The Inside Scoop on Gaming

Delta Green is Pagan Publishing's sourcebook for Call of Cthulhu in the 1990s, and it is absolutely terrific -- nothing short of an intelligent, useful, intriguing reworking of the venerable Call of Cthulhu game itself. While set in the realm of aliens and conspiracies made famous by the X-Files, it exists as a logical extension of the Call of Cthulhu 1920s setting, as well. It is almost eerily well done -- I have no trouble believing that the folks at Pagan Publishing have (as they claim) been working on it for several years, and it shows every sign of being the labour of love of some very talented people. I've read it twice and run the included adventures with my group, and I now consider Delta Green the best RPG book to come down the pipe in a long time -- quite possibly the best I've ever seen in my ten years of gaming.

The book itself clocks in at a whopping 300+ pages. About half describes the setting and history and the Cthulhu Mythos in the 1990s; the rest is a series of appendices -- a bibliography of books on the U. S. government and conspiracy theories, a glossary of spy-talk, an explanation of security classifications, a bunch of realistic-looking government documents related to the background, descriptions of various federal agencies (including character templates for members of those agencies), new skills, a list of modern firearms and three adventures. In short, a lot of cool stuff you can't live without. There's also a very good index, with entries like "Shub-Niggurath, Dark Young of" and "Hitler, risen." The book is sparsely illustrated, but the artwork is well used -- consistent in tone, and very atmospheric.

The premise of Delta Green is that since the FBI raid on Innsmouth (which was basically a part of a throw-away epilogue in H. P. Lovecraft's Shadow Over Innsmouth and was a significant part of Chaosium's supplement Escape From Innsmouth), various shadowy groups within the U. S. government have been aware of aspects of the Cthulhu Mythos, but without ever understanding it. The evolution of these groups is the overriding theme of Delta Green's inspired history of the Mythos in the twentieth century -- especially that part of the twentieth century since the prohibition-era activities of most other Call of Cthulhu products (and most of Lovecraft's writing). The title organization is one such conspiracy -- since World War II, Delta Green has existed in one guise or another, tracking down Mythos incidents, dealing with them as effectively and permanently as possible -- and praying it's enough.

The whole history section is excellent, and surprisingly useful. There are plenty of details here to flesh out 1990s adventures and characters and having a consistent, believable background like this is vital to the political-conspiracy setting (where would the X-Files' government conspiracies be without mysterious references to Nazi eugenics programs and Cold War spying projects?). Thankfully, it doesn't choose the path taken by most other conspiracy RPGs and put the Mythos behind every significant historical event (the "Vampires were behind the destruction of Pompeii" school of gaming) -- there's just enough "secret history" to provide an appropriately paranoid tone without straining the willing suspension of disbelief too much.

Which brings us into Delta Green's version of the Mythos in the 1990s. Unlike Chaosium's "Cthulhu Now" setting, Delta Green offers more than just standard Call of Cthulhu encounters given a '90s twist -- it offers a reworking and updating of Mythos themes. And it works surprisingly well. Gone, or at least reduced in importance, are many of the familiar Call of Cthulhu trappings -- the world-spanning cults of the 1920s have been destroyed or changed beyond recognition; the mind-shattering eldritch tomes have been relegated to the background; and the time for a small group of independent investigators to track down and destroy alien monstrosities is mostly over. In their place are more modern horrors. The best fleshed-out threat is the familiar alien "greys," who are mutilating cattle and abducting people on deserted stretches of highway, and who are part of an agenda even more sinister. Also tossed into the pot are the usual pop conspiracy suspects: black helicopters, secret government medical experiments, UFO researchers, New Age mysticism, Roswell -- even South American Nazis. And all of it is connected, wittingly or not, to the Mythos. All of this is written with a degree of thoughtfulness and effort sadly lacking in most RPG products, and the results show. The setting is consistent, logical, and eerily plausible in the same way that the best conspiracy-nut rantings are -- everything _almost_ makes sense, and the fact that it doesn't quite add up just makes it creepier.

The setting also provides something that Call of Cthulhu has long been missing -- a logical reason for a group of skilled (but not extraordinary) people to seek out these murderous cults and eldritch horrors. Delta Green exists as an illegal conspiracy that has infiltrated many different branches and departments of the U. S. government, especially the FBI. It functions by gathering information about potential supernatural phenomena from government reports and private-sector "friendlies" and arranging for Delta Green operatives (mostly government agents) to be assigned to the appropriate investigations and operations. By having PCs belong to Delta Green, there is an excellent rationale for introducing new characters, special equipment, and tidbits of information, and the fact that Delta Green characters are all government agents from different departments allows for characters with just about any specialized or general skill or group of skills. Want to play a high-clearance computer hacker? Take an NSA Computer Security Specialist. A stealthy fighter? Try a Navy SEAL. A pistol-packing psychologist? How 'bout an FBI Psychological Crimes Specialist? Most importantly for me, though, it is a perfect device for having a group of characters with diverse backgrounds not just get together, but stay together after their first encounter with the Mythos.

