A Deep Dive on the BATARIAN HEGEMONY: Mass Effect’s Most Vilified Alien Race
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- Опубликовано: 9 июл 2024
- In this video, we’re going to do a deep dive on the Batarians - Mass Effect’s most aggressive and despised alien race. We’ll be taking a look at their history, government and relations with the Council races.
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0:00 Introduction
1:29 Early Days of Batarians in Council Space
3:09 Humans Become a Target for Batarian Hegemony
5:45 The Batarians Retreat After Torfan
7:13 Batarian Technological Advancement
8:52 The Fall of the Batarians in Mass Effect 3
10:00 Will the Batarians Return in the Next Mass Effect?
MASS EFFECT 2 ARRIVAL - CAN YOU SAVE THE BATARIANS?
• Mass Effect 2 Arrival ...
THE MOST HEARTBREAKING QUEST IN MASS EFFECT
• The Most Heartbreaking...
BRING DOWN THE SKY - ALL CHOICES AND ENDINGS
• BRING DOWN THE SKY - A...
The Batarians are first introduced to us in Mass Effect 1 but we don’t actually ever meet one of them during the base game. We hear conversations about Batarian pirate gangs, slavers, the Skyllian Blitz and the attack on Mindoir, but we never get a Batarian perspective on these events.
The first time we do meet the four-eyed aliens, they’re committing a terrorist attack by trying to ram an asteroid into a human colony during the Bring Down the Sky DLC. So by the end of Mass Effect 1, our perception of the Batarians is that they’re either slavers, pirates or terrorists. Not exactly a good look.
In order to understand why the Batarians became the bad boys of the galaxy, it’s important to learn about their early days of Council relations. Much like humanity, the Batarians gained access to Faster-than-light travel via discovery of a Prothean ruins. In their case, they discovered a badly damaged Prothean site on Bira - a moon of the planet Verush. According to the planet description in Mass Effect 3, it is a point of pride amongst the Batarians that they were able to develop FTL technology while having access to only limited Prothean data when compared to other council races. This is because Bira was badly damaged by an earthquake, causing some of the Prothean archives to be lost prior to Batarian discovery.
Once the Batarians could travel long distances through space it wasn’t long before they made first contact with the Council races. While we don’t have exact dates for this, it was likely around the 1500s or 1600s - centuries before humanity would come onto the scene.
Roughly one century after first contact, the Council granted Batarians diplomatic representation on the Citadel. They didn’t have a seat on the Council, but their status was similar to that of the volus and elcor. They had an embassy on the Citadel and diplomatic relations with the rest of the galactic community.
Nonetheless the Batarians had no problem being openly aggressive and imperialistic, even to the point of attacking their supposed allies. This led to several diplomatic crises with the Council races. In 1785, Batarian ships bombed the Salarian colony world of Mannovai. Side note - Kirrahe gives one of his units the codename Mannovai during the Virmire mission in Mass Effect 1.
In 1913, the Batarians annexed an independent Asari colony of Esan. They even came into open conflict with Citadel forces on the planet Enael in 2115. So even before humanity’s introduction to the wider galactic community, the Batarians were the bad boys of the galaxy.
Tensions would only heighten after humanity joined the fray, with colonial expansion being a major point of contention. As the Alliance began establishing its own colonies in places like the Skyllian Verge, the Batarians petitioned the council to grant them exclusive colonial rights in the region. 
Игры
“Shepard, we’re grounding you and placing you on probation.”
“For the Batarian thing?”
“No no that was cool as hell, the top brass loved that - this is for the whole Cerberus thing.”
"What you did was absolutely based, Shepard."
“Oh the Cerberus thing, huh? Yeah okay that’s fine. Long as we’re cool about the whole Batarian thing.”
“Oh we’re more than cool. They’re calling you a goddamn hero for what you did to those spider-eyed bastards.”
“Nice.”
@@regalcartoon3952 -the whole damn reason you're not in jail right now is because you killed 350k+ of those slavery bastards.
It's the reason you weren't sent to prison, if you doubled the number you would have been free right away.
A Batarian squad mate would of been a really fascinating perspective. Plus I don’t recall if we see a female batarian. So that would be interesting too.
Do female Batarians even exist?
@@Dagreatdudeman No they all impregnate each other via anal sex lol. Yes there are female Batarians. There is at least one I know of in the Mass Effect novels.
I wish Zaeed was a batarian instead of a human. Would've made more sense if you think about it. Guy's a mercenary, founder of the Blue Suns to boot, and we find him doing a bounty on Omega. We already have so many human squadmates in ME2. Having Zaeed be the batarian squadmate would've been neat and offer us a different perspective from someone outside the watchful eyes of the Hegemony.
@@hawk66100 not a completely unreasonable assumption considering this is Mass Effect. The asari manage.
Oh I agree :o
Shout-out to Bray, the only Batarian who wasn't an asshole
Was he in the Aria missions? I dont remember where he was
@@shimavitz47 her right hand man
@@kreigguardsman3355 right hand Batarian....
He only turned up at select points in the Omega DLC, when shepard docks & leaves Dock 42 at the Citadel, during the breaks at Aria's command centre before heading out on the main missions & once as Shepard leaves Omega, when Shepard says, 'Do you always get these crap details, Bray' while Aria issues orders in the background
Narl was pretty ok as well
It's often claimed the Batarians represent humanity's dark side. Then again Cerberus pretty much has that part covered. And real life organizations are of course even worse.
