Obsidian Talks Sexy Time In Alpha Protocol

Alpha Protocol developer Obsidian Entertainment has revealed why it chose to include sex scenes in the upcoming espionage RPG.“I don’t see sex in games as an achievement to be earned, but as an experience, and I think Alpha Protocol delivers it as an experience first,” Obsidian’s Chris Avellone told VG247.“There’s a lot of emotional depth in Alpha Protocol from bonding over mutual respect, friendship, questioning traditional loyalty (at points, quite extreme), and even what I would call “no-mances,” which are devoid of romantic feeling entirely but provide a nice character arc for the player and the target, regardless.”He goes on to criticize developers which add sexual content for shock value only.“I think the focus on sex solely as sex (or more specifically, the taboo it has) is pretty ridiculous.”Elsewhere in the interview, Avellone explains why the traditional black/white morality system in RPG games does not apply to Alpha Protocol.“In Alpha Protocol, however, rather than you being marked as good or evil (which is a weak classification for the spy genre, in my opnion), individual people’s perceptions of you change,” he said.“We do allow the player to offer motivations and commentary on their own actions in the game (which may not mesh at all with their motivations at the end-game, with great results), but NPCs react to the player based on the NPC’s own morality judgments, not the player’s – or ours as game designers.”Alpha Protocol is due for release on PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 in Spring 2010.