Well, fun if you like a mixture of an insane computer, easily-killed pawns, and a wild dystopic setting. Let me explain.
Many, many years ago there was a table-top role-playing game called Paranoia (latest version here). Your character lived and worked in Alpha Complex, a big domed city like the one in Logan’s Run, run by a insane computer. You work as a troubleshooter, i.e., you find the trouble and shoot it. Throw in mutants, Secret Societies, and psychic powers (which all the people you hunt down possess.) Oh, and you are a mutant, belong to a Secret Society, and have a psychic power. Imagine the Three Stooges in this scenario and you won’t go far wrong in understanding the game. Your character will likely die in wildly implausible ways, but it’s OK. Your clone is activated as soon as you die, and takes up where you left off. About the only straightforward way of dying is by getting shot in the back by one of your teammates.
Fast forward to today. Modiphius Entertainment has created Paranoia: The Uncooperative Board Game. You still work as a troubleshooter in Alpha Complex, but things are (a little) more straightforward. You start as a Red Level Security Clearance clone, with the goal to be the first one to make it to Ultra-Violet Level Security Clearance clone before everyone else.
The game is played in rounds. Each round involves every player taking a turn. On their turn, a player takes action cards, letting them do things like explore Alpha Complex (placing room tiles down to create the ‘map’ as you play), or complete tasks. The action cards are color-coded for different security levels. If you play a color above your level, there a chance the other players can call you out for ‘treason!”. If that happens it can affect your actions on your turn, like having to give one of your ‘loyalty’ tokens to another player. That can make it harder to complete a task. Completing a task is one way you advance up the ladder to Ultra-Violet.
Some old college buddies came over today and we spent the day playing. Our morning session had us trying to learn how the game worked. We played for around two hours before we decided to break for lunch. We stumbled over several things, like how does your clone get equipment, or activate the elevator so you can move to a different level of the map. We figured we were doing something wrong or didn’t understand the rules well enough.
After lunch we went back at it. Looking over the rules we figured out the things that were giving us problems in the morning session. The game ran much smoother after that. We got the equipment thing worked out, and we advanced up the level chart. In the morning game, only one player moved up two levels, and another moved up one level.
The rooms are also color-coded. If the room you are in is of a higher color code than you, guardbots will make their way toward you for ‘loitering.’ If they catch you, then you have to spend your action cards defeating them instead of doing more important things like completing tasks. If you end your turn in such a room, you might take damage as detailed by directives on the tasks cards. If you are several levels lower on the color code scale you take more damage!
In short, we laid out the different rooms, defeated the guardbots within them, called each other out on treasonous actions, interfered with other players completing their tasks, and had a lot of fun.
If you like competitive games, and can be cool about it if another player blocks your attempts at winning, you might enjoy this game. (Some folks don’t have the right temperament to play competitive games.) There is some strategy involved, some sneaky bits (like seeing if the other players can spot you attempting something treasonous – I got away with it on one turn and smiled inwardly), and humor on the action cards, which have pithy sayings from the Computer on them. If you loved the original TTRPG version of Paranoia, you’ll like this version.
You can pick up your copy of Paranoia: The Uncooperative Board Game here.
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