Yeah, but they go pretty much the opposite route in ME3. We are sorry for the Batarians there, but Cerberus went to be full-out villains, with no relation left with humanity at all.
@@mike-6139 Yep, he was slaughtering humans on the Nazi scale, and almost sacrificed the whole Earth along with humanity so he can be a godlike controller of the Reapers.
@@juzoli yeah I miss ME 2 TIM. Sure he was the head of a human supremacist organization into some really shady shit, but helping Shepard save the galaxy was always his top priority. No matter what you did to sabotage Cerberus he would do nothing more than voice his disappointment and would never withhold his support, because he knew the best thing for humanity was to let Shepard do their thing.
@@battlesheep2552 He didn’t really help Shepard to save the galaxy. The ending is about the realization that his goal was to get his hands on the Collector station, and its technology. Saving humans was just an excuse.
Nevertheless, even though this goal was evil, it was a reasonable goal, and he made rational steps to achieve it.
But in ME3, most of his actions was not directed towards any specific goal. He was just automatically against Shepard and humanity on every front.
Cerberus was destined to go down that route, as TIM had reaper cybernetics from way before you met him. He became obsessed with human advancement and supremacy of the galaxy because he was a veteran of the first contact war, and learned of the reaper threat after he was accidentally exposed to a reaper artifact when a turian research vessel was shot down and crash landed on a human colony, and was subjected to an incomplete husk transformation. Considering that the reaper cybernetics allowed him to immediately understand alien species, gave him some information of the reaper's history, and changed his eyes, its likely his brain had been partially converted by reaper cybernetics. That would've made him especially vulnerable to indoctrination from anything designed to send reaper signals, whether it be from artifacts or proximity from the reapers themselves.
Recently I've learnt that the word 'Carnifex',used for the heavy pistol, means 'Butcher or Executioner' and it also happens to be the scientific name of the Executioner Wasp, whose venom is one of the most painful in the world. Makes sense as this heavy pistol is both accurate and lethal.
The Paladin in ME3 is actually more powerful being a modification of the Carnifex the only downside of it is a reduced clip size which can be remedied with a upgrade.
In ME3 you can rescue a Batarian leader and have it as an asset for the war effort, according to it's entry this leader became one of the first diplomats of his species to openly collaborate with the council races, stating that seeing the compasion and generosity shown when rescued made him change his mind over the Council Races or at least humanity
I think your view is too optimistic of the situation. The Batarian's were left to die to the Reapers to the point that the Alliance thought their civilian ships retreating into their territory was a Batarian invasion even though the Alliance was aware the Reaper's were a credible threat. We are seeing the basic understanding that the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" situation where that leader simply understood the situation that working together is the smartest play. Even Balak had to learn this the hard way. The Batarians hate everyone for basically turning a blind eye to the Alliance's territorial claims.
@@Seriona1 that isn't 'their view' of the situation, they said "according to its entry"
@@emackenzie The game has left no conclusion in my mind other than what I said. All we know is that a Batarian politician is preaching the aliens as their allies and Balak being the highest ranking military officer we know of, had to accept the alliance anyways.
@@Seriona1 I'm not talking about any conclusions people have drawn- OP says they're directly referencing what the game says and aren't just expressing their own view of it. It's great that you have your own opinions on the situation but telling OP "their view is too optimistic" falls flat when they literally didn't express any opinion in their original comment.
The Batarian Hegemony as 'Space North Korea' is actually a very realistic comparison.
Maybe the Palestinians would be a closer analogy, with the alliance being israel and the citadel being a combination of the UN and the US. It's partly over land, both sides have valid claims initially, and both sides have valid grievances against the other (though one more than the other), with one side committing or sponsoring terrorism.
@@jayburn00 well don’t forget that the alliance also sponsors terrorism and warlordism, just not so openly. More like the US than Israel.
@@shartingpope7371 the israel thing comes from them both having valid grievances and it stemming from territorial claims.
Except the Batarian Hegemony don’t have a major power ally to ask for help when the rest of the world (or galaxy) just wants them dead.
In what kind of absurd fantasy world do you live, to believe this is a "realistic comparison"?!?
Please list some examples of North Korea practicing colonialism, imperialism, piracy, attacking other countries, slavery of the conquered and terrorism. I'll wait.
Meanwhile, I could list multiple western countries, which have and continue to practice many of the aforementioned crimes, including but not limited to the United States of America, which has broken international law countless times for their war profiteering among other things.
There are actually 2 batarians in ME Andromeda. The playable characters "Batarian Scrapper" and "Batarian Vanguard" in multiplayer. They are two ex-pirates whose gang attacked uncomfortably close to the Citadel. They betrayed their gang by giving information to the Alliance, basically entering a witness protection program. When that protection failed, they asked the Andromeda Initiative for sanctuary. The salarians agreed to give them two cryopods on the salarian ark, hoping to gain more security forces when arriving in Andromeda. The two agreed and are excited to work for the greater good (presumably meaning APEX).
Some of those character bios though sound like the devs brought in their 6-year old kids to write it for them - particularly the Krogan engineer.
@@GTAVictor9128 while I haven’t played Andromeda, we have seen 3 tech-minded krogan in ME2: a mechanic and doctor on Tuchanka, as well as O’Keer: Grunt’s creator.
