I've never been much of a board game kinda guy - we played Monopoly when I was younger but I've never enjoyed it because, if i was winning I'd feel bad that others were losing and, if I was losing I'd take it personally! But we didn't play many others so I've never really got in to them or desired learning new ones.
We recently bought Pandemic - it seems to have been around for a while but, whether through its title or a need for more home entertainment, it seems to have become more "mainstream" as we hadn't heard of it before but has become much more noticeable in the last year or so.
Unlike other games it's collaborative - you're not playing against each other but with each other, and you're encouraged to discuss the progression of the game between turns. It's designed for 2-6 players, with each player being assigned a different role with different special moves. For example there's a researcher who can share knowledge outside of the normal rules, or a medic who can remove a "cured" disease entirely from a city on one go.
The object of the game is to "cure" four diseases. Some (or all) of the diseases will be started as part of the initial set-up when 9 cities around the world are infected. Each player must move around the world curing or eradicating or positioning themselves to achieve one of these, whilst all the time working with other players to "win" the game.
During the game epidemics can be started which may lead to an outbreak, so just as you think you're getting a disease under control, it can flare up and leave you backtracking and delaying your planned next move!
The game can be lost! Each disease is represented by a small coloured cube (yellow, red, blue and black) and once you run out of one of these, you're done.
Or you could have too many disease outbreaks - once you've had 8 outbreaks, you've lost.
Or you could run out of playing cards - every city on the game board has a corresponding playing card; if you run out of these before curing all four diseases, it's game over.
We found this a really fun game, even if just for the two of us (all games we play have to be suitable for just two people) and as diseases increase and outbreak into neighbouring cities, the tension really rises. We got a little surprised at how much we got in to it! The box suggested it would take 45 minutes and when we played it the second time it wasn't far away - about 50 minutes or so, so it's ideal for a quick early evening game or you could play a couple of games - see if you can keep the winning streak going or turn a losing streak around!
Have you played this or something similar? Want us to look at other games? (If we've got it or can get hold of it we'll review it next time!) Let us know in the comments!
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