'Plague, Inc.': Crashes, Crashes, We All Fall Down

At the I'm writing this, "Plague, Inc." is the hottest-selling app in App Store. It caught my as it perched there on the "Top Paid" list, so I looked it expecting to see some kind of attempt to ride the coattails of last year's "Contagion," a movie in which Gwyneth Paltrow plays particularly unglamorous role. I figured the gameplay would probably cast player as a globetrotting scientist to fight a fast-spreading worldwide epidemic.

Turns , that's not quite the scenario players step with "Plague, Inc."

, you act as the plague itself. You decide how you will evolve over the of many months, how resistant you are drugs, what symptoms you cause humans, and how you will spread.

The goal of the game is the destruction of humanity. That's an unusual twist. There are a million books and movies world-ending plagues, but how often is the story told from the of view of the disease?

"Plague, Inc." features three difficulty modes. After choose one, it's to name your disease. You're limited to 10 characters, so you'll have to brief. I settled on "The Ennui" for my first malady's moniker. Next are options different types of disease. Bacteria is the only variety that comes unlocked, but others Virus, Parasite, Nano-Virus and Bioweapon, others.

From there, you're taken to a world map, will be your main interface. Boats and planes travel all the world with varying intensity depending on the of year (and later, level of panic). A news feed clues you in headlines of the day, which can be used shape your strategy . A calendar ticks off the date; under that is a speed adjuster that can be set to pause, medium or fast.

Pick a country of origin, and Patient Zero starts coming with something. Where you begin is important factor -- each country or zone on "Plague, Inc."'s map possesses certain factors wealth and rural vs. urban population. These factors will affect how and how fast disease is spread, as as how sophisticated the medical community's response will be.

Once the illness is kicked , it slowly begins to spread and change. Where it goes and what it does are to you. You'll need to "buy" new characteristics for you plague by spending DNA points, which are accumulated the sickness makes further process. Use them to gain new transmission vectors, new symptoms and strengths and abilities.

Eventually, , humanity will fight back by working a cure. Your object is to out the species before that cure is reached. Start killing early and humanity will shut you in a hurry. Spend too much DNA building abilities and you'll never spread anywhere. Wait long to spread and new technological developments like advanced airplane air filters will cut you .

Get Down With the Sickness

Designing a strategy game for iPad is different than making one for a PC. Too many interfaces and options could get really ungainly a touchscreen-only device. I couldn't imagine playing "Civilization V" on an iPad, instance. "Plague, Inc." understands this. It keeps things relatively simple. You have your map screen, your interface building your disease, and a World interface to keep tabs on a few main statistics. I suppose I could tolerated a little more complexity, but it is, "Plague, Inc." is a perfectly engrossing casual strategy game, especially for the one-dollar price.

The music is well-done. It's the kind of tune I'd imagine playing in a typical "disease spreads like wildfire over the world" movie during a montage of people coughing, sneezing, washing their hands, and being overall icky and unsanitary. It's very eerie. Oh, and are those kids singing "Ring Around the Rosy" in background? Nice touch.

Bottom Line

"Plague, Inc." is a highly morbid engrossing and challenging light strategy game. It has just enough depth to you in but not so that you're bogged down by overly complex interfaces that difficult to use on a touchscreen.

But some users may cursed with a perpetual crash that seems to like to visit right when you're the edge of victory. It's a common complaint the "Most Critical" reviews for this game at the App Store, and the syndrome apparently infected me as well. this rate, I'll never know what it's like to be a nano-virus.

Adapted and abridged from: MacNewsWorld, June 12, 2012.