@@smokyjo5245 Also the Krogan Scientist working for Saren on Virmire
I hope those two Batarians get to use Okeer based technology ( lab growth and teaching tools) to make a Batarian colony in Andromeda.
@@barrybend7189 They are more batarians traveling in the Quarian arch which was more of mix of all non-council races.
In Mass Effect 3 there was some npc dialogue “The Batarian Refugees have been acting allot friendlier now that they know the Hegemony isn’t watching” implying their government not only baths them in propaganda but spies on them to make sure they’re hostile to enemies of the state. Space North Korea is very appropriate
China does the same. They have secret police stations across the western world.
China too. Also Hegemony treats any dissent like rusdian government does towards russians who refuse to be "mobilised " or don't want to be anywhere near the warzone(or just call "special military operation" the name it deserves - the war.) - jail and fine them
Sounds like Space USA more like tbh
@@phunkracy You could leave USA anytime you want. Nobody is going to jail you for saying "I hate the government". That's not the case for North Korea.
@@phunkracy sure, you will get +100 points in your Social Rating for your comment, comrad
Someone asked colonist shepherd what it felt to kill a batarian, he only replied with a bit of recoil.
Something to note is that, if you import a save where you didn't play Bring Down the Sky, Balak introduces himself as a captain.
The Batarians got hit so bad that the highest ranking figure left is a Captain.
It's been a few years maybe he got promoted
I'm pretty sure he was part of their special forces/secret police so its likely captain is a higher rank than a navy captain
Good
Well they deserve it
reminds me of WH40k Space Marine when a single Lt. became the highest commanding officer of a city sized garrison.
Garrus mentions he had a batarian on his omega gang. I think a mass effect game where you play as garrus in the terminus systems while Shepard was dead would be pretty great. It's easily the most compelling side story and we already explored Liara and the broker.
Plus now with the legendary edition for current gen, you can import your mass effect 1 garrus status into his game, Dr heart etc.
I would play this.
Mass effect: Archangel. I can already see Garrus doing some James Bond kind of pose on the cover.
I think this as a shorter more linear action shooter would be fun. Plus they could add on a ME3 style multiplayer mode.
@@MandalorV7 yeah it definitely wouldn't have such an impactful ending but there's plenty of wiggle room for different choices since everyone dies in the end
Good, but i'd prefer a scenario where Garrus, now a spectre, is testing a possible spectre recruit (the player) in a mission in the terminus systems, tge mission serves as the prologue if the fame and to set in motion the events of the game.
8:56 I like little pieces of consistency like that. Given how the Alpha Relay and the Batarian Colony in it were at the very south east area of the Galaxy Map during Arrival, it hints that the Reapers were somewhere in that region of dark space in order shorten the distance to its range in the event they needed to use the Alpha Relay as a backup plan. Thus they'd naturally continue advancing from that approach with standard FTL which would lead to the Batarians getting hit first (specifically the Vular system that's annoyingly only avaliable on the Galaxy Map if you bother with the Salarian dumbass from Aria: Blue Suns).
Dan, you forgot to mention that Batarians have a caste system but they probably will have to set that aside to rebuild.
The Batarians ask potentially the most antithetical question to Mass Effect's core philosophy, which is; "what if another race's ideology and cultural values are just shit?" The Batarians, I believe could be a great mirror to hold up to the series, questioning whether the idea of preserving and respecting other races' differences is valuable or even possible when those differences are things like slavery and authoritarianism. Other than the Arrival DLC they aren't featured prominently in any Mass Effect game and I think that's a real shame as any game heavily featuring the Batarians could end up being the KOTOR 2 or DS9 of Mass Effect. I guess we'll see what comes next.
Great points. I feel they're such a missed opportunity overall. I would really love to have you be able to play a Batarian in the next game, or at least have them much not involved then the first 3 games
Boy if people gave Miranda shit for being a Cerberus apologist just imagine if we had a Batarian crew member who was a wumao tier shill for the hegemony. And every time you have those crew member debates he makes renegade suggestions that would get even Wrex to cringe.
Nah, that's too cringe. Batarians are fucked, also their homeland is non-existent so basically they're went instinct
@@Kachanoidhey aren't extinct. But their population became a whole lot smaller. But the same is with quarians. I think in modern day France we got twice the amount of people than the migrant fleet. And they still got some power in the galaxy. Let's say the next mass effect plays 20 years from the last one. Then it should work pretty fine with them having a few colony worlds in the terminus system which slowly gets them back to power.
@@xaga8794 quarians have a big ass fleet this is why they have some influence, but batarians has nothing after reapers invasion. Most of the population were killed or turned into husks, their homeland is destroyed, all that was left of their population spread around the galaxy. I don't see how they can recreate something-like batarian state.
If the alpha relay incident had killed several people of the council races, I'm damn sure there would have been astronomical consequences for Shepard and ME3 would have turned out very differently than what it is today.
Yeah we should definetly make an alpha relay incident memorial day, but first we have to have a reaper war veterans day... Today
If the alpha relay had been in Council space, the entire colony would have become indoctrinated. Lack of actual resources is why the batarians didn’t explore the nearby asteroids more thoroughly and find Object Rho.
