Trivia / Alpha Protocol

• Ronald Sung has a physical resemblance to real-life blogger Roland Soong. The perception of his politics as being extreme compared to mainstream Taiwanese politics may be a reference to James Soong (no relation)
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: In 2019, due to a copyright license regarding a song in the game expiring, Alpha Protocol was pulled from Steam. Normally these matters are resolved within a week as the game is updated to remove the song and it gets relisted, but Sega left the game unavailble to purchase for nearly 5 years. In 2024, GOG, SEGA, and Obsidian rereleased the game on GOG, with all the licensed music intact.
• Screwed by the Network: When the game was nearing completion, SEGA declared they weren't too happy with the current state of the game, and announced they would push the release date back a couple of months. Obsidian hoped that this would leave them with more time to give the game some much-needed polish, the logical thing to assume since the game was delayed anyway, but when they appealed to SEGA for more development time in the delay period, SEGA flat out refused to greenlight it.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The entire game was nearly cancelled, as Sega had grown tired of Obsidian's ambition exceeding what it could practically do alongside the game having a troubled development due to the chosen engine not being suited for stealth. Sega ultimately chose to instead cancel a planned Aliens RPG Obsidian was also making, as they had another licensed game with the IP on the way.
  • According to an interview with Chris Avellone, a possible sequel would have involved multiplayer in the form of intelligence-sharing among players and a Denser and Wackier tone in the vibe of Kill Bill (with the Saints Row series being used as an example).
  • The entire plot was rewritten when Brian Mitsoda left Obsidian and Chris Avellone took over the project. Not much is known about the original version, but judging by Syriana having been mentioned in early interviews as a major influence, it would've been quite a bit more serious.
  • The player was originally meant to have the option to play Thorton as a woman, but this was one of the features cut to make deadlines.
  • Brayko's theme song was originally going to be "The Final Countdown," rather than "Turn Up the Radio."
  • Obsidian had early plans for an Alpha Protocol 2, with their pitch to Sega being nearly forty pages long. However Sega turned the idea down, and have since sat dormant on the IP.