3590 réponses à ce sujet

[TurianSpectre]

Gah! Don't remind me. How was the first Reaper harvested and created when there were no Reapers and when the Leviathans are so powerful that they have no trouble mind-controlling organic races and taking down Reapers millions of years after their downfall? That just makes my head hurt.

I find that the whole catalyst scene was just stupid and rushed considering that you were actually meant to fight TIM as there was an image of him as a reaper in one of the collectors edition handbooks or something

[gothpunkboy89]

The setting of the Mass Effect franchise consistently fails to portray AIs as some black-and-white and hostile-by-default beings. There's pretty much nothing "supporting" the notion that synthetics are dangerous by default besides Tali's bullshit claim about how "they have no use for us. None!" What kind of reasoning is that? It's hilarious how the games painstakingly go out of their way to explain that every act of synthetic aggression we encounter has its cause, just like every act of organic aggression we encounter does. The fact that AIs are dangerous is merely stated a handful of times by not exactly reliable sources throughout the entire franchise at best while the games consistently portray them as beings with their own motivations that don't necessarily want anything to do with organics, much less fight them. That is pretty much only untrue for the geth that are led by the Reapers. The Reapers freaking use the geth to kill organics and we're supposed to believe they're trying to fix the problem?

 

Also, nobody has yet explained to me how advanced = automatically hostile.

 

 

Possibly because we haven't seen a fully advanced race of AI's just yet.  Geth in the game despite their advances are a low end model AI. Post Reaper upgrade they actually gain and become a high level AI. The game conveniently ends how ever before their growth develops. And with 2 out of 3 of the endings were the Geth survive either Synthesis has addressed the issue or AI Shep has an entire fleet of Reapers to prevent hostilities from breaking out by literally blowing to hell the first group to steps out of line.

 

Destroy ending is the only one were they are left on their own with no out side sourse to address the issue. And it is never stated that the next AI race created stood in circles singing kumbaya.

[Vanilka]

Possibly because we haven't seen a fully advanced race of AI's just yet.  Geth in the game despite their advances are a low end model AI. Post Reaper upgrade they actually gain and become a high level AI. The game conveniently ends how ever before their growth develops. And with 2 out of 3 of the endings were the Geth survive either Synthesis has addressed the issue or AI Shep has an entire fleet of Reapers to prevent hostilities from breaking out by literally blowing to hell the first group to steps out of line.

 

Yeah, but that's exactly it. In a video game, I'll believe what I'm shown and what I experience. Since I've never experienced synthetics in the games the way Catalyst describes them, it naturally makes me go, "Nope. That's not what happens." Not to even mention that the Catalyst is basically the leader of the enemy, which gives me even less of a reason to trust it. Its words are then no different from, say, Saren's. They sound like insane hogwash coming from somebody ready to throw the entire advanced civilisation under the bus, somebody I've been fighting against since the beginning of the franchise, or so the ending would like to have us believe. If all synthetics were portrayed like the geth on Eden Prime, back when we didn't know a Reaper was behind the attack, then I'd have a reason to believe the Catalyst. I'd still think its "solution" is bullshit, but it would help a bit.
 

Destroy ending is the only one were they are left on their own with no out side sourse to address the issue. And it is never stated that the next AI race created stood in circles singing kumbaya.

 
It is never said that it won't, either. The Destroy ending doesn't even try to imply that the galaxy might be exposed to any future synthetic threat. It doesn't express any sort of concern in that matter.

[Natureguy85]

There are many examples on Earth of more advanced civilisations being taken down by technically lesser ones. The fall of Rome to name just one.

In the Mass Effect universe the Protheans were turning the tide in the war against the technically more advanced Metacons.

What force did the Catalyst have to defeat the Leviathans? Remember that it didn't have the Reapers at the time. It used them to create the first in the form of Harbinger.

The most advanced doesn't always win.

 

Well, Rome fell because it was corrupt and rotted away from within as much as it was from outside enemies. And they made a LOT of enemies.

 

Anyway, you're still right though. I'll get into it more below.

 

 

Gah! Don't remind me. How was the first Reaper harvested and created when there were no Reapers and when the Leviathans are so powerful that they have no trouble mind-controlling organic races and taking down Reapers millions of years after their downfall? That just makes my head hurt.

