screenshot TheMoniker plays Plague Inc. Evolved

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

hah, mass effect reference as the achievement.

fuck you EA

[RandomSwordmaster]

"Not the Neurax Worm"

(they both infiltrate the brain, but this can only kill instead of taking control :D)

[TheMoniker]

It's actually more a parasite than a worm, though the effects are similar.

In short, it could be the reason why we like cats so much, and why cat videos are so popular.

(It's known to makes rodednt attracted to cat pee, letting them be eaten more easily, and are present in most humans, though there's no proofs of their danger... yet.)

More information here

30-50% of the WORLD infected... Only effect being making people slightly drawn to cats...

Maybe Plague Inc. wasn't as unrealistic a simulator as we all thought. I'm going to go live in fear now.

Anyways, this seems like a good thing to name Prion.

hah, mass effect reference as the achievement.

fuck you EA

The achievements have a lot of references. In fact, a lot of the news ticker stuff that plays at the start is based off real news.

Plague Inc. Episode 6: Parasite: All this craziness over nothing...

This is what a Parasite looks like! It's basically a long skinny thing. Eww.

Standard setup here. Hopefully, we'll actually unlock something from the other 2 gene categories soon.

And now, the world shall come under assault from NOTHING!

Start in China as usual.

So... business as usual, right? After all, Nothing happened...

Alright, here's what's so special about parasites. Basically, they don't get DNA points from infecting people (they do from killing people, though!). So, we'll have a lot less than normal to work with... at the start. Remember the orange bubbles I talked about back in the beginning of the LP? Throughout the game, they've just been a supplement, giving us a little more to use. But here, they shine! They appear a lot more than normal, and they give us a lot more than normal! We just have to lay dormant until they we have enough DNA to kill everyone.

The first thing we'll need is Symbiosis 1. It's only effect? REDUCING severity. Sounds like a bad thing, right? Well, it's not. Remember, severity controls how fast we get noticed, how much the world wants to cure us...

If we make ourselves lose enough severity... the world won't be able to notice us at all!

Level 2 gives us literally no severity at all. This means our DNA-point flow is super slow, but it means something else too...

No! Not that! Don't interrupt me, world!

It means we can get some infectivity-increasing symtpoms, and STILL not have severity! We can start making people around the world breaking out in rashes, getting stomachaches... and NOBODY WILL KNOW WHY.

The reason is, of course, Nothing.

Getting level 2 means we can start piling on the symptoms. We don't even need transmissions on a run like this!

Now, we wait.

Not too sure what this means.

Man, stupid Korea... I wish we could get the disease over to them, but I guess they're infected with Nothing at all!

Man, a lot of stuff is happening to the world this run!

Barely 2 months later, another disaster strikes!

Man... I feel like this is kind of boring, but waiting is just such an effective strategy, particularly for a disease like Nothing! Still, just imagine it... people breaking out with all sorts of minor symptoms all over the world, and all the doctors tell them that it's just nothing!

No no disease, I like how things are going!

I'm guessing I'm going to forget about this later and evolve it.

We don't want to invest too many DNA-points in stuff, but once things get intense drug resistance and genetic hardening will help.

I think I ended up keeping this one, because it didn't give enough severity to get us noticed.

Nothing can go wrong now! Nothing is taking hold all over the world!

Ahhh! No! We DEFINITELY don't want that! That's a lethal mutation!

(Look at my DNA points. All this waiting and bubble-popping is making them skyrocket.

This just decreases infectivity in urban areas slightly. Nothing to be concerned about.

Look at it... isn't it beautiful? We have all the countries infected. Nobody has noticed Nothing. We just need to wait for the billion or so people left.

NO DISEASE! NOT YET!

So many disasters! Granted, we have been spreading Nothing for three and a half years in-game time.

Looking at the newsfeed, it seems the colored messages are the important ones. Maybe the iapps one affects the "ICure" event?

I guess you can keep this one. This gives us a small shred of infectivity, but not enough to actually be noticed...

...Right?

Why does everyone seem to be so concerned about this? It's just Nothing.

Too little too late.

Shouldn't it be super obvious if they have a disease?? I mean, they've got Anemia, Nausea, Cysts, a rash, coughing, abscesses...

Dangit, guys! It's Nothing! Stop freaking out!

Good thing everyone in the world is infected now. This is an alternative way to get your disease discovered, and is actually sort of a preventation mechanism to prevent us from doing... well, what we just did. Of course, it only happened because I let that mutation go through, which gave us a bit of severity. Having no severity at all makes it impossible for us to be found.

But, I'd say it's time to spend our 184 DNA points, wouldn't you?