Unfortunately, the three Delta Green adventures included in the book are its weakest part. It's not that they're bad -- far from it -- but they don't really live up to the promise of the rest of the book. One of them is only vaguely related to the Mythos at all, and the others tie into only a couple of corners of the rest of the book. Personally, I would have rather seen them dive in and _use_ the other 250 pages -- as it stands, they could have been published on their own with an extra paragraph or two of background. Also, there are a few too many scenes of apocalyptic violence for my tastes. Within the three adventures are: a huge highway traffic accident, a mansion full of dead party-goers, the contamination and possible destruction of an entire town full of people, two gun battles with near-immortals, a disastrous government raid on a cult compound, and the immanent destruction of the Earth. Whew! Even when I left out a couple of the more cataclysmic scenes, my players joked that CNN reporters covering disaster news must know all their characters by first name. On the other hand, there is just as much cool stuff in the adventures, including some truly memorable scares and creepiness (my players were especially freaked when a routine medical examination discovered microscopic surgical incisions around the circumferences of their skulls...), and that's what it's all about in the end, anyway.

Overall, I think Delta Green is the best RPG book to come along in a long time -- and I think there's been a lot of good stuff released in the last couple years. Call of Cthulhu has always been my favorite game, but with Delta Green, it got even better. I really hope Pagan Publishing will follow up on this book (something mentioned in the text a couple of times), because there's an awful lot of potential here. I also hope everyone who has any interest at all in horror, conspiracy or Cthulhu gaming, or just refreshingly intelligent, original gaming in general, will go out and buy Delta Green -- you won't be disappointed.

Style: 5 (Excellent!)
Substance: 5 (Excellent!)

