The current coronavirus pandemic shows wiping out humans from the face of Earth is just as challenging as a playthrough in Plague, Inc.

Plague, Inc imitates life

Your goal as a player is choosing which mutations will carry out in your agent. From the classic bacteria and viruses to zombification and even vampirism, the game shows some very accurate responses according to what we have historically seen in the real world.

By choosing the hardest difficulty, eradicating mankind is extremely challenging. You'll have to take your time to study each country's responses so you can choose what is the best way to remain unstoppable.

Plague, Inc as a learning tool

But you know what is the biggest difference from lower difficulties to the hardest one? The number of people who wash their hands daily. And how frequently they do it. This fact alone, scaled up, makes the game that much harder to complete.

The best part right now is how educational Plague, Inc can be! Even though it sticks to the strategic gameplay, we learn about various disease agents and what we can do to prevent it, or how a new disease has to be taken seriously just in case it is has the potential to make us become extinct.

A single agent can't have it all. While we spend our limited infection points, we have to choose how it's going to be transmitted, what problems / symptoms it will cause to the human body and what is or isn't enough to break into a certain country.

The virus won't gain new mutations all over the world at the same time in real life, because it doesn't have a collective consciousness. So you could say our disease is stronger ingame than it would really be. Also, “leveling up” a disease isn't super real, but the depiction of mutations is precise.

Too educational for China

In fact, the game is so damn informative, it just might be the reason why it got banned in China. That's right. After sitting in the play store as one of the few titles that were actually approved, it got banned after becoming popular again thanks to the coronavirus. Go figure!

But hey, you don't have to stick to realistic conditions. If you want a more fantastic treat, mods can be loaded from the Steam Workshop. From demons to aliens and various fantastic conditions, you will remain entertained.

Get Plague, Inc on Steam. Also available on mobile.