 

I have no problem with this actually. The Leviathans relied on their mind control abilities. Their thralls did everything for them. The only indication of advanced technology are those spherical Artifacts. Other than being large, there's no indication that they are particularly powerful in a fight. The Catalyst built enough Synthetic Pawns to be referred to as "an army and the Leviathans had their guard down. The Catalyst attacked by surprise, much like the Reapers suddenly pop into the galaxy from the Citadel Relay. You're dead before you know what happened.

 

The only problem with this is that we do see the Leviathan dragging down the Reaper. Maybe it's affecting the organic goop inside. The Pawns were purely synthetic so maybe they couldn't be controlled by Leviathans.

[Vanilka]

I find that the whole catalyst scene was just stupid and rushed considering that you were actually meant to fight TIM as there was an image of him as a reaper in one of the collectors edition handbooks or something

 

Hush, we do not speak of boss fights here, lest we'll be accused of being uneducated barbarians with bad taste and immature at that. 

 

I agree with you, though. I wouldn't even need a boss fight if it were well executed otherwise, but I do hate the Catalyst scenes with passion and I've written a great deal as to why in this very thread. Let's say I've been much happier since I installed a mod that cuts the Catalyst out completely and skips right to Destroy. It's not perfect, but it spares me the headache. I used to have a coffee break during the Catalyst scenes before anyway since that thing just goes on and on.

 

I've also seen the concept art of TIM as a boss. I think there have been mixed reactions about it and I can't blame people. Myself? I'd have fun. I've hated TIM since the very beginning of ME2 (in the good way), so fighting some crazy Reaper form of him sounds like a lot of fun. Although I'd prefer him as something more like a banshee or other monster with abilities relying more on special powers rather than strength which the concept seemed to hint at.

[Vanilka]

I have no problem with this actually. The Leviathans relied on their mind control abilities. Their thralls did everything for them. The only indication of advanced technology are those spherical Artifacts. Other than being large, there's no indication that they are particularly powerful in a fight. The Catalyst built enough Synthetic Pawns to be referred to as "an army and the Leviathans had their guard down. The Catalyst attacked by surprise, much like the Reapers suddenly pop into the galaxy from the Citadel Relay. You're dead before you know what happened.

 

The only problem with this is that we do see the Leviathan dragging down the Reaper. Maybe it's affecting the organic goop inside. The Pawns were purely synthetic so maybe they couldn't be controlled by Leviathans.

 

That's a decent guess, I suppose. I still don't like the idea since we see the Leviathan take down a Reaper. I assumed the orbs could simply control the Reaper technology as well as minds. (EDIT: It does disable ships and other technology. Like the Kodiak and the other ships on Despoina.) OR it could be that it simply makes the Reaper's "mind(s)" go boom and that's it. The game never explains how it works, so we can only make guesses and assumptions. It's a great deal of maybe and perhaps around here. But since this doesn't actually affect the plot so much, unlike the revelation of the Catalyst and its solution, I'm more willing to let that slide.

[Shechinah]

Hush, we do not speak of boss fights here, lest we'll be accused of being uneducated barbarians with bad taste and immature at that. 
 
I agree with you, though. I wouldn't even need a boss fight if it were well executed otherwise, but I do hate the Catalyst scenes with passion and I've written a great deal as to why in this very thread. Let's say I've been much happier since I installed a mod that cuts the Catalyst out completely and skips right to Destroy. It's not perfect, but it spares me the headache. I used to have a coffee break during the Catalyst scenes before anyway since that thing just goes on and on.
 
I've also seen the concept art of TIM as a boss. I think there have been mixed reactions about it and I can't blame people. Myself? I'd have fun. I've hated TIM since the very beginning of ME2 (in the good way), so fighting some crazy Reaper form of him sounds like a lot of fun. Although I'd prefer him as something more like a banshee or other monster with abilities relying more on special powers rather than strength which the concept seemed to hint at.

 
Since Mass Effect 2 and the Arrival DLC, I thought the team were setting Harbinger up for something since not only does he survive unlike Sovereign, he shares dialogue exchanges with Shepard and seems to have a bit of an interest in Shepard if only to make sure Shepard is killed.
 
It even seems like the team were attempting something like this in the endgame of Mass Effect 3 since, I believe, Harbinger is mentioned by name as having broken off from the Reaper forces in space to head to Earth with a couple of other Reapers. It may have been that Harbinger was coming to secure the beam and did not know Shepard was amongst the people making a run for it.
 
