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Protogen
April 27, 2026 at 04:45 PM
Cleaned punctuation and AI-style phrasing (2026-04-27)
Protogen is the primary antagonist faction in The Expanse: Osiris Reborn. Described by the official game account as "a private company from Earth, not overly-famous, but extremely well-funded," Protogen can afford the best possible equipment for its security force. Crossing paths with them means trouble. In the game, the player fights Protogen mercenaries and operatives from the opening escape on Eros Station through to the campaign's later acts.
The developers have noted that the game has a different branch of Protogen than the one shown in the books and TV series. While the broader Expanse story follows characters who encounter Protogen's leadership and research divisions, the player in Osiris Reborn runs into the corporation's security and military operations from the perspective of a Pinkwater Security mercenary. This means the game can tell an original story within the established lore without contradicting the events fans already know.
In The Expanse universe, Protogen is a subsidiary of Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile, one of the largest and most powerful megacorporations in the solar system. Mao-Kwikowski is based on Luna and has business interests spanning the entire Sol system. Protogen operates as the conglomerate's black-ops division, responsible for classified research and development that the parent company keeps at arm's length for deniability.
Protogen's leadership included executive Vice President Antony Dresden, who headed the biological research division and personally orchestrated the Eros incident. Dresden ran operations from Thoth Station, a shadowy R&D facility where Protogen scientists studied the protomolecule and monitored the Eros experiment remotely. Thoth Station was eventually discovered and captured by an OPA assault force aided by the crew of the Rocinante, and Dresden was killed during the operation.
Protogen's most significant operation was the controlled infection of Eros Station. The plan called for two ships to travel to Eros: the Osiris with its science teams, and the Anubis carrying live protomolecule samples. The Anubis never arrived intact after becoming infected, but the protomolecule reached Eros through Julie Mao, the sole survivor of the Anubis, who carried the infection to the station unknowingly.
To carry out the experiment, Protogen first withdrew its security contract on Eros and replaced it with Carne Por la Machina, a puppet organization Protogen created specifically to facilitate the infection. When the lockdown was triggered, the station's population was directed into contamination cells disguised as fallout shelters. The entire population of approximately 1.5 million people was infected within hours. Protogen scientists observed the results remotely from Thoth Station.
Protogen commanded significant military resources, most notably the Amun-Ra-class stealth frigates. A total of nine of these vessels were commissioned, each named after a deity from Egyptian mythology. The stealth frigates were among the most advanced warships in the solar system, capable of operating undetected by conventional sensors.
Asset | Details |
|---|---|
Amun-Ra-class stealth frigates | Nine vessels total. Six were used in the attack on the MCRN Donnager and destroyed. Two others were lost in separate engagements. |
The Osiris | The last operational Amun-Ra-class vessel. Served as escort for Thoth Station. Destroyed by the Rocinante during the OPA assault on Thoth. |
Thoth Station | Protogen's primary research and command facility. Used to monitor the Eros experiment. Captured by OPA forces. |
Ground forces | Well-equipped security personnel and mercenaries encountered throughout the game. Armed with top-tier military hardware. |
The game's title itself references the Osiris, one of Protogen's stealth frigates. While the original Osiris was destroyed during the assault on Thoth Station in the established lore, the name carries thematic weight: the player commandeers a Protogen vessel during their escape from Eros, creating a direct link between the player's ship and Protogen's military legacy.
Throughout the campaign, Protogen is a persistent and dangerous adversary. Their forces attack Pinkwater Station early in the game, forcing the player to defend the station or negotiate a surrender. Their operatives appear across multiple locations in the solar system as the player uncovers the extent of the protomolecule conspiracy.
Protogen's resources are substantial. Their mercenaries are better equipped than most security forces the player encounters, and their operations are backed by the vast wealth of Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile. The game's official description warns that Protogen "can afford the best possible equipment for their security force," meaning encounters with their troops are among the most challenging combat scenarios in the game.
