I picked up Triangle Agency (2024) at PAX Unplugged 2024, seduced in part by the graphic design, in part by the promise that someone uttered that it was like Delta Green, but funny. This is only nominally true. I think what it has most in common with Delta Green is that it was fun to read, in a way very few RPGs are. A lot of folks also reference the videogame Control and the TV show Severance, but mostly what I came away with was Paranoia, to the point that the fact that no one else seems to be reminded of Paranoia actively bums me out.
System first, because it is genuinely interesting. Dice pool, using D4, every 3 is a success. All rolls are 6D4; with only one 3 needed to succeed, this puts the base chance of success pretty high. This is mitigated by burnout and other attribute and situation-based modifiers that both add and remove successes. These toe the scale so thoroughly that the game assumes most attempted rolls are going to fail, which pushes players to either use their Anomaly powers or call in help from the Agency (both of which play into the desires of the Agency). Side note: Mörk Borg gets a lot of shit for its graphic design being hard to parse, but lemme tell you, this RPG is easy to read and still needs a systems reference document, stat, because extracting the system from the chatty text is a chore and a half.
Players take the role of characters who have special anomalous powers who are employed by the Agency (a privately owned corporation with no government affiliation). In an unexpected bit of meta, we, the players and the world we live in are actually hallucinations of the characters used to cope with their broken perception of reality, so when we come together to play the game, the results are real and tangible in the “actual” world. In play, scenarios are basically an X-Files-style monster of the week formula.
But all is not what it appears! Of course. The Agency has this all rigged (taking the same essential role as the Computer in Paranoia) and many mechanics for the game are “playwalled” meaning players only get access to them once specific things happen in the game, meaning A. They have to make a lot of decisions without understanding the consequences or B. They have to cheat and read the sections they aren’t supposed to read. I find this both delightful and irritating, waffling between both extremes basically moment to moment.
I dig the formula and the conspiracy complications, I think, overall. I dig the way the book is simultaneously an employee handbook and a send-up of an employee handbook. I don’t dig how difficult that makes it for me to feel like I could use this book, as written, to run the game (and honestly, I am probably the only person I play with who would be willing to try). My biggest concern, though, is tone. It is a very funny book and I think in play it would also be very funny. But on some level, I think the game wants to be paranoid and frightening and nothing I have seen so far here makes me believe it can turn that tone. This might be the handbook aesthetic coupled with the bright and welcoming art. Even when it’s weird, it gives me vibes of visual novels or, I dunno, Dead End: Paranormal Park. Which is a legitimate vibe, but maybe not one for me. And maybe I’ll never know, because I was a good boy and only read what I was allowed to read.