If Harbinger did know Shepard participated in the run, it is odd that he was completely silent and decided to leave after having decimated the run since of all the Reapers, he should have known the importance of making sure Shepard was dead or simply ensured that there were no survivors.
 
Seriously, Harby, just extend one of your legs and smush Shepard's unconcious body into paste or shoot it with your laser eye until Shepard's body is nothing but ash. The same for any of the other soldiers. It even looks like Harbinger stayed to see if Shepard or any of the other soldiers moved before leaving since Shepard sees him leave after regaining conciousness though that depends on how long Shepard was out.

 

Then there is allowing the Normandy to land and leave rather than decimating it. I had to headcanon that as Harbinger not wanting people near the beam and believing that the survivors of a shot down Normandy might make a run for the beam but that can be drawn into question by Harbinger leaving the beam site with minimal ground forces in his place.
 
Note: I do not know how someone was able to recognise Harbinger well enough to pick him out of a line-up since only Shepard has seen Harbinger in his Reaper-form and that was in the Arrival DLC. As his holographic image was not scaled, it is unlikely they'd be able to pick him out by his size. I had to headcanon it as Harbinger having made some speeches during the Reaper invasion and so had become known.

[Natureguy85]

That's a decent guess, I suppose. I still don't like the idea since we see the Leviathan take down a Reaper. I assumed the orbs could simply control the Reaper technology as well as minds. (EDIT: It does disable ships and other technology. Like the Kodiak and the other ships on Despoina.) OR it could be that it simply makes the Reaper's "mind(s)" go boom and that's it. The game never explains how it works, so we can only make guesses and assumptions. It's a great deal of maybe and perhaps around here. But since this doesn't actually affect the plot so much, unlike the revelation of the Catalyst and its solution, I'm more willing to let that slide.

 

 The wiki page just says it's a pulse that disables the Reaper. It could be the same thing that initially brings down the shuttle and all the other ships.

 

 

 

 
Note: I do not know how someone was able to recognise Harbinger well enough to pick him out of a line-up since only Shepard has seen Harbinger in his Reaper-form and that was in the Arrival DLC. As his holographic image was not scaled, it is unlikely they'd be able to pick him out by his size. I had to headcanon it as Harbinger having made some speeches during the Reaper invasion and so had become known.

 

He does have a distinctive appearance with no central tentacle, instead having clear "eyes" there.

[BloodyMares]

 
Since Mass Effect 2 and the Arrival DLC, I thought the team were setting Harbinger up for something since not only does he survive unlike Sovereign, he shares dialogue exchanges with Shepard and seems to have a bit of an interest in Shepard if only to make sure Shepard is killed.
 
If Harbinger did know Shepard participated in the run, it is odd that he was completely silent and decided to leave after having decimated the run since of all the Reapers, he should have known the importance of making sure Shepard was dead or simply ensured that there were no survivors.

Maybe they realized how stupid Harby's infatuation with Shepard came out in ME2 and decided to discard this in ME3.

Really, Harby sounds in ME2 like some obsessed and creepy fan of Shepard. I'm glad non of that was in ME3 but I agree that he could've had some dialogue and be presented as the main antagonist instead of TIM/Catalyst.

[Shechinah]

Maybe they realized how stupid Harby's infatuation with Shepard came out in ME2 and decided to discard this in ME3.

Really, Harby sounds in ME2 like some obsessed and creepy fan of Shepard. I'm glad non of that was in ME3 but I agree that he could've had some dialogue and be presented as the main antagonist instead of TIM/Catalyst.

 
Even back in Mass Effect 2, I always found it amusing to imagining Harbinger as Shepard's obsessive and bordering on abusive ex-boyfriend who kept leaving messages on Shepard's answering machine.  Seriously, try listening to Harbinger's comments with this context;
 
Shepard: "This is Commander Shepard and this is my favorite answering machine on the Citadel! Please, leave a message after the beep."
 
*Beep*
 
Harbinger: "This delay is pointless. I sense your weakness. I know you feel this. This hurts you. You prolong the inevitable. Embrace perfection. Why do you resist us, Shepard? You cannot escape your destiny, Shepard. You are arrogant, Shepard, you will learn. Shepard, submit now. You will regret your resistance, Shepard. If I must tear you apart, Shepard, I will. You will know pain, Shepard. Flee while you can, Shepard. You escaped us before, Shepard, not again. "
 
...Then there's the erotic photos of himself that he keeps sending Shepard;
http://i140.photobuc...9/Harbinger.png

Note: the link does not lead to NSFW or anything gross.

