Obsidian Entertainment has posted another blog about our upcoming Alpha Protocol on IGN.com. In the blog, Audio Producer Mike Dowling shows how a conversation comes together from concept to execution. Having seen the game in action, the dialogue trees can be pretty interesting, especially when you consider the complexities of the conversations. The blog outlines this quite well, even showing visuals of the flow charts to give you a sense of how intricate they can be, here’s a taste:

At the beginning there are three possible starting points for the scene that either goes along in the standard matinee to Stance Choice to matinee format; or things get more complex dependent on the variables the player has already set throughout the course of the game. Which hub has the player gone to after Saudi first? What activities did the player do in said hub? And once in Moscow did the player go to Grigori first or not? Each of those variables are accounted for in the first few moments of the scene.

Take a look at the full blog over at IGN!

It’s no big secret that we love us some Valkyria Chronicles here at SEGA. It looks Destructoid does too, as the game recently showed up in their top 10 games of the last decade!

Chad Concelmo, the author of the blogs detailing the top 50, wrote:

“Everyone that played it instantly fell in love with its gorgeous visuals, solid strategy gameplay, and surprisingly moving story. In a way, this slow build only helped the game in the long run. Instead of the over-hyping that curses most big videogame releases, Valkyria Chronicles was able to be sought out by gamers rather than shoved down their throats.

And once found, gamers were rewarded with one of the richest, most brilliantly constructed turn-based strategy games ever made, topped off with a powerful, extremely moving story (one that affected me in ways I can’t even describe) and a wonderfully endearing cast of characters. There is an extra special place in people’s hearts for Valkyria Chronicles. It is easily the most pleasant gaming surprise of the last decade.”

Well said, Chad. Cheers for the VC love!

You can check out the full top 10 listing here. Also, be sure to check out number 27 on their list.

In case you haven’t already, be sure to get your votes in for PSO-World’s Rappies make it better contest! Celebrate PS0 and the PS series’ Rappy Heritage – and give some props to the people behind all the fantastic entries, which you can see on their contest page.

Vote for your favorites here, and be sure to check back on PSOW soon for the winners! Good luck to everyone who submitted entries, and seriously – nice job. (We got a good kick out of these here in the office!)

It’s time for another Free Stuff Friday! Time got away from us this week in the holiday rush, so we don’t have a video for you this week. But we do have some great stuff, which I hope makes up for it!

Holiday Schedule

This is the US team’s last Free Stuff Friday for 2009! The UK team is doing the giveaway next Friday (December 18th) and then we’re off for holiday break. There will be no giveaways on Friday, December 25th or Friday, January 1st. The US team will be back with the first giveaway of 2010 on January 8th.

Happy Holidays from all of us at SEGA of America!

On the Block

1. Bis Wall Graphic

We’ve partnered with LTL Prints to bring you some fantastic wall graphics of your favorite characters from Jet Set Radio. The wall graphic that we’re giving away is Bis, but there are lots of others as well. If you don’t win it, you can order the same one we’re giving away here, or you can see all the available graphics here.

Congrats to our winner, @ER_nut!

2. PlaySEGA Controller and Voucher

You may have heard that we recently re-launched PlaySEGA with some old-school Genesis games and a brand new VIP program. You  have to have a VIP membership to play the Genesis games, and with your membership you get a PlaySEGA-branded USB controller so you can play the games using that instead of a keyboard.

This prize includes a voucher for a free VIP membership to PlaySEGA and the USB controller, so you can get right to gaming online.

Congrats to our winner @StevenM86!

3. PlaySEGA Controller and Voucher

If you don’t win the first time, don’t fret! You’ve got a second chance to win.

Congrats to our winner @nonstopnerds!

4. Empire: Total War (PC) Special Forces Edition

This is the Special Forces edition of the game, which includes six exclusive in-game units, the History Channel program The Revolution on DVD, an art book and a fold-out campaign map.

Congrats to our winner @Talus!

5. SEGA Polo from E3 2008

We’ve got some black SEGA-branded polo shirts! These were purchased for SEGA employees to wear at E3 2008, and now you can have one of your own! I dug through the box and saw sizes M – 2XL, so the winner can pick their size.

Congrats to our winner @OmgahWaffles!

6. Yellow Sonic T-Shirt from Japan

These have been very popular giveaway items, so we’ve got another for you! As before, these are yellow t-shirts with Sonic the Hedgehog on them, and they are straight from our friends at the SEGA Japan offices. We only have size Medium in these.

Congrats to @@spymasterralph!

How it Works

1. You must be following us on Twitter to be eligible. (If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can create one by going to http://www.twitter.com and click the green “get started — join!” button in the center of the page.)
2. At random times on Friday, we will announce the prize we are giving away, and what number of response you need to be to win. Send us a direct message (DM) via Twitter and be that number to win the prize. (@ replies do not count as entries!)
3. All followers are eligible to win all prizes, unless a restriction is noted. Restrictions are usually due to the prize being region-locked. For example, US games that won’t work on UK gaming systems. There may also be age restrictions due to the rating of the game.
4. We will announce the winner on our Twitter feed once eligibility is confirmed.

Make Sure We’re Following You on Twitter

If you are currently following us on Twitter, please be sure that we are following you as well. You can do this by making sure that SEGA is in your “followers” list, or by going to DoesFollow and typing SEGA in the first blank, your Twitter username in the second, and pressing the “check” button. You can reverse this to be sure that you are following us. If you are following us, but we’re not following you, please send a message to @SEGA and we will follow you. This is important, because only people we follow can send us direct messages (DMs), and DMs are the only way to enter the giveaways.

How to Send Direct Messages on Twitter

There are a few ways to send us a Direct Message on Twitter. The easiest way is to go to our Twitter page and select “message” under the “Actions” heading in the side bar. If you do not see “message”, this means that we are not following you. Please send a message to @sega to let us know, and we will follow you. When you click “message” you will be taken to a window where you can type a message and press send.

You may also select the “direct messages” tab from your Twitter homepage, and select SEGA from the drop-down menu at the top of the page. Again, if you don’t see our name there, it’s probably because we’re not following you. Let us know, and we’ll follow you.

There are also many Twitter clients that you can use instead of using the website. These include TweetDeck, Twitteriffic, Tweetie, and Twhirl. Each of these programs works differently, so you’ll want to figure out how to send a direct message on the program you use. If you want to send us a test message, we’ll let you know if we received it or not.