Delta Green
Author: Dennis Detwiller, Adam Scott Glancy, John Tynes Category: game Company/Publisher: Pagan Publishing Cost: $27.95 Page count: 305 ISBN: 1-88797-08-4 Playtest Review by Eric Brochu on 11/23/97. Genre tags: none	Delta Green is Pagan Publishing's sourcebook for Call of Cthulhu in the 1990s, and it is absolutely terrific -- nothing short of an intelligent, useful, intriguing reworking of the venerable Call of Cthulhu game itself. While set in the realm of aliens and conspiracies made famous by the X-Files, it exists as a logical extension of the Call of Cthulhu 1920s setting, as well. It is almost eerily well done -- I have no trouble believing that the folks at Pagan Publishing have (as they claim) been working on it for several years, and it shows every sign of being the labour of love of some very talented people. I've read it twice and run the included adventures with my group, and I now consider Delta Green the best RPG book to come down the pipe in a long time -- quite possibly the best I've ever seen in my ten years of gaming. The book itself clocks in at a whopping 300+ pages. About half describes the setting and history and the Cthulhu Mythos in the 1990s; the rest is a series of appendices -- a bibliography of books on the U. S. government and conspiracy theories, a glossary of spy-talk, an explanation of security classifications, a bunch of realistic-looking government documents related to the background, descriptions of various federal agencies (including character templates for members of those agencies), new skills, a list of modern firearms and three adventures. In short, a lot of cool stuff you can't live without. There's also a very good index, with entries like "Shub-Niggurath, Dark Young of" and "Hitler, risen." The book is sparsely illustrated, but the artwork is well used -- consistent in tone, and very atmospheric. The premise of Delta Green is that since the FBI raid on Innsmouth (which was basically a part of a throw-away epilogue in H. P. Lovecraft's Shadow Over Innsmouth and was a significant part of Chaosium's supplement Escape From Innsmouth), various shadowy groups within the U. S. government have been aware of aspects of the Cthulhu Mythos, but without ever understanding it. The evolution of these groups is the overriding theme of Delta Green's inspired history of the Mythos in the twentieth century -- especially that part of the twentieth century since the prohibition-era activities of most other Call of Cthulhu products (and most of Lovecraft's writing). The title organization is one such conspiracy -- since World War II, Delta Green has existed in one guise or another, tracking down Mythos incidents, dealing with them as effectively and permanently as possible -- and praying it's enough. The whole history section is excellent, and surprisingly useful. There are plenty of details here to flesh out 1990s adventures and characters and having a consistent, believable background like this is vital to the political-conspiracy setting (where would the X-Files' government conspiracies be without mysterious references to Nazi eugenics programs and Cold War spying projects?). Thankfully, it doesn't choose the path taken by most other conspiracy RPGs and put the Mythos behind every significant historical event (the "Vampires were behind the destruction of Pompeii" school of gaming) -- there's just enough "secret history" to provide an appropriately paranoid tone without straining the willing suspension of disbelief too much. Which brings us into Delta Green's version of the Mythos in the 1990s. Unlike Chaosium's "Cthulhu Now" setting, Delta Green offers more than just standard Call of Cthulhu encounters given a '90s twist -- it offers a reworking and updating of Mythos themes. And it works surprisingly well. Gone, or at least reduced in importance, are many of the familiar Call of Cthulhu trappings -- the world-spanning cults of the 1920s have been destroyed or changed beyond recognition; the mind-shattering eldritch tomes have been relegated to the background; and the time for a small group of independent investigators to track down and destroy alien monstrosities is mostly over. In their place are more modern horrors. The best fleshed-out threat is the familiar alien "greys," who are mutilating cattle and abducting people on deserted stretches of highway, and who are part of an agenda even more sinister. Also tossed into the pot are the usual pop conspiracy suspects: black helicopters, secret government medical experiments, UFO researchers, New Age mysticism, Roswell -- even South American Nazis. And all of it is connected, wittingly or not, to the Mythos. All of this is written with a degree of thoughtfulness and effort sadly lacking in most RPG products, and the results show. The setting is consistent, logical, and eerily plausible in the same way that the best conspiracy-nut rantings are -- everything _almost_ makes sense, and the fact that it doesn't quite add up just makes it creepier. The setting also provides something that Call of Cthulhu has long been missing -- a logical reason for a group of skilled (but not extraordinary) people to seek out these murderous cults and eldritch horrors. Delta Green exists as an illegal conspiracy that has infiltrated many different branches and departments of the U. S. government, especially the FBI. It functions by gathering information about potential supernatural phenomena from government reports and private-sector "friendlies" and arranging for Delta Green operatives (mostly government agents) to be assigned to the appropriate investigations and operations. By having PCs belong to Delta Green, there is an excellent rationale for introducing new characters, special equipment, and tidbits of information, and the fact that Delta Green characters are all government agents from different departments allows for characters with just about any specialized or general skill or group of skills. Want to play a high-clearance computer hacker? Take an NSA Computer Security Specialist. A stealthy fighter? Try a Navy SEAL. A pistol-packing psychologist? How 'bout an FBI Psychological Crimes Specialist? Most importantly for me, though, it is a perfect device for having a group of characters with diverse backgrounds not just get together, but stay together after their first encounter with the Mythos. Unfortunately, the three Delta Green adventures included in the book are its weakest part. It's not that they're bad -- far from it -- but they don't really live up to the promise of the rest of the book. One of them is only vaguely related to the Mythos at all, and the others tie into only a couple of corners of the rest of the book. Personally, I would have rather seen them dive in and _use_ the other 250 pages -- as it stands, they could have been published on their own with an extra paragraph or two of background. Also, there are a few too many scenes of apocalyptic violence for my tastes. Within the three adventures are: a huge highway traffic accident, a mansion full of dead party-goers, the contamination and possible destruction of an entire town full of people, two gun battles with near-immortals, a disastrous government raid on a cult compound, and the immanent destruction of the Earth. Whew! Even when I left out a couple of the more cataclysmic scenes, my players joked that CNN reporters covering disaster news must know all their characters by first name. On the other hand, there is just as much cool stuff in the adventures, including some truly memorable scares and creepiness (my players were especially freaked when a routine medical examination discovered microscopic surgical incisions around the circumferences of their skulls...), and that's what it's all about in the end, anyway. Overall, I think Delta Green is the best RPG book to come along in a long time -- and I think there's been a lot of good stuff released in the last couple years. Call of Cthulhu has always been my favorite game, but with Delta Green, it got even better. I really hope Pagan Publishing will follow up on this book (something mentioned in the text a couple of times), because there's an awful lot of potential here. I also hope everyone who has any interest at all in horror, conspiracy or Cthulhu gaming, or just refreshingly intelligent, original gaming in general, will go out and buy Delta Green -- you won't be disappointed. Style: 5 (Excellent!) Substance: 5 (Excellent!)