Yeah. With 184 DNA points and Sympto-Stasis, we buy a TON of symptoms.

The world will shortly find out that what they thought was Nothing was indeed something.

Crap. Of COURSE I'd end up forgetting about that! This gives the world a little cure boost.

India, AND EVERYWHERE ELSE! Moo wah hah hah!

You wanted to contain Nothing? Well, MAYBE YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE IT A LITTLE EARLIER.

We've destroyed a good portion of the world's cure capacity, and they don't even have everyone on the job yet.

Yeah, the world is doomed.

With all these symtpoms, countries will fall into anarchy fast. Of course, China had a head start(TO DOOM) with those riots.

Why does this message always come late and last?

Judging by the fact that over half the world is dead already, I'd say this message came late too.

The world has 20% cure progress, but it's far, far too late. They just got DESTROYED, by NOTHING!

Oh, yeah, after 6 billion people are dead... MAYBE A BIT LATE ON THAT.

Okay, in case it wasn't obvious, we win. This is the most total victory we've ever had, even though it took a long time to get.

Hah, hah. This is actually a bad symptom combo, though it's a bit late.

Humanity has succumbed at the hands of nothing.

Have I talked to you guys about the scoring system yet? No? Basically, it gives you a score on a scale of 1-5 "Biohazards" on how well you did, based on difficulty selected, speed, and cure progress. We failed miserably on speed, but we did everything else well!

We get Trans-Stasis(no symptom cost increase) and Prion, our next disease unlocked. That's all for today!

NEXT TIME: Brain invasion! Again!

Okay! Prion is finished and its our next episode, but now I need name suggestions for the one after that, the Necroa Virus, the second of the special plagues. According to the government, it definitely DOESN'T turn people into zombies.

Also, since Plague Inc. has online matchmaking multiplayer (I think??), I was thinking of doing a game online and recording it. I'm not sure how it works, but if we're allowed a name, can you guys think of a name I could use to taunt my opponent?

[Tamanoir]

Nothing would have been good for the Necroa Virus as well actually...

I'll propose Cure for Pain, then.

[RandomSwordmaster]

*CoD reference time*

ELEMENT 115 FOR NECROA VIRUS

...ALSO FE14 AVATAR CONFIRMED FOR SMASH HYPE

Edited December 15, 2015 by RandomSwordmaster

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

clearly it should be the T virus.

[X-Naut]

Max Revive for zombie virus.

Porn for prions.

Also this rash? It's probably nothing.

Fast-forward a week, and X-Naut is lying dead in his dorm.

Edited December 16, 2015 by X-Naut

[Clarinets]

Also, since Plague Inc. has online matchmaking multiplayer (I think??), I was thinking of doing a game online and recording it. I'm not sure how it works, but if we're allowed a name, can you guys think of a name I could use to taunt my opponent?

I can't think of one, sorry

Your opponent should be me

[TheMoniker]

For Necroa Virus we're going with "Cure for Pain" because its cool.

Max Revive for zombie virus.

Porn for prions.

Also this rash? It's probably nothing.

Fast-forward a week, and X-Naut is lying dead in his dorm.

I actually got sick early on during this LP. It was horrible. Thankfully, I developed no lethal symtpoms.

Plague Inc: Episode 7: Prion: Based on a True Story!

This is what a Prion looks like! Isn't it a cute little squiggly thing?

Standard set of genes for this one.

But seriously guys. Go look this disease up. It's kind of freaky and apparently it's about halfway through a standard Plague Inc. game, with countries all over the world infected.

I wonder where the real disease started?

So, Prions are more difficult to notice, as the game says, and have increased natural resistance to the cure. However, they take longer to react to new evolutions in exchange. I haven't mentioned this before, but whenever something is evolved there's a period of a few days before it takes effect. In this disease's case, that period is lengthened by a few more days. It honestly doesn't mean that much, and it means we can go more aggressive early on since we don't have any pesky cure to worry about!

I THINK this makes cure progress go slower. It doesn't add any severity like a symptom, but we don't want to spend DNA points on it now, since the cure isn't currently an issue.

First off, a few basic symptoms. Get things off the ground!

Next, a few transmissions on top of it.

Hey, that helps the cure slowing even more! Notice we've already got a good deal of the world infected.

It was to be expected, since we have symtpoms beyond "maybe increase cat attraction???"

Neural Atrophy should buy us time to infect more people.

Probably won't be a problem.

We don't want to go TOO severe yet, but this should be okay.

Most of Africa along with Iceland, Greenland, New Zealand, and the Caribbean are uninfected. We need to keep waiting...