[themikefest]

Harbinger is one of my favorites characters. I liked hearing him talk smack to Shepard. Too bad it couldn't continue in ME3.

[Shechinah]

Harbinger is one of my favorites characters. I liked hearing him talk smack to Shepard. Too bad it couldn't continue in ME3.

 
There are some very nice videos made that combines Mass Effect music with Sovereign and Harbinger's speeches respectively. Here are two of them;

Sovereign



Harbinger


 

[voteDC]

Well, Rome fell because it was corrupt and rotted away from within as much as it was from outside enemies. And they made a LOT of enemies.

 

Anyway, you're still right though. I'll get into it more below.

 

 

 

I have no problem with this actually. The Leviathans relied on their mind control abilities. Their thralls did everything for them. The only indication of advanced technology are those spherical Artifacts. Other than being large, there's no indication that they are particularly powerful in a fight. The Catalyst built enough Synthetic Pawns to be referred to as "an army and the Leviathans had their guard down. The Catalyst attacked by surprise, much like the Reapers suddenly pop into the galaxy from the Citadel Relay. You're dead before you know what happened.

 

The only problem with this is that we do see the Leviathan dragging down the Reaper. Maybe it's affecting the organic goop inside. The Pawns were purely synthetic so maybe they couldn't be controlled by Leviathans.

The problem is that introducing the Leviathans as a race means you have to accept that every single one of them were absolute idiots, who somehow completely missed that the AI they'd built to solve the AI organic conflict was building a robot army large enough to destroy even them?

Not one of them noticed this and ordered their thralls to destroy where this army was being built. Did the Catalyst build a indoctrination device large enough to ensnare the Leviathans, making them float to their own destruction?

I really wish the Leviathan of Dis had remained a Reaper instead of a new race getting created. They just weren't corrupt, they were deaf, dumb, and blind.

Plus it was Rome that fell and not the entire empire. The Eastern, Byzantine, portion of the Roman empire lasted for hundreds of years more. The more I think on it, the more I'd like to see a movie of the fall of the Leviathans. If they can make one about James Vega they can make one about this.

[rossler]

You understand your imaginings, not what the events actually showed and told.

 

You ignored what the game told you before and are mangling it to fit with what you were told later. New information can force you to look at old information in a different light, but that should be a smooth transition. You have to really contort things to make sense with the Catalyst.

 

The Catalyst wasn't foreshadowed until the Cerberus base. It does contradict the story. Nobody has proven otherwise. There has only been weak speculation attempting to make the two work together.

 

Yeah, the radio probably shouldn't work. And Shepard should have been incinerated in the atmosphere of Alchera after the Normandy was destroyed. The radio works so that Shepard and Anderson can talk. It was done in service of the story and that's fine for minor details like that.

 

You're not reading between the lines or picking things up. You're inventing the narrative.

 

You and I have been through this before.

 

You think you know everything about this game. Anything that I or anyone else says is just made up headcanon, unless the game explicitly spells everything out for you. 

 

You're just looking for reasons to fuel your hate over the ending, and how it still doesn't make any sense. 

 

This is your real problem. 

 

Edit:

 

The Catalyst wasn't foreshadowed until the Cerberus base. It does contradict the story. Nobody has proven otherwise. There has only been weak speculation attempting to make the two work together.

 

Oh is that so? I've got a surprise for you. The Catalyst was revealed right after the Mars mission when talking to the Council. You need to start paying more attention to the story and less time raging about how it doesn't make any sense and contradicts everything. 

[voteDC]

 Anything that I or anyone else says is just made up headcanon, unless the game explicitly spells everything out for you. 

Well yes, that is exactly the case.

Unless a Bioware employee comes out and says this is what happened, then anything we interpret, for good or ill, is purely headcanon.

Bioware did that when people asked what was the point in helping people on the Citadel if they all die in the end anyway, it doesn't affect war assets to an important degree after all. They came out and explicitly said that they survive. I'm willing to accept that even though I don't see how, because Bioware have said that it happened. It's no longer headcanon they survive but story fact.

That counts for everything that isn't explicitly stated.

[BloodyMares]

rossler, on 20 Jun 2016 - 6:37 PM, said:

You're just looking for reasons to fuel your hate over the ending, and how it still doesn't make any sense. 