I saved the council on my second play through and I was so amazed at how useless they are. Honestly I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t do anything
@@kreigguardsman3355 The only thing they are good at is ranting. Map that to the batarians, and it leaves you wondering why they haven't kicked them out of Council space a long time ago (too much aggression from a particular species would actually warrant that), but since they haven't, they are eiter completely brain-dead (and therefore useless, a fact that is corroborated by the games), or batarian society wasn't as bad as BioWare wanted to make us believe (that also includes their slaves), and as far as the Council is concerned it wouldn't have been all gold that glitters (the clashes about some colonies could also have resulted from other species colonizing planets that have originally been allotted to the batarians), and one is left to wonder how many skeletons there are in _their_ closets.
But no matter what, the batarians are a lot of wasted potential. One option would have been to make them less aggressive, but they could still have a somewhat antagonistic stance, because they just refuse to jump through hoops at the beck and call of the Council. At least it would have given them a more three-dimensional setup and would have included many opportunities for side stories.
@@Robidu1973 The Batarians are already not technically in Citadel Space any longer, when the Council let humanity settle the Skyllian Verge the Hegemony had a tantrum and turtled up.
There was some interesting lore about the batarians in the novels, like how they have a very strict caste society and use subtle gestures to express meaning kind of like how the elcor communicate not just with speech. Also there were batarians allowed on the missing quarian ark to Andromeda (also in the novels).
I know a lot of people don’t like Andromeda and didn’t read the novels but I think you could make really neat videos exploring the lore from those.
It just looks so boring
Important to note if balek is dead you meet another batarian trying to scrounge up resources and he’s actually kinda chill
Wouldnt mind seeing a batarian companion in mass effect 4 would be interesting seeing how they deal with most of their people being wiped and maybe seeing their people redeem themselves with the other council races
and send him to his death, muhahaha
I'd like to see their development in the wake of the Reaper War, especially with their malignantly narcissistic government gone. Could become interesting, especially in which direction their culture has evolved.
They seem very religious actually Despite either being Pirates, Mercs or Terrorists I just hear them preaching (though it was probably the same guy)
Could easily imagine evolving into some Religious Collective style society after them suffering for so long......Be good if they became quite compassionate to others etc
@@JackRabbit002 I think the most likely conclusion is that governments tends to be fanatical to the politics than the people that make up the government. A real life example is that Iran and US hate each other on paper but the people of each nation tends to have a neutral view of the people itself. The Batarian's lost their high command to the Reapers, this vacuum of power means the Batarian people might now favor the races of the galaxy because they are now brother in arms to a common enemy. The only remaining issue is culture. Will the Batarian's stop their slave trade? Maybe. But I certainly do not see the new government formed being hostile to what they now call their allies.
@@Seriona1 I always found it odd that people bring up North Korea when discussing the batarians, I always thought they were a not-so-subtle allegory for Iran. Authoritarian and repressive government of a relative pariah state is common for all of them, but unlike North Korea and like Iran, the batarians were at least somewhat militarily relevant as a local power, a major state sponsor of terrorism, and generally religious but not following a cult of their leader.
After reading Annihilation, there’s no reason why the Quarian Ark shouldn’t arrive in Andromeda, but how many survivors the ship would have I’m unsure, FYI there are Batarians on the Quarian Ark
There's a perfectly good reason why the Quarian ark shouldn't arrive in Andromeda, they canned the DLC lol.
why would you want to continue the andromeda story? it's like a bad holonet series in the ME universe. The project is far too large and you wouldn't actually get that many people into deep freeze for 6 centuries, not without certain knowledge of the Reapers. None of it makes sense and it's all done because they wrote themselves into a corner.
@@mishmashmarsh9499 the book was written because they canned the dlc, and I have no doubt that at some point in the future they’ll want to go back to the Andromeda galaxy in some way
Why would someone want batarians on an ark? They are a bunch of slaving terrorists and the good ones are at least assholes.
Have you read the book?
The Batarians are one of my favorite Mass Effect races. We were supposed to have one as a companion and I'm super disappointed they decided to trash the idea.
Really hoping they'll be in the next Mass Effect despite their numbers being wrecked.
It's a shame that we haven't, because the batarians would have provided ample opportunity for a story arc involving them (and maybe also some opportunitites for cleaning up some mess that has cropped up - and would have allowed for the pre-service history and psychic profile to have a significantly stronger impact).
Now, just imagine your Colonist Ruthless Shepard who has to go to Khar'shan to get some sort of issue between the Hegemony and the Alliance resolved... ouch!
I love how the council doesnt even question they're just like "oh shit happens" and they probably even went along with the reaper excuse even if they "dismissed that claim"
We met with enough bad batarians to hate them all. But then there are many decent individuals as well, which makes us realize, they are not inherently bad, but their politics fucked up their galactic relationships.
So in the end, I’m sorry for them.
Agreed, Bray was a pretty decent guy.
It's the likes of Balak who are the problem.
@@janeshepard9549 Not gonna lie, there are way too many Balak-like people around there:D But still…
Also they are quite realistic. This political failure happens in real life as well. They fuck up once, get the backslash, which might push the whole society towards the extremities.
@@juzoli Hatemongers, those who've sworn revenge, bullies & justice seekers always spoil everything & anything that advocates for peace.
No surprise the Batarians hate humans. Just look at Charles Saracino & the rest of Terra Firma.