Infect those boats! We need to SPREAD!

Sheesh, short term memory less. We're a very cruel disease. Now everyone is Dory.

Waiting a bit longer, it seems like we've almost got the entire world under our sway! We just need to wait a bit more-

Ah. This is another prevention mechanism within the game, when the world is trying to cure us a little bit but isn't doing too much while we spread. The even triggers another event, which is...

Yeah. Stupid humans, launching Awareness Days! Now we have to go aggressive before everyone's infected.

Well, okay, we'll probably be fine.

Necrosis should help our in-country infection rates! Right now we don't have enough lethality, but we still need to infect some people and the cure resistance should help cover us.

Why Saudi Arabia? Did no other country want to do it, so they just shoved the responsibility onto them?

This always comes too late.

I'd say its the latter.

But they're all delayed by short-term memory loss for some reason!

Once we get some more DNA points, the cure should be less of a problem.

I'm worried about Canada. Being a rich AND very cold country, but NOT an urban country, it's hard to spread disease there. I've lost games to Canada.

The solution is of course environmental resistances!

Now it's time for Insanity/Paralysis/Coma to help the cure!

It's a race now. Will I kill everything before that cure comes out?

Oh, dangit! Of COURSE I would forget about that!

This is concerning, things just aren't happening fast enough. We need more lethality!

Ah, that's perfect. Thank you! Dysentery is a very lethal symptom.

500,000,000 people are dead(which isn't much), and even with basically everyone infected, that cure is nearly complete!

This is about all we can do. We really need DNA points...

As it is right now, we can't do much but wait...

AND GIVE PEOPLE COMAS

Not really as helpful as I'd like.

The last time I showed this menu, it was "47 days to completion". Now it's 61 days away.

We've won.

Cure progress contributes to your end score, so we still want it reduced.

You'd think this would have happened sooner, but all the countries decayed at the same rate, and now they're all going to collapse almost simultaneously.

Mass graves, the destruction of Russia, and curfews... all caused by us.

I feel like some evil overlord. But it's just a game, right?

Even with almost everyone dead, the world refuses to stop sending cure planes. Even if only a few thousand people are left alive in the entire world, they'll STILL charter a research plane.

That's a wrap! We win again!

That actually went really well! We're getting close to finishing the game now. The next plague, though, is actually quite difficult. We'll certainly see if I'm up to the task of doing it on Brutal.

(Also, this run unlocks the "ATP Boost" gene, which gives us 8 DNA points at the start! Woohoo!)

Okay, next I need name suggestions for Nano-Virus, an incredibly powerful disease that is highly vulnerable to the cure.

[Darrman]

So I died to nothing, then a cat made me fall in a bottomless pit, and...

Cold. Kill everyone with the common cold! It's easy to cure: take cough medicine. Or just wait a week or so. Easy-peasy!

[RandomSwordmaster]

Ransomware. Hold humanity's lives for ransom with a nano-virus, or else they die!

[Tamanoir]

Senpai noticed me twice in a row.

I feel so proud about myself.

[FdRstar]

OK, I just realized something. A prion is an abnormal protein that makes normal protein become abnormal.

But a protein doesn't have genes, it can't evolve any symptoms, it doesn't make any sense. I don't think it can be transmitted through air or water either but I'm not too sure there, I guess.

Of course the game is far from a simulator but it's still a bit... much.

[RandomSwordmaster]

OK, I just realized something. A prion is an abnormal protein that makes normal protein become abnormal.

But a protein doesn't have genes, it can't evolve any symptoms, it doesn't make any sense. I don't think it can be transmitted through air or water either but I'm not too sure there, I guess.

Of course the game is far from a simulator but it's still a bit... much.

The mutations could be considered errors while converting other proteins, causing them to change from their original function...

[Serranade]

Hey, I've been lurking this topic. This looks like an interesting game!

Name it... the Bananovirus. Look ok it came to my head and I thought it was funny so I'm putting it down here see

[Tamanoir]

I'm going to propose Fairy Dust.

[TheMoniker]

OK, I just realized something. A prion is an abnormal protein that makes normal protein become abnormal.

But a protein doesn't have genes, it can't evolve any symptoms, it doesn't make any sense. I don't think it can be transmitted through air or water either but I'm not too sure there, I guess.

Of course the game is far from a simulator but it's still a bit... much.

From a scientific perspective, it's not just this that doesn't make sense, but the fact that you can distribute new symptoms and transmissions to every single copy of your disease in a matter of days is a touch unrealistic. Prion especially, as you've said, doesn't make much sense.

The mutations could be considered errors while converting other proteins, causing them to change from their original function...

