The combat could be more exciting and its over-reliance on walking and talking can be a bit tiring, but Paranoia: Happiness is Mandatory remains a challenging and rewarding experience nonetheless.

Overall, Paranoia: Happiness is Mandatory feels like a missed opportunity.

A powerful background and some good ideas are not enough to save Paranoia: Happyness is Mandatory from being a missed opportunity.

Paranoia: Happiness is Mandatory is an isometric RPG set in a dystopian future, but the real dystopia is the game itself.

Poor in content, form and substance, Paranoia: Happiness is mandatory involuntarily inscribes itself in the list of games that certainly do not bring the video game closer to the traditional role-playing game, but rather that underline the extreme differences and limits of the medium with respect to the characteristics of the paper versions.

The only positive thing I can say about this game is that it convinced me to research the source material. The tabletop RPG is infinitely more interesting than this adaptation because it’s designed for human interaction - hence the name “Paranoia”. When the surprises and betrayals are scripted, the core of the game is missing. Happiness may be mandatory but, thankfully, to play this game is optional.

Paranoia feels like someone got hold of the license and then either couldn’t figure out what to do with it or had a lot of nice ideas that were then horribly constrained by budget and time. Were it budget-priced or still in Early Access, it might be forgivable. But as a full, major release? It’s too short, too annoying, and too uninteresting to recommend to anyone – even the most ardent of Paranoia fans.