@@janeshepard9549 Yes, hate is pretty much a positive reinforcement process, and can easily spiral out of control.
If you do something stupid, then they will hate you. So you hate them even more. And so one…
Something I kind of hate is that we can't be racist towards Asari.
Shepard: "Finally, the greatest evil in the galaxy has been defeated..."
Anderson: "Shepard, the Reapers are still rampaging across the galaxy."
Shepard: "Reapers?"
EDI mentions in ME3 that the Batarian refugees are a lot more peaceable nd friendly now they don't have the Hegemony watching over them Kind of like a North korean/Chinese government situation going on with them I guess
That could also be because they just got their shit pushed in by the Reapers
"Commander, how do you feel about the Batarian people?"
"Well, I don't exactly consider them people..."
I would say the Vorcha are probably more hated than Batarians - literally treated like vermin - but I understand the Vorcha's impact on galactic society seems substantially smaller.
Either way, great video!
1:01 actually we do outside of the BDTS DLC, it’s assumed that all humanoid characters that are wearing a helmet are either a Bartarian or a human. (Asari have their own models) (Enemy name is PIRATE, which either would mean helmeted human or helmeted Bartarian)
In the Grunt mission, Shepard states that he was put in house arrest to keep the Batarians off him. Which is kinda funny to think about.
Batarians got sidelined when we arrived and proved to be a far more capable (and reasonable) species
Yes, you can clearly feel it from the behavior of the council. They don’t officially support the expansion of Humans, but we can see they are secretly happy about it.
Some races are upset about being council members before them. But their grand plan is clear. Humans are going to control a large portion of the galaxy which was previously a Wild West. And they bring it under council control.
Being a council member is not just a petty award for saving the council. It is actually a big gain in the influence for the council over the whole galaxy.
11:21 Hey! Thats me lol.
A batarian squad mate would be interesting. Human squadmates tend to get boring very quickly so thatd be a nice way to change things up. Especially with how destroyed their society got in mass effect 3
Yes I'm curious to see what they do with it in the next Mass Effect game
Although Batarians occupy only 13% of citadel space, 50% of citadel prisons are occupied by Batarians
I remember the weird art the codex had of them before the dlc. Their heads looked different and less generic than just a skull with four eyes. It blows my mind how many races Bioware got away with never showing any female members.
The Turians are probably the worst offender. They gave no logical reason why we don't see any. Especially since they confirmed Turian women serve in the military. I honestly would've just said Turians lack differences between the two sexes.
@@fenrisvermundr2516 Well, the reason I've heard is that they didn't know how to make a Turian look female until Mass Effect 3. They didn't have a base model or design for a female turian for the first 2 games.
@@fenrisvermundr2516 We saw at least two. Aria's sweetheart and some chick Garrus tried to pick up.
I wonder if the weird art could be used as female Batarians
@@thephoenixxm4160 Even then. I don't remember there being a single mention in ME1. Garrus only mentions his father.
It honestly feels like something they tacked on because people were asking about it. I mean after all they would've at least had a concept design to go off of for ME2 if they had it planned for ME1. We should've at least seen 1 in the comics leading up to the release of the 2nd game.
I actually really like the batarians, they have an interesting culture and we really don't know a lot about the lower social classes because of their social heirarchy. The books shed better light on them, especially Revelation and Annihilation.
I still say that Zaeed should have been Batarian..
I love the idea of a Batarian squad mate especially with the comparison to Dorian. Dorian presents a new view of Tevinters without dismissing the common view. He's aware that they are viewed a certain way and even can understand why. He also sees that change is necessary in tevinter but is both unsure of how much and afraid of the consequences of trying to force quick change. Everything about Dorian was handled perfectly in my opinion and I'd love to see that applied to a Batarian.
Zaeed should have been a Batarian, and so should Vito. Makes more sense for a batarian finding the blue suns than a human that's only been in the galactic community for almost 30 years.
That's a great point. Feel like zaeed's personality would fit a Batarian merc too. Plus don't see the value in another human companion when the game already had Jacob, Miranda and Kasumi
I think a problem with Mass Effect is that humanity is WAY too new to the galaxy for everything that's happening.
That would mean sacrificing his cool look and cockney accent. So hell no to that.
@@davidstinger1134I agree, I loved ME1 concept as humans as the grasping new guy and lowest in the foodchain. Further entries like made it into another HUMANS FIRST trash.
@@davidstinger1134yeah Humanity should’ve arrived like 120 years ago. New enough to be new to the other major civilizations but old enough to have some history. Maybe some extremely old humans could still remember pre-alien days.
There is a human, turian and batarian running what seems like some sort of fast/street food vendor on Omega in ME2. You can't interact with it at all, but I find it quite wholesome.
Batarians are in Andromeda. There are playable ones in the multiplayer, they have a space on the Quarian Multi-race ARC, and in lore the Salarians contracted some Battarians as security
This was VERY well done. I appreciate that you showered the trilogy for additional info and context.
My head cannon is that Council races are distrustfull of humans largely because of previous experiences with Batarians.
The Hegemony = Space North Korea comparassion is scarly accurate.
Another great video! I love the lore of this franchise. I hope we get to see a more nuanced look at the Batarians in the next game, especially considering the Reaper war
Fun fact: There is a Batarian in Mass Effect Andromeda though you only see him through the multiplayer. The codex explains he is the single representative of their race.