I don't know much about medical science, so I can't say too much scientifically. However, I'd suggest you all read the descriptions for the upgrades I buy, since you can learn a bit about science.

Hey, I've been lurking this topic. This looks like an interesting game!

Name it... the Bananovirus. Look ok it came to my head and I thought it was funny so I'm putting it down here see

The Bananovirus... That looks like the best suggestion! Let's do it!

Plague Inc: Episode 7: Necroa Virus: Cure For Pain Part 1

The second of the special plagues. It looks... pretty weird, honestly!

The entire bottom category of genes have been replaced with special "Necroa Virus" genes. This means we can't use our "x-stasis" genes at ALL, and we don't have anything to replace them with.

Now, I was actually stuck on this disease for a while, and I had to look up guides online! A lot of them said that we needed certain genes and that they would really help, but we don't have many genes unlock, so we are NOT using any sort of "recommended setup".

No bad puns today. Soon, nobody will ever experience the pain of bad puns again!

Believe it or not, the best country to start is Saudi Arabia. It gives us built-in heat resistance and is connected to quite a lot of important targets.

Necroa Virus Soundtrack(IMO, best track in the game. LISTEN TO IT.)

Hmm... I wonder what it can do?

To begin, the transmissions have been changed on us again! Zoonotic shift is the first upgrade we want, even though it speeds up research speed.

The other weird icon in the bottom-right area is "Saliva" transmissions, which eventually lets us transmit through poop. We won't be getting it, though.

Bats 1! Bats are another new transmission, and they aren't that different from the others we've seen.

Now, this is something interesting: This lets is turn Bats into ZOMBIE bats, and they'll attack humans for us! The thing is, the bats can actually kill people, so these transmissions are unique in that they add LETHALITY, not just infectivity or severity!

Have we seen this before? Maybe.

One of the reasons we want to go for animal transmissions is due to mutations, which we need to be effective.

The symptoms tree is again totally changed. Hyper Salivation doesn't do that much, thankfully.

Now, we need Blood and Air. This lets us get more planes, which are vital to our strategy.

The world is blissfully unawares. We want it to stay that way for a bit, but with this disease it NEVER sticks for long.

Skipping ahead a lot, Insomnia slows down cure research a bit. We want it to evolve symptoms on the same tree, though!

We've been discovered. Not too much we can do about that!

It's not long until they start working on the cure, even though all we do is make people salivate and have a bit of insomnia.

Now we want Segmented Genome, for faster mutations.

No, it's nothing to be concerned about! Can't you read the name of the virus?

You shut down the airports!? The disease barely DOES anything!

So, one of the reasons the Necroa Virus is different is because the world reacts to you MUCH quicker than it normally does, and is EXTREMELY trigger-happy with cure research and border-closing. The reasons for this will become apparent when we reach the second stage of the disease...

Looks like the game wants us to go down the "cure slowing" tree. That's fine, I guess.

(The other tree is a logical progression eventually leading to Cannibalism.)

Normally, the game will ALSO raise the Threat Level (I'll explain it fully if I see it happen again), and extremely bad action for us, but it didn't do it this time. I think that helped us win.

Photophobia! We're definitely going for the cure-slowing tree now!

Our in-country spread is getting more and more difficult, just because all the countries are closing their borders! We've got about half the world infected, which is great, but the cure is only speeding up.

Don't do anything yet... let more people get infected...

That boosted the cure by 6%. Really not helping!

Okay, I know I'm supposed to wait a bit longer, but I don't want to anymore!

Delirium! And finally...

Cytopathic reanimation.

Without exiting the menu and starting the events, we also need to get Anaerobic Resuscitation. Without, the zombies just won't kill anything. Bye, personality!

These two upgrades make our new minions much more powerful, but they're all I have DNA for.

Okay, I think this seems like a good place to stop. I had to split this update into 2 parts due to an excess of images.

Second part should be coming up momentarily, hang tight!

[TheMoniker]

Plague Inc: Episode 7: Necroa Virus: Cure For Pain Part 2

Notice that the world is no longer tracking Infected and Dead... now it tracks ZOMBIES and Dead. All the people infected will now start slowly converting into zombies.

The world is still gunning it on that cure, even moreso than before! It's moving practically 2% per day!

Oh, thanks, game! That's a high-level symptom!

We need to continue buffing our zombies for right now, as it makes them kill faster. We want them to take the world over very quickly!

Oh no! We've lost!

...OR HAVE WE.

And so, the government finally acknowledges it with a quarter of a billion zombies on its hands.

Now, with the cure complete, infected people will start becoming healthy again... but a LOT slower than normal.

