The Troubleshooters is the newest project by Swedish tabletop role-playing game makers Helmgast AB, whose previous efforts include dark fantasy games Kult: Divinity Lost and Eon. While the majority of the company's past projects were created exclusively with a Swedish audience in mind, its newest will be its second-ever intended for an international market. What makes The Troubleshooters unique from its past efforts is its setting: a world directly inspired by Belgian and French comics from the 1960s.
Notable among its inspirations is The Adventures of Tintin, the internationally-successful Belgian comic book series about the genre-spanning adventures of everyman reporter Tintin, evidenced most directly in a visually-similar art style. Helmgast AB also counts among its influences Franco-Belgian adventure comic Spirou & Fantasio and American mystery series Carmen Sandiego, Scooby-Doo and Nancy Drew.
Players can start The Troubleshooters by selecting from among its character templates that include a number of style-appropriate archetypes, such as a sixties spy or mad scientist. The game's title is taken from the group at its core, who tackle people's problems. Adventures will take that group to expanses of wilderness, bustling cities and other locations conducive to mystery and intrigue.
Its setting is pan-European, and takes place in a realistic but alternate history written for the game's unique world. By 1965, when the game's events occur, a joint Japanese-French rocket has landed on the moon, and two fictional Central European nations, Arenwald and Sylveria have gone to war with one another. And of course, key to its narrative is The Octopus, a villainous organisation attempting to capitalize on world events and bring chaos to Europe.
The Troubleshooters is currently in the early stages of creation. A Kickstarter campaign will be launched on April 7th, with a planned release in the Summer of 2020, presumably after crowdfunding has concluded. Its Kickstarter page already has nearly 250 followers, so it seems likely that the campaign will reach its goal once it's gone live. Its initial release will include a core book of rules and world-building elements, as well as an initial adventure titled The U-Boat Mystery. Further adventures set in the game world are planned for the future.
Source: Helmgast AB