Protogen's research also extends to Project Caliban, the program to create protomolecule-human hybrid supersoldiers. The player encounters the results of this program during the campaign, representing some of the most dangerous enemies in the game.
Name | Role |
|---|---|
Antony Dresden | Executive Vice President of Protogen's biological research division. Mastermind of the Eros experiment. Killed after the fall of Thoth Station. |
Jules-Pierre Mao | CEO of Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile, Protogen's parent corporation. Funded the protomolecule research and Project Caliban. |
In the closed-beta build, Protogen is the principal antagonist the twins face directly. The game's inciting event is the controlled release of the Protomolecule aboard Eros Station, which Protogen engineered to wipe out and reanimate the station's population. The player's twin pair survives the outbreak, escapes aboard a vessel seized from the attacking forces, and carries that ship to Pinkwater Four Station to debrief. Protogen pursues them there within the same mission, which puts the corporation in the role of an active pursuer rather than a distant research entity.
This is the closed beta's framing for the corporation: Protogen uses the Protomolecule as a weapon rather than treating it purely as a research subject. The Eros operation proves the corporation is willing to sacrifice more than a million civilians for data, and the raid on Pinkwater Four proves it is willing to destroy an entire mercenary base to recover a single ship and two witnesses.
During their escape from Eros, the twins seize a Protogen-aligned ship and use it to reach Pinkwater territory. That vessel becomes the Gemini, which is the player's mobile base for the rest of the game and shares its call sign with the twins themselves. Protogen wants the ship back for two overlapping reasons:
The hardware: the stolen vessel likely carries encrypted data, boarding logs, or Protomolecule-operation equipment tied to the Eros incident. Losing it to a Pinkwater crew is a containment failure.
The witnesses: the player and J, also known as Jay, survived an event no non-Protogen personnel were meant to live through. Leaving them free to talk is a second containment failure.
The corporation moves on Pinkwater Four with enough force to obtain both. A Protogen ship docks with the station during the twins' debrief with Oscar O'Connell, Director of Pinkwater Four, and demands the crew turn the twins over. Refusal triggers a full boarding action. Cooperation strips the station's private server banks instead. Neither outcome lets the twins simply walk away.
Protogen's boarding force is mechanically distinct from other enemies in the closed beta. The corporation deploys a mixed force that stresses the player across multiple fight layers: interior residential corridors, the director's office defense, a spin-gravity exterior hull sequence wearing magnetic boots, and the final push to the hangar. The table below summarizes the enemy types the corporation deploys and the counters that worked best in the closed-beta build.
Enemy Type | Behavior | Countermeasure |
|---|---|---|
Standard boarding trooper | Cover-to-cover riflemen who flank the player, throw grenades to flush cover, and fall back when taking fire. | Conventional cover-based fire is sufficient. Shredding destructible cover exposes them quickly. |
Shielded charger | Melee rusher who closes distance behind a personal shield and swings at the player in close quarters. | A charged Pandemic Algorithm stun locks the charger in place and cracks the shield open, making the rest of the kill trivial. |
Heavily armored infantry | Thicker enemies that shrug off sustained rifle fire and hold central choke points during the interior firefight. | Armor-piercing wrist-launcher rounds one-shot most of them. Tactical Scanner reveal plus the +30 percent damage bonus also helps. |
Mini-boss commander | Elite Protogen operator deployed at a choke point during the raid. Accompanied by a support drone that heals him continuously while it is alive. | Destroy the healer drone first, then focus fire on the commander. Engaging J onto the drone with an Engage command usually kills it in a single pass. |
Exterior EVA boarders | Troopers dropped onto the station hull from a Protogen boarding craft. Fight the player across magnetic-boot surfaces while the station rotates for gravity. | Use the Gemini's PDCs as an environmental exploit through Zafar. The PDC fire shreds enemy cover and sends bodies drifting free. |
The corporation coordinates attacks across gravity and vacuum environments in the same mission. Interior engagements use standard cover-shooter fundamentals with destructible surfaces. Exterior engagements drop the audio mix into the muted vacuum treatment the game uses for all EVA sequences, so Protogen gunfire reads mostly as suit vibrations and pings off nearby hull plating. Enemies killed outside lose their boot grip and drift with the station's spin, which doubles as a visual signal that Protogen forces have been cleared from a section of hull.