Well, duh! If the game is vague on something and then somebody makes up their own facts to justify the game then it's headcanon. The game of this nitpicky genre (details-first science fiction) has to spell everything out to be clear.

So it's bad to critique? Critics do not hate. They analize and find the weak spots so that others don't make the same mistakes in the future. Nothing more. Nothing less.

If you love the game with all the flaws, it's good for you. But why does everybody else has to look past the flaws?

[Natureguy85]

The problem is that introducing the Leviathans as a race means you have to accept that every single one of them were absolute idiots, who somehow completely missed that the AI they'd built to solve the AI organic conflict was building a robot army large enough to destroy even them?

Not one of them noticed this and ordered their thralls to destroy where this army was being built. Did the Catalyst build a indoctrination device large enough to ensnare the Leviathans, making them float to their own destruction?

I really wish the Leviathan of Dis had remained a Reaper instead of a new race getting created. They just weren't corrupt, they were deaf, dumb, and blind.

Plus it was Rome that fell and not the entire empire. The Eastern, Byzantine, portion of the Roman empire lasted for hundreds of years more. The more I think on it, the more I'd like to see a movie of the fall of the Leviathans. If they can make one about James Vega they can make one about this.

 

I was fine with the Leviathan's explanation for that. They controlled everything, so the Catalyst rebelling against them was "beyond their comprehension."

 

The Leviathan of Dis was a Reaper. However, I like your idea of having the Leviathan character be a Reaper. It could mean Reapers who have broken off, similar to the split between the Geth and Heretics.

 

 

 

You and I have been through this before.

 

You think you know everything about this game. Anything that I or anyone else says is just made up headcanon, unless the game explicitly spells everything out for you. 

 

You're just looking for reasons to fuel your hate over the ending, and how it still doesn't make any sense. 

 

This is your real problem. 

 

I don't know everything. There are things I've missed or forget. However, you've just brought up misinterpretations or made things up. You have a conclusion and pick and choose what came before to make it fit with what you've already decided. I hate the ending because it is objectively terrible.

 

 

 

 

Well yes, that is exactly the case.

Unless a Bioware employee comes out and says this is what happened, then anything we interpret, for good or ill, is purely headcanon.

Bioware did that when people asked what was the point in helping people on the Citadel if they all die in the end anyway, it doesn't affect war assets to an important degree after all. They came out and explicitly said that they survive. I'm willing to accept that even though I don't see how, because Bioware have said that it happened. It's no longer headcanon they survive but story fact.

That counts for everything that isn't explicitly stated.

 

Well, I wouldn't call it headcanon to take something that's implied, even if two people interpret something that is unclear in a different way. I only consider it headcanon if its induced or totally made up. You could be right though.

 

 

 

 

Well, duh! If the game is vague on something and then somebody makes up their own facts to justify the game then it's headcanon. The game of this nitpicky genre (details-first science fiction) has to spell everything out to be clear.

So it's bad to criticize? Critics do not hate. They analize and find the weak spots so that others don't make the same mistakes in the future. Nothing more. Nothing less.

If you love the game with all the flaws, it's good for you. But why does everybody else has to look past the flaws?

 

Actually, the verb of critic is critique. That's what I think we're doing. We're doing a detailed analysis of what does and doesn't work and why.

[voteDC]

I was fine with the Leviathan's explanation for that. They controlled everything, so the Catalyst rebelling against them was "beyond their comprehension."

 

The Leviathan of Dis was a Reaper. However, I like your idea of having the Leviathan character be a Reaper. It could mean Reapers who have broken off, similar to the split between the Geth and Heretics.

Yet it still requires for them to be completely unobservant and incompetent. They can observe thralls to realise that they are getting wiped out by AI creations but don't spare a glance at their own AI creation

I meant to type Leviathan DLC, goes to show what happens when something else gets stuck in your head. It would have helped it, or them, being actual Reapers as it would allow for actual preservation of a species (kind of, still a Reaper). Perhaps some of the harvested races could resist the Catalyst's control after being turned into a Reaper and would not go along with the harvests.

 

Well, I wouldn't call it headcanon to take something that's implied, even if two people interpret something that is unclear in a different way. I only consider it headcanon if its induced or totally made up. You could be right though.

It is implied that Shepard survives in the breath ending, yet it is very easy to interpret that as a death scene. I don't recall Bioware ever stating that as fact Shepard survives in High EMS Destroy. Given how often I am wrong though, it wouldn't be a surprise.

