So I heard some Bioware fans cite this argument over the years, and there are some who still do to an extent. It was when I remembered what I knew about real life guns, and science did I really start to poke major holes in the general arguments. Something really felt off about the science the moment I heard the codex explain it in Mass Effect 1, yet I seen fans act like its science and somehow makes it justified. Most of this comes from Bioware forums, which has never exactly been rational or had any sort of boundaries. Most off this mentality dropped off as the years went by but you still see a rare one here and there.
The most common argument would be "Mass Effect guns would be better than real life guns" and cite general things real life guns can already do, or just cite how ME guns are new and our guns are "old." Needless to say, that argument would be based on no actual firearm knowledge or what modern guns can do.
For instance, a "bullet proof" armor is nothing more than a sale's pitch. Modern armor can't stop bullets even from a Kar 98, a rifle from 1935. There are sniper rifles now that can through through pretty much everything you put in front of it. Even concrete. Body armor doesn't mean much.
The argument boasts how a small sheared projectile to have greater power than previously possible, but I haven't exactly seen anything different from a normal gun. For Mass Effect fans to claim "Our guns are obsolete" a gun from Mass Effect would have to puncture any material to live up to the hype. I would even accept greater accuracy, but guns are not always supposed to be 100% accurate. Guns tend to fill a variety of roles. So basically a SMG from Mass Effect would be able to shoot through walls and reduce enemies to bloody piles of gibs to live up to its hype. Hell, a SMG being shot in a space station would have enough force to puncture the hull and destabilize everything if the hype was true. Even mechs would be reduced to nothing by a pistol if the hype was to be believed. Yet ME guns don't puncture walls and mechs are common security forces. Armor, something even modern guns laugh at, is suddenly a thing in Mass Effect. So unless mass Effect has found materials made of enchanted adamantium, Mass Effect's guns seem weaker than real life weapons we have now. No kinetic shield would possibly protect you in a real 100% realistic scenario, hell any kind of armor would be impossible. Making mechs expensive and useless as security.
The argument really falls apart when Mass Effect uses "little boys" and "fat men" to describe the power of a ship's weapons. Bombs that are long since obsolete for the last 40 years since the Tsar Bomba. To us, little boys and fat men are pea shooters compared to the exponential increase in the power of our modern weapons, even by 1961 standards. When taken into context of what we have now, eezo hasn't exactly been a great leap in terms of power. With eezo, we are almost exactly where we started. Barely anything changed. We can pierce armor, the bullet isn't weak.
The FTL travel is also space magic. By the time the Quarians left their worlds using FTL travel and travel towards Earth for example, they would arrive long after humans went extinct. Time dilation.
The reapers would theoretically have the same problem. Even with relays they would arrive long after all the species died out. So reapers can't wait in the "void" for millions of years. By the time they get to the void, its already past the time for harvesting. If they got there before the harvesting, they would have to immediately leave to make it back to even have a chance of harvesting.
So I am left wondering:
What makes Bioware special? If anything at all? Why does Bioware seem to attract such as a die hard fanbase? Including the more weird ones from Bioware forums that try to build Mass Effect sex dolls out off clothes, and tape. I seen stories with 1/10th the plot holes Mass Effect has, and get 1,000x the hate Mass Effect did (until ME3). I know there are gamers who know physics, gamers who know how real life guns generally work, etc.
So how did Bioware get away with it for 5 years before anyone actually noticed the errors in the world building? And this mentality just got more and more rare? Why would any fan takes it so seriously they apply Mass Effect science to the real world? Is it just Bioware's appeal and how they tell a person their stories? Or did I miss the mocking of Mass Effect's space magic in 2007?