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Pandemic 2
Sep. 6th, 2012 08:38 amWho remembers Pandemic 2?
It was a flash game made in the mid-2000s in which the player takes the role of, as the name suggests, a highly infectious disease. The goal of the game is to wipe out humanity by tailoring the traits of the disease, and its ongoing mutation, to first enhance transmissibility and reduce visibility, and then to raise lethality once enough people have been infected. In response, the people of the world will kill your infection vectors, shut down transit systems and eventually develop a vaccine to try and stop you, but only if they realise how big a threat you cause.
This structure makes for a briefly interesting game, but far more amusing is the various unrealistic things in incorporates and implies.
First of all, as we know, there is no planning behind the progression of any given disease, so it's quite amusing to have something milder than the common cold spread throughout the world and then suddenly cause millions to drop dead from brain haemorrhage.
Then there's Madagascar. Known in the real world as a relatively poor island nation with interesting wildlife, players of Pandemic curse its name, and its government tendency to shut down its one port at the first sign of someone sniffling in Japan. More often than not, Madagascar becomes the last bastion of humanity against the disease, to the point where some commentators at the time suggested simply restarting the game if you didn't actually start there.
My first disease, back in 2008, was a virus, Disco Fever, which ravaged most of the world but left Australia and Madagascar untouched. How about yours?
It was a flash game made in the mid-2000s in which the player takes the role of, as the name suggests, a highly infectious disease. The goal of the game is to wipe out humanity by tailoring the traits of the disease, and its ongoing mutation, to first enhance transmissibility and reduce visibility, and then to raise lethality once enough people have been infected. In response, the people of the world will kill your infection vectors, shut down transit systems and eventually develop a vaccine to try and stop you, but only if they realise how big a threat you cause.
This structure makes for a briefly interesting game, but far more amusing is the various unrealistic things in incorporates and implies.
First of all, as we know, there is no planning behind the progression of any given disease, so it's quite amusing to have something milder than the common cold spread throughout the world and then suddenly cause millions to drop dead from brain haemorrhage.
Then there's Madagascar. Known in the real world as a relatively poor island nation with interesting wildlife, players of Pandemic curse its name, and its government tendency to shut down its one port at the first sign of someone sniffling in Japan. More often than not, Madagascar becomes the last bastion of humanity against the disease, to the point where some commentators at the time suggested simply restarting the game if you didn't actually start there.
My first disease, back in 2008, was a virus, Disco Fever, which ravaged most of the world but left Australia and Madagascar untouched. How about yours?