If Bioware don't state that something is fact then it is all personal interpretation, your own headcanon. 

[BloodyMares]

Actually, the verb of critic is critique. That's what I think we're doing. We're doing a detailed analysis of what does and doesn't work and why.

Fixed. English is not my first language.

[angol fear]

Wow... Now interpretation no longer exists. It turned into headcanon (while fob would disagree Nietzsche would be glad to learn things from people on this forum, ahahah) . And sure, thanks to google, anyone can be a critic that's why there are only expert readers here who know everything about poiesis and esthesis, the history of litterature and cinema... This forum still so fun to read.

[voteDC]

Wow... Now interpretation no longer exists. It turned into headcanon (while fob would disagree Nietzsche would be glad to learn things from people on this forum, ahahah) . And sure, thanks to google, anyone can be a critic that's why there are only expert readers here who know everything about poiesis and esthesis, the history of literature and cinema... This forum still so fun to read.

I find it really frustrating, to the point of anger at time I confess, to converse with people who don't know as much about a subject as I do. Yet you seem to take a devilish delight in it.

I had a mental breakdown which I am now at the tail end of, so advice on how to laugh at situations that would frustrate or anger me would genuinely be gratefully received.

[rossler]

So it's bad to critique? Critics do not hate. They analize and find the weak spots so that others don't make the same mistakes in the future. Nothing more. Nothing less.

If you love the game with all the flaws, it's good for you. But why does everybody else has to look past the flaws?

 

I never recall stating the game was perfect or without flaws, do you?

[Vanilka]

I love how some people never have anything constructive to say and just drop in from time to time like, "lololol, you guys don't understand anything." Yeah, pinnacle of intelligent discourse right there. That doesn't look butthurt at all. 

 

But enough about irrationally emotional posters (you know who you are), come to think of it, when TIM in ME2 started talking about the corpse of the Reaper that we later explore and mentioned a super weapon that took it down (and they did find said super weapon), even if it had been long broken, I thought that was going to be our lead. I was like, "AHA!" I was very disappointed it was never mentioned again.

[Natureguy85]

Fixed. English is not my first language.

 

Oh, no, don't worry about it. It is a very common misconception even among native speakers and merely find the distinction to be very important.

 

 

Yet it still requires for them to be completely unobservant and incompetent. They can observe thralls to realise that they are getting wiped out by AI creations but don't spare a glance at their own AI creation

 

You're right but, again, I was ok with it. I like the idea that they are fat assholes laying on a couch being fed grapes. They became so lazy that rather than figure out the problem themselves, they made the AI and told it to figure it out because they couldn't be bothered. They were so arrogant and "above the concerns of lesser species" that they never considered that they'd fall to the same problem that their thralls did. The Catalyst says that Synthetics surpass their creators but the Leviathans couldn't fathom that they could be surpassed. Of course their AI would stay obedient. In fact, had the Leviathans been in the main game, this could have been the best argument for the inevitability the Catalyst claims.

 

 

 

 

I never recall stating the game was perfect or without flaws, do you?

 

No, but you make an excuse for every flaw.

 

 

 

 

 

But enough about irrationally emotional posters (you know who you are), come to think of it, when TIM in ME2 started talking about the corpse of the Reaper that we later explore and mentioned a super weapon that took it down (and they did find said super weapon), even if it had been long broken, I thought that was going to be our lead. I was like, "AHA!" I was very disappointed it was never mentioned again.

 

Pfft. Why use an established element based on known and understood technology when you can manufacture an unknown device and never explain or explore it?

[Natureguy85]

Oh is that so? I've got a surprise for you. The Catalyst was revealed right after the Mars mission when talking to the Council. You need to start paying more attention to the story and less time raging about how it doesn't make any sense and contradicts everything. 

 

You're wrong but this one is understandable because there are two things called "The Catalyst."

 

The one you're referring to is just a plot device. The Crucible needs some thing called "The Catalyst." It could literally be anything at this point. Vendetta says it's the Citadel.

 

However, I was referring to the character/exposition machine that calls itself the Catalyst and is the central intelligence behind the Reapers. I was wrong on one thing though; Vendetta speculates on it on Thessia, not on the Cerberus base. That is earlier and therefore a bit better. Looking at Mass Effect 3 alone, that might be an ok time for that kind of foreshadowing, but it's late in the series as a whole. Mass Effect 2 might have been a good spot.