2 batarians were in mass effect andromeda's multiplayer. I would love them to come back and always wondered what banter would be like with a batarian in the squad.
One thing I wish more people would talk about is the war asset governor Grothan Pazness. After the Baterians were demolished, Pazness basically turned into a Baterian liberal and that implies he might lead the Baterians into a new era of cooperation with the other races.
Great video and analysis.
Always thought the Batarians were a missed opportunity overall. I feel like the galaxy in mass effect could be more dynamic. Obviously the main story revolved around the reapers, and there were serious conflicts between geth and quarians and (potentially) krogan trying to cure the genophage and salarians. But other then that, everything just seemed a bit "too peaceful" during the games between the main races.
Then there's the Batarians. It was cool to have a rogue state, but they never were more then an ineffective nuisance to the galactic community. There was little nuance to them, to me it was just "ineffective, authoratian state who's brutal policies always backfire". Everything made sense in the context of the story, but I'm really hoping they take some risks with the Batarians in the next game. They can still be an aggressive, potentially advisarial state, but it would really be cool to play as a Batarian in the next game (if they consider playable races instead of humans which is unlikely).
Since watching this video, well since being reintroduced to this trilogy a lingering thought resurfaced for me. When the Batarians became indoctrinated by the dead reaper it got me thinking about the timeline of indoctrination. In a comic that I can't remember it gives you the history of the illusive man and it shows that he was indoctrinated even before the events of mass effect, same as Saren. I mean how could the Illusive man come into so much money and resources and fly under the council and Alliance radars for years, not to mention the technology needed to bring back Shepard or to fake the signal that led to the trap on the collector's ship? Same as Saren to become a near untouchable Spectre? I also suspect that Nassana was in the early effects of indoctrination. She was one of the more powerful people on Illium and it does explain her crazy behavior in ME2.
Yeah I feel like the indoctrination stuff is inconsistent throughout the series
You have a point here. It would be worthwhile to explore this issue further.
Member baby. I've been wanting to find a youtuber to become a member with for a while. and you are the first. and only. my boy you make fantastic content. and you have re-invigorated my love for Mass Effect! Dan keep up the good stuff. we all love ya my dude! :D
Thanks for the support Jake! Welcome aboard!
I have no sympathy for Batarians unless they work for Aria.
I see where you’re coming from and I sort of agree.
I loved this video, i hope you do more on the other races
Great lore deep dive, thanks for this. I hope we get more Batarian lore in the new game, and a deeper dive into the Vorcha, Elcor, Volus, Drell and Hanar.
Dope video. V well done
Here's a tip: 2 eyes human, 4 eyes batarians
Not sure if it's been mentioned in the comments already, but the Batarians are part of the Andromeda Initiative and were on the 4th Ark along with the Quarians, Volus, Elcor, Drell and Hanar. The Mass Effect Andromeda book "Annihilation" explains what happens to their Ark on there way to Andromeda.
The main Batarian character in that book Borbola Ferank is my favorite character and changed my opinion on the Batarians quite a bit. She's the Matriarch of a top Batarian crime family and her sarcasm is hilarious. The content from the book was originally meant to be DLC but was made into a book instead.
The council had to have know Shepard had a good reason for destroying the relay which is why nobody questioned it. A spectre does whatever it takes afterall
Great video! One thing tho, two batarians actually did make it to Andromeda. They're in the multiplayer. Something about them being given spots on the journey after testifying against their pirate gang.
Batarians were actually an ancient Race/culture of people who lived near Babylon, so I wonder if that plays a factor for most people's hate.
I personally was sympathetic to them and gained their alliance to fight the Reapers.
Everything you listed the Batarians as doing, all the other groups have done as well from the Asari having slave classes and hording Prothean technology to Eugenic war crimes of the Salarians.
Humans and Turians hold animosity due to the war crime transgressions they committed against each other.
It's exactly this reason why I see the Council as quite hypocritical. I'm wondering how many skeletons _they themselves_ have in their closets.
I'm doing another playthrough of the OG ME trilogy and I've noticed a unique detail in ME1.
So while doing the various tech attacks like Overload or Sabotage, Shepard actually throws a disk like projectile, very similar to the grenades, which flies to the enemy very quickly and detonates instantly, giving the desired result of overload or sabotage. But these projectiles do not detonate when thrown on non-hostile things like a wall. But the Overload we see in later games is instantaneous and not projectile-based meaning the in-universe technology has improved over the course of 2 years.
That seems to be a simple change in fight mechanics. There were a lot such change between ME1 and ME2.
Some of these got an in-game explanation, like omnigel or the ammo. This didn’t got, just changed it for better fight experience.
Or its like Fallout where guns were just repurposed magic spells.
They’re probably my second favorite race in the game (after the Turians). I really do so humans as the villains in the Batarian-Human Conflict as they forced Batarians off their colonies. I don’t condone some of the methods that they Batarians use, but I feel like the race is heavily misunderstood, and their government doesn’t help at all.
Yeah their government did not help at all with funding pirates, slavers, and terrorists to attack human colonies. I would put blame squarely on the Council though for being wholly inept in governing that region.
