Not too sure about games to be honest.
I think that the main thing that you need to look into is the maximum poly count for the thing your importing, for example in GTA a car might be, say, 10000 polys max.
I think that mental ray in maya 8 can render tris. but prior to that it would ignore them.
How do you know I dont bark??
"No pressure, no diamonds" Thomas Carlyle