with Kasumi in "Stolen Memory". If you play as Fem!Shep, there's a point where her breasts are prominently in the foreground.
 * The game seems to cater to Female Gaze as well, as the camera seems to have no qualms with focusing on anyone's ass in those skin tight uniforms when dialogue is taking place. See also Jacob's romance scene (holy cow, those abs).
 * Man On Fire: Incendiary ammunition/tech ability that throws fire + enemies = Foregone Conclusion. There's also an achievement for causing this. A lot.
 * Match Maker Quest: You get to run one on Illium to smooth things over between an asari and her krogan ex-boyfriend. Worth taking just on account of his poetry. If you do this, then he might show up in Mass Effect 3..
 * Mauve Shirt: Arguably the crew of the second Normandy are mauve shirts, as several are named and carry out conversations among one another about their families, the mission, etc. Depending on the player, it might be further motivation to.
 * Meaningful Name:
 * Cerberus was formed as a result of a perceived need to have an independent group to protect humanity from aliens outside the Charon relay; in Greek Mythology, Cerberus is the guardian of the Underworld, and Charon is the ferryman for crossing into the Underworld. In addition, Cerberus (the dog) had three heads. Cerberus (the organization) has three divisions: political, scientific and military.
 * Illium is an asari-settled and -populated planet that is outside of asari territory and serves as a link and trading hub with the lawless and foreign Terminus Systems. Ilium is one of the names of Troy, a Greek-settled and -populated city that was founded outside the territory of Greece itself and served as a link and trading hub with the "lawless" and "barbarian" nations of Asia.
 * Mecha-Mooks: The LOKI and FENRIS mechs from the second game.
 * And then there are the YMIR...
 * A Million Is a Statistic:
 * Nicely averted. Khalisah al-Jilani tries to call Shepard on heartlessly sacrificing soldiers for inconsequential gain. Then Shepard recites the names of each of the human alliance ships destroyed and reminds her what exactly they died for.


 * However, if you don't save the Council, she still bitches at you for the nearly 10,000 souls you sacrificed.
 * Mordin also averts and acknowledges this trope when he calls his favorite nephew: as a scientist who lives by I Did What I Had to Do, he uses this to keep perspective before fighting the Collectors.
 * Mind Hive: The Geth are explained to be this; what we see and fight are merely mobile platforms for hundreds (more, in Legion's case) of uploaded runtimes. Individually, these programs are not very intelligent, but they gain sentience and understanding by working together.
 * If you choose the right dialogue options before the suicide mission, afterwards, Legion will reveal that the same is true for the Reapers' "we are each a nation" gig: each Reaper contains the uploaded intellects of uncountable organic lifeforms (likely the very lifeforms that the Reaper is built of). It's suggested that the Reapers select only certain individuals for their unique genetic stock, while the rest of the species is exterminated.
 * Mind Over Matter: Biotics are explicitly not mind powers, but this line is spoken by your squad members when they use biotics to fling an enemy across the room. Probably because "the element zero nodules in my nervous system" is just too clunky.
 * Mirror Chemistry: The Quarians and Turians are based on right-handed amino-acids, while most other races use left-handed like humans. This is mentioned almost every time you enter a restaurant or bar in a rather obvious example of Expospeak. You'd think that it wouldn't take long to remember this issue for someone actually living in a multi-racial community.
 * Misaimed Fandom: In-universe example. Councilor Anderson saw a vid called Saren: A Hero Betrayed... and apparently, he needed a lot of alcohol for that.
 * Misfit Mobilization Moment: This is pretty much an entire game based around an extended one of these.
 * Money for Nothing: Inverted: there are more things to buy than there are credits to buy them with. Played straight again in subsequent playthroughs or with Mass Effect 1 characters who had several million credits when imported into the second game. Also played straight with minerals: by the time you get enough Element Zero or platinum for all the upgrades, you will likely also have big piles of palladium and iridium, and nothing to do with them.
 * Mood Whiplash:
 * The part when is a Player Punch, but it also contains shout outs to The Matrix and Futurama, and one of the most hilarious jokes in the game, all in the space of four seconds.
 * There's also 's trial, which is all very dramatic and serious... until one of the admirals drops those atrocious penis puns.
