The Ryder siblings are cryogenically frozen and dispatched alongside their father and tens of thousands of other colonists on a 600-year journey to the Andromeda galaxy, departing before the events of "Mass Effect 3". The ark carrying the humans, the "Hyperion", arrives at the wrong drop point, far from the forward command centre of the Andromeda Initiative, the Nexus, and cut off from contact with both it and the other arks. The player-controlled Ryder later succeeds their father as the "Hyperion's" Pathfinder, and is tasked with leading their crew on the command ship "The Tempest", successfully settling the Heleus Cluster, and improving life aboard the Nexus, a galactic hub for the colonizer races from the Milky Way.