Trivia / Zap Dramatic

• Acting for Two: Happens most often with Michael Gibson, but there are other instances: In "Move or Die", Jennifer Gould plays both Wilma and the police officer she calls in, and in the Agricultural Institute of Canada's Professionalism and Ethics Simulation, Dennis O'Connor plays both John the Realtor and Mike of the Farmer family he's offering to purchase assets from. Most other games don't credit who plays whom, but in "Sir Basil Pike Public School", the kid from Ferndale that Tariq helps interrogate sounds just like Tariq speaking at a higher pitch, and it's also likely that Lisa Brown plays multiple staff members in one scene. The limited number of actors credited for "The Track Meet" strongly suggests that Chip and Jimmy have the same voice.
• Approval of God: Michael Gibson found the Retsupurae videos funny, and they boosted subscriptions to his site.
• Colbert Bump: After Retsupurae noticed these videos, more people started to check out Ambition.
  • The videos themselves had a few people look at the original song that is used in the intro of the series.
• The Other Darrin: In her second appearance, Bridget's mother has received a new voice actress. May also count as The Other Marty due to rerecording lines for a Flashback, like the Mediator examples below.
  • Bridget too. In The Stinger of episode 2, she's voiced by Tricia Brioux, as she was in "The Lusty Barfly". From episode 7 onward, Bridget is voiced by Gaye Hardiman instead.
  • Dr. Russell's new voice in episode 10 largely drops the campy posh accent he had in episode 6 and merely sounds snobby like Victor Krantz. In "The Print Shop", Dr. Russell's lookalike, Bill Gimel, speaks in an even quicker and more casual tone of voice, closer to that of Frank Crabtree, while in an ad for a negotiation workshop, Bill sounds like an older country gentleman.
  • Evidently the remakes of The Mediator games were made so late that not all the original voice actors were available to record new lines. While Michael Wadsworth played Jeff McCluskey in "Union vs. Management", he was dubbed over by Michael Gibson for "The Swearing Archer and the Association". Nadine from "The Conflict at Staff Quarters" sounds quite different from Sonia of "The Angry Neighbors" as well.
• Recycled Script: Entries in The Mediator series were remade to suit other topical issues and organizations at some point, as seen here.
• What Could Have Been: The teaser at the end of episode 9 is very different from what the final installment turned out to be. The original plan seemed to be that we would play as Rolf having to deal with the even bigger players on the other end of the Paxwic deal. Given that these shadowy figures are described as "pure evil" it may have also explained why Rolf was so invested in the deal that he was willing to kill, despite suffering from terminal prostate cancer that would soon render the money moot.
  • After the cliffhanger ending, the series was supposed to continue in a sequel entitled "Ambition: The Mystery Continues." It's been over six years since the last episode, so it's not very likely that the mystery will be continuing anytime soon.
    • As of 2012, Gibson is apparently working on another project about "a dinner party from Hell." This has not come out yet, but we may see more Ambition if and when this other thing gets finished.
    • In Episode 25 of slowbeef and Diabetus' Retsutalk podcast, it was confirmed that Gibson is in the brainstorming phase of five or six more new Ambition episodes.
    • As of December 2020, no new information is available and it can safely be assumed that this project won’t be coming to fruition.
    • Adobe Flash is now dead as of January 2021. There won't be any more episodes of Ambition unless he learns a new system and given the difficulty he had with a simple program like Flash, there's almost certainly not going to be anything further from him.
  • Early versions of the site revealed some very different descriptions for episodes before they were released, providing the strongest evidence of Writing by the Seat of Your Pants.
  Episode 5: Death and Betrayal "Three murder suspects and only one is telling the truth."
  Episode 6: The Editor "The newspaper editor is faced with an ethical decision when the killer calls."
  Episode 7: The Ex-Wife "Help Ted negotiate with Bridget to get access to his children."
  • Before "The Angry Neighbors" was released, the site promised another drama in October 2000 that never came to fruition, apparently starring a prototype of Helen.
    The Jealous Mate: "She's hopping mad and not listening to reason. Talk your way out of this one!"
  • "Move Or Die" was planned to be a Television mini-series meant to "bridge television and the internet", by having the characters die in the series, which meant audiences could then play through the games online to try and get them out of the situation. It didn't get very far, and only the first game in 6 ever got released.