Per the Earth Systems Alliance Space description for one of the taken down mobile games app: “Humanity's aggressive expansionism has triggered conflicts with several neighboring species and their governments, most notably the Batarian Hegemony.” So while humanity is a villain for taking potential colonies for batarians and other unknown species, the Council did absolutely nothing but exasperated relations in the area by being somewhat neutral. The Council was probably using the species in the area as a weak buffer zone along the border with the Terminus Systems. Although I question how hostile they are when Illium and some of asari space seems to border the the Terminus.
Shepard: The reapers are coming back! Will you help me fight them?
Council: Nah. Nah, bro!
During my most recent play through I noticed something in Diana allers quarters,(in legendary edition, not sure if its in the original one) I was looking at her wall with all the pictures, I saw several that looked like real life photos, my best guess is there pictures of the mass effect team.
In case it hasn't been mentioned, there were several thousand batarians aboard the quarian ark to the Andromeda galaxy, but the ark never made it there so so much for the batarians
Which pair of eyes do we look at while talking to them?
Also, would they consider it an insult if you tilt your head to the side and look them straight in either of the right or left set of eyes?
Actually, after Shepard destroyed the Alpha Relay, there was a tremendous effort to have him tried for his war crime. However, Shepard had Guardian Angels called Anderson and Hackett who delayed and warded off this process as much as possible, since they knew that Shepard would be very much needed once the Reapers rolled in. In ME3, we get an email forwarded from Hackett detailing this.
Also, contrary to what they communicated publicly, leadership was well aware of the impending Reaper invasion. And not only Alliance leadership, but that of other council races too, as can be seen in the Citadel Archives in ME3. Everybody knew how important Shepard would be.
This is probably going to be cringy so fair warning lol. But it's really awesome to see someone who shares a passion for Mass Effect, its lore and the characters and everything and even more so to see that person take it to youtube to popularize it and spread awareness of a franchise we both love. Thank you so much for what you do Big Dan, keep it up as you'll always have a subscriber and viewer in me. 💗
Same- but sadly idk 🤷♂️ when I’ll go back and actually finish the playthrough that I started the other day.
@@daydreamdirty Whenever you're ready to. There's no rush but I hope you enjoy it when you do.
Brand new to the series, can't believe skipped it for so long, Big Dan got some a the best vids out there
@@dorkydragon5055 Yeah he does and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! 💗
So cringe...
Thanks for the vid! I'm a fan of the batarians so this was great!
Side note in me3 multiplayer I loved playing the batarians.
There’s only one good thing about Batarians: smoked BBQ
Ingredients
1 Batarian Loin - Silverskin removed
1 qt Cold Water
¼ C Kosher Salt
⅓ C Maple Syrup
1 tsp crushed garlic
1 Tbsp chopped thyme
1 Tbsp Olive or Avocado Oil
2 Tbsp BBQ Rub
Instructions
Combine the water, salt, syrup, garlic, and thyme in a bowl, and then whisk.
Place the Batarian loin in a large ziplock bag and add brine.
Let the Batarian loin sit in the brine refrigerated for 6-12 hours.
Remove loin from brine and pat dry.
Rub the surface of the loin with oil.
Sprinkle rub over loin, make sure the entire surface is covered.
Smoke the Batavian loin at 225 degrees until the internal temperature hits 140 degrees.
Let rest for 15 minutes before slicing to allow for internal temp to rise, and the juices to redistribute.
The Ironic thing was, some how, the rivalry between human and Batarian were not about how they different from each other, but How similar they are to each other, so they understand another won't coexist with them.
In one of the Mass Effect Andromeda book, the Andromeda Initiative did bring Batarians. Very very few though. They were on the Quarian Ark with the Volus, Drell, and Elcor. Great book.
Man out of all the videos I am late it needs to be this one.
The Batarians had their marked words taken by humanity when they didn't asked if they already had a claimed ownership, even Shepard agreed with Balak that it was wrong what happened but they then went on a war and when they lost they called the Council for help. They then hired slavers and pirates to attack human colonies and sponsored people like Balak to attack places, all while denying involvement. My colonist war hero Shepard felt sorry for the Bahak System but I am glad that they get a chance to redeem themselves.
Edit: he tried to warn the Batarians but then justified the destruction as it slowed the Reapers, then they still came.
I'm pretty sure the Batarians were said to be on the Quarian Ark in Andromeda. Also, in Dragon Age: Origins, you could recruit a Quanari as a companion right after the first battle with the Blighted horde
I think Sten was dlc so he might've never gotten him he's pretty cool though
"The only good Batarian is a dead Batarian" - Commander Shepard
I wish 304,942 batarians a Happy Mass Relay explosion
Thanks so much for this video! Legendary Edition was my first go-round with the series and I picked Colonist for my femShep's background. Since then, I found the back-and-forth of the Mindoir raid followed by the Alpha relay massacre to be a super interesting conundrum for my Shep, so I'm actually kinda partial to Batarians for the interesting backstory and conflict they provided my first long-service Shep.
10:00 its mentioned that they weren't in Andromeda, which is true; but they are in the Andromeda book, Annihilation aboard the ark with the drell, hanar, and quarians. And the main batarian character is a 3 eyed female that was betrayed by her sons. She's kinda likeable 😅
I would have really enjoyed a Batarian squadmate in ME3. A former Batarian soldier who lost his entire family to the Reapers. To seek revenge he will do anything, including teaming up with the human responsible for the massacre of Batarians.
Well we have Javic filling that role. He actually is more ruthless than a Batarian.
