Alpha Protocol - Q & A @ 1Up

1Up has a question and answer session with Obsidian's Chris Avellone and Chris Parker previewing their espionage rpg in development, Alpha Protocol. Here's Avellone on the approach to dialogue:

1UP: When I hear about a game that you guys are doing, I think of previous writing-heavy titles like PlaneScape: Torment or Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer. Can you talk a bit about the writing and dialogue for Alpha Protocol?

CA: What we're trying to do with Alpha Protocol is tailor the dialogue system to reinforce the feel of the game -- give it more of a 24, or "timed momentum," feel. When I say that, I mean that in a lot of our previous games like PlaneScape or KOTOR 2 or Mask of the Betrayer, the conversations in those games are very interrogation-based, in that you can go through each dialogue option repeatedly and explore everything that character has to say. In Alpha Protocol, that is a lot different; there is one path during the conversation, and it keeps going in a forward direction -- you don't usually have the chance to go back and talk to people again. We call this overall system the Dialogue Stance System, which was developed by Brian Mitsoda who worked on Vampire: Bloodlines. The whole intent of the conversation system is to make conversations feel more real, so a lot of the Stance choices you make won't loop back on themselves; they'll take one path of the conversation, and you'll see reactivity and results based on that choice.