Several traits of the Protogen force on Pinkwater Four are worth noting as consistent with the corporation's wider profile:
Mercenary boarding teams, not regulated military. Protogen arrives on its own ship rather than working through MCR channels or any other regulated force. The corporation bypasses the normal chain of authority that would flag an operation of this scale.
Corporate-grade firepower. The closed-beta build presents Protogen troops as noticeably better equipped than the baseline Pinkwater crew, which matches the corporation's description as a private company with the funding to buy the best possible gear for its security operators.
Willingness to scorch the earth. Detonating a nuclear device to destroy a spin station occupied by civilians is treated as an acceptable option if Pinkwater resists. The corporation trades a whole station and its residents for operational secrecy.
Willingness to harvest data. On the softer-looking path, Protogen walks off with private servers from Oscar O'Connell's office. The corporation is as happy to take data as it is to destroy people, and the stolen servers become a long-term threat to the player.
Use of the Protomolecule as a deployable weapon. The Eros operation is presented as a live deployment, not a lab test. Reanimated victims are part of the early combat experience rather than an off-screen horror.
The Pinkwater Four encounter is the first time the player decides how to deal with Protogen directly. The decision happens during the debrief with Oscar O'Connell as the Protogen ship is already docking. The two branches are summarized below. Neither removes Protogen as a threat, so long-term reactivity continues after the beta window.
Path | Short-Term Outcome | Long-Term Consequence |
|---|---|---|
Resist Protogen | Persuade Oscar O'Connell to rally Pinkwater defenders. Armed NPC soldiers fight alongside the player during the initial firefight, and the station armory is emptied to arm them. | Once the player escapes, Protogen executes Oscar and detonates a nuclear device that destroys the entire station, killing Larry and the residents who spoke with the twins earlier. |
Stand down | Tell Oscar to cooperate. Pinkwater lowers its arms and the twins sneak out through service corridors alone. The station armory stays stocked and can be looted for extra gear. | Protogen walks off with a cache of private servers from the director's office. The data almost certainly contains information on the twins, seeding a long-term threat that follows the player for the rest of the campaign. |
This is the defining choice and consequence moment of the closed beta. It also reshapes smaller elements of the mission. On the resist path, the armory near the residential block has already been raided by Pinkwater's own defenders and is largely empty. On the stand-down path, the same armory remains stocked with weapons, ammunition, and subsystems. A skill-gated engineering route through the station is accessible only under certain circumstances and contains unique loot that most playthroughs never see.
Osiris Reborn keeps Protogen consistent with its counterpart in the broader Expanse universe. The corporation retains its position as a private, Earth-backed entity with scientific ambition that has crossed every ethical line, and its role as the driver behind the Protomolecule experiment is preserved. The developers have noted that the game focuses on a different branch of the corporation than the books and show followed, so the player deals with Protogen's security and military operations directly rather than with its research leadership. That separation is what lets the game tell an original story, including the pursuit of the twins and the raid on Pinkwater Four, without rewriting or contradicting events fans already know.
Within the game's own story arc, Protogen is a persistent pressure on the player. The closed beta introduces them as the corporation that burned an entire station to cover an experiment, then chased the only survivors to a second station and was willing to burn that one too. Mention of Project Caliban and the wider faction network in the game's pre-release material sets up further encounters with Protogen forces and Protogen research outputs across the solar system.
Protogen commanders speak during the Pinkwater Four boarding sequence but are not given on-screen identifying names in the closed beta. Auto-generated captions render the corporation's name inconsistently as Progen, Proteen, or Protogene. Only Protogen is correct. Named individuals associated with the Eros operation in broader Expanse lore, such as Antony Dresden of the biological research division, are covered in the sections above and remain lore references rather than characters the player meets in the closed-beta window.