 * Mook Horror Show: Korlus turns into this thanks to the Blue Suns' radio chatter. It quickly becomes apparent that Shepard's team of three is a bigger threat than all of Okeer's rejected krogan, their boss is no help whatsoever, and all they can really do is panic.
 * Moral Guardians: The Codex is written by the HSA/Citadel Council. The moment that you realize that Sovereign is recorded as being a geth ship, you realize that the Codex is purposely being rewritten in-universe, presumably to prevent "mass hysteria".
 * Morality Kitchen Sink: While the first game has this in spades (especially if you're a Renegade), the second game has this extensively, ranging the whole scale from the hero end ("pure" Paragon Shepard), to those in the middle (Garrus, especially during his worst moments), those close to the villain extreme (the Illusive Man), and all the way down to the people like Nassana Dantius and Morinth.
 * Mordor: The closest outer space can come to it: the Collectors live in the galactic core, which is full of exploding stars, black holes, and a minefield of hull skeletons of ships that entered it and never returned. Even more inhospitable than space normally is.
 * More Dakka:
 * The system in which Jack's mission takes place is called Dakka.
 * Also, the point of Garrus' ship upgrade.
 * Supposedly the whole point of the thermal clips and disposable heat sinks. Instead of waiting several seconds for your heat sink to cool down, you eject the heat sink and the clip automatically loads in a new one, allowing you to resume shooting almost immediately. Unfortunately, due to the decision to eliminate cooldown entirely this simply becomes a limited ammo system, effectively resulting in less dakka.
 * The M-76 Revanant LMG that Soldiers can pick up on the Collector ship has huge clips of very damaging shots, but low accuracy. It actually seems more like a support weapon than anything. This gun can take down a gunship without reloading, but is hard to use against individuals (although if they clump together it will wipe out a group in seconds). Then again, that's what Adrenaline Rush is for.
 * More Friends, More Benefits: If you romanced someone in the first game, and you don't want to cheat on your partner or make a completely new character just for this, you're not getting the romance achievement because your romance from the first game doesn't count for this. Admirably, at least the game doesn't directly encourage you to cheat.
 * Motor Mouth:
 * When Shepard first meets Mordin, Mordin tries... to... subvert... this... trope... no, no-no-no, can't do it. No time.
 * Tali if you romance her.
 * Mugging the Monster: Samara's loyalty mission features a turian named Meln in the VIP area of a nightclub who will crassly proposition FemShep if she intervenes to keep him from sexually harassing (and possibly assaulting) an asari dancer. Cue Meln being punched, then thrown in the general direction of the door. And if Shepard is wearing a certain DLC outfit, then this is done by a woman in high heels and a Little Black Dress.
 * Multiple Endings: Four different endings depending on the decisions you made in the Suicide Mission..
 * Mundane Utility: In one of the last Firewalker missions, Shepard discovers a gigantic Prothean sphere that can alter its size, emit energy, and transmit massive amounts of encoded data. S/he keeps it on his/her table as an ornament. It makes cool noises when you poke it.
 * My God, What Have I Done?: One of the admirals on the board during Tali's trial is a geth apologist, a minority philosophical movement that thinks the quarians should leave their old homeworld to the geth and find a new place to call their own. Why? Because objectively speaking, the entire conflict is the quarians' fault to begin with: when the geth looked to be on the verge of becoming intelligent enough to rebel, the quarians tried to destroy them before it could become an issue—only to discover that they were already smart enough, they just weren't interested in rebelling. The geth then said "Fuck this noise" and kicked the quarians out of the planet like you'd kick out a small but irritating hobo.
 * Mythology Gag: You can edit what Shepard wears while on board the Normandy. One of these outfits—black pants and a pale brown leather vest—is a direct callback to Canderous Ordo's default outfit in Knights of the Old Republic.
 * A statue of a Dragon Age Ogre can be seen in Kasumi's loyalty mission.
 * There's a colonist named Sten.
 * "Go for the optics, Chiktikka vas'Paus". And the space hamster you can buy.

The rest of this list can be found at:
 * Tropes A-F
 * Tropes N-S
 * Tropes T-Z