It was have been a mind trip to have Balak recruitable.
The batarians remind me a lot of the Klingons in Star Trek. In the original series they were depicted as mainly villains and unredeemable. Then, in The Next Generation, we got to meet Worf, a Klingon crewmate and the Klingons themselves became a lot more nuanced instead of the black-and-white villains they were in TOS. Just like humans, some were good and some were bad. I think it would indeed be very interesting if they had a batarian crewmember in the next Mass Effect game, assuming they make one. It would be interesting to see how Bioware tries to redeem this race and maybe explain why some batarians are good (or at least not complete assholes, for example Bray). It could be similar to real life North Korea, where the government is tyrannical and basically a dictatorship whereas the citizens are unfortunately forced to abide by it. Kinda like what you said about how they're not really allowed to leave batarian space.
not all races need to be redeemed, this is not anime. Having one race that's just complete a-holes enriches the story.
I know this video is old and no one will read this, but there's a tie in book for Andromeda about the quorian life ship that never arrived. That ship has all the other races that didn't show up in the game, like the drell. It's got the Batarians on it, who hope to start over again without the stereotypes and find a new home in Andromeda. The book ends before the ship can arrive and, with a cliffhanger too. There will probably never be a resolution:(
“Batarians are the galaxy’s most aggressive and despised alien race.”
*Krogans being sterilized for launching meteors at Turian settlements after defeating an infestation of corrupted telepathic termites by swarming their hives and killing their queens in melee combat*
Unlike the Batarians who allways were aggressive douchebags who started fights and caused nothing but problems, the Krogans used to be heros who saved the galaxy from the Rachni.
The Krogan leaders with their aggressive expansion which started because of their booming population growth and their therefor commited anexation of allready settled worlds triggered the Krogan rebellion.
Their evolution was rushed by the Salarians because they needed them as soldiers against the Rachni.
Outside their dangerous homeworld the still relatively primitive Krogans reproduced to unimaginable numbers. Their birthrates grew out of control.
The only reason they weren't whiped out after the rebellion is because their crimes were only possible because the Salarians rushed their evolution.
Thanks!
I don't know if someone already said this but batarians ARE a part of the Andromeda initiative! They are a part of the Quarian Ark Keelah Si'yah among the quarians, the volus, the elcor, the drell and the hanar. In fact, Mass Effect Annihilation (the novel about the quarian ark) might be the only piece of Mass Effect media that has a prominent batarian character portrayed in a positive light with all the nuance you would expect from any other Mass Effect race that isn't batarian or vorcha. I mean there's Bray too but he's a sidekick anyway. Annihilation is a great novel that in my opinion every Mass Effect fan should read.
I too have thought of a batarian squadmate. I would love to have a batarian sniper purely to make the "You would be a better marksman if you had four eyes" joke.
The Batarians have a presence on the Andromeda initiative, they're on the arc with volus elcor drell hanar and quarian races
The Batarian Shotgun the AT12 Raider (in ME3 MP) can be fired 3 or 4 times if you time it correctly. Combined with smart choke and damage booster and you have the equivalent of like 3 or 4 M300 Claymore rounds every 3 Seconds. AND it can be reload canceled :D
I hope we get a Batarian squad-mate in Mass Effect 4. I think it would also be interesting to fight alongside a Volus, Elcor, Hanar, or Vorcha squad-mate.
The Batarians are damn near extinction by the end of ME3. Fuck yeah!
I never realized nor even thought about what Reaper cannibals were
I still want a batarian squadmate
I wouldn't mind that.....so long as u had the option to kill them and they weren't forced upon you
Man having batarian companion would have been epic.Leaks shown supposed to be one but bioware scrapped the idea and also idea to have volus member on the ship too as part of the engineer team shame bruh
>Ironbull showed us another side of the villainous qunari
did you forget about Sten from Origins? he already showed us that the Qunari aren't bad guys they just live by a strict life code
Hey Big Dan, I was a little curious but have you played Jade's Empire?
"Think of it like the surface dwarves in Dragon age" thank you.
Your comparison of the hegemony to North Korea + Dragon Age dwarf society was spot on and made a ton of sense. Great video.
8:18 "Reapers?" xD
Gotta love how the entire Batarian race is basically an embodiment of projection
As a corollary, they are presented as the Scapegoats and a means to provide narcissistic supply. Add more blameshifting and gaslighting, and you know enough.
Glad you liked my Space North Korea comparison!
There was two batarians in Andromeda multiplayer, establishing a few went along with one of the arks. That’s why you don’t see any in Andromeda. It’s a cool little detail.
Big Dan should do a video on hock's vault on what's in it and how hock got it in there because hock has a illos statue
Fun fact that zaeed used to run with the blue suns back in his day but the second founder vito Santiago ended up adapting the gangs by hiring batarians because they are cheap laborers for the suns zaeed wasn’t too happy about it until his own squad betrayed him and was shot to the head thankfully zaeed survived it but since then he’s been pretty much on a killing spree or bounty hunting batarians whatever chance he get so in his understanding yeah Vito had it coming and pretty much most of us don’t like the batarians
I knew that the batarians pulled out of all dealings with the council, so I knew they weren't welcome in council space. But it helps a lot to know that the hegemony also prohibits law abiding batarians from traveling from their homes at all.
We literally never saw a batarian that wasn't on the wrong side of the law already.