Oh, and the cure just flat-out doesn't work on zombies. So, we haven't lost after all.

Now, for our zombie abilities. What is an "active ability"? Allow me to demonstrate.

After making it actually effective, of course.

See that "Active Abilities" tab over on the far left. Now, we have control over where our zombies go! We can spread wherever we want!

Oh, great. THESE idiots.

So, Z-Com is your main threat. The world isn't just going to stand down and die to zombies. Z-Com slowly fortifies itself, gathers resources, sends out planes to spread itself to new countries... It's like a new military disease that exists specifically to counter ours! If you can destroy its first base, then they won't be a threat, but this is Brutal and we don't have many zombies near Poland, so we can't stop them right now.

Why couldn't they have set up in some OTHER country our zombies had nearly conquered, like this one?

Anyways, all healthy and infected people are now gone from Southeast Asia. The zombies will start to die off from that country if you don't make them move to new, less-infected countries.

Looking at the world map, I know it looks like we've barely conquered anything, but we can definitely do this, I swear! The zombies can be relied upon to spread on their own to non-Z-Com infected countries, as long as we keep upgrading them.

See? They've ALREADY got enough for a new base! They're going to start sending blue planes, trading resources in between bases, and upgrading themselves more and more. It's TERRIBLE!

We need to begin taking out the countries surrounding Poland. The zombies will slowly start coming into Poland, and while they'll be killed immediately Poland will be weaker, and we'll have plenty of places to attack from when it's time to strike back.

Note that the zombies travel by land and sea, and so can only go to countries DIRECTLY next to the one they're going from. You basically have to "zombie hop" from country to country a lot of times.

Great. Their defenses in Poland are now going to be VERY hard to conquer. Luckily, Poland doesn't have a very large population, otherwise we'd REALLY be screwed!

While we attack Ukraine, let's take a look at the world map for a little bit. Our only real hold on the entirety of North and South America are the... uh... whatever the countries below Mexico are called! The game doesn't classify them as a bunch of individual countries, but I can't remember what their name is!

Meanwhile, Asia is gone, and we need to get the zombies to bright new pastures. Australia is slowly being conquered, as well as the islands next to it. Africa is also not well-infected but slowly spreading. Europe seems to be being favored by Z-Com, so we want to spread there soon.

I know it seems like we have a lot of DNA points, but we really can't afford to spend all of them advancing to countries in not Z-Com areas. We need to bide our time and rely on the zombies to advance on their own for a bit. They have the upgrades for it.

This will help too. Once zombies decay enough they flat-out die, and we want to slow it down.

Keep going! This unlocked a lot of stuff.

The Carribean thinks its so smart on that one little island? WE'LL SHOW THEM! It will also make a nice base to attack the USA from.

Right now, things aren't looking too great for our disease. We just need to keep killing people and hope we can keep our zombies alive, or at least get enough new ones to replace the ones that die.

Japan! You are not allowed to be safe! YOU NEVER EXPORTED SO MANY VIDEOGAMES TO US, AND NOW I TAKE MY REVENGE!

We have a lot of zombies in Australia, so we need to make sure to infect all the little islands!

Oh, come on! As you can probably guess, this makes zombies decay faster.

Notice on the world map that Z-Com heroically but stupidly set up in East Africa, despite the place being half-conquered by zombies. We'll see how well it works out for them.

Poland over here is doing just fine, thanks to Z-Com. We need to change that.

And yup, the base in East Africa is GONE. That was a waste of resources for them, really.

Carribean is done for despite the heat wave, and now the USA needs to feel the pain!

Also, we'll want to start sending out bigger hordes. Soon, just sending in a few thousand zombies won't be enough.

And now, we can command absolutely MASSIVE forces of zombies.

Now, go, my minions! Go to Poland, and kill as much as you can! Those 12 zombies can't do it on their own!

Look at it! Look at them spreading! I'm doing my best to control Z-Com's expansion out of Europe, and the rest of the world can't hold off the zombies without them. Africa will be gone soon!

Maybe this will help those guys in Poland?

Russia's been holding out for an aggravatingly long time, but now they're almost gone. Great for us!

Coma only affects infected people, not zombies! Bad choice, game!

Our last attack killed a lot of people in Poland, but they made it through. Another try!

Maybe NOW they'll win?

Man, and here I was worried we wouldn't win! Things are looking much better for us! Iceland and Greenland might have good defensive terrain, but once I actually send zombies to them they'll be completely helpless to stop it.

In fact, why don't we do it now?

The USA is totally gone, and we can use its large population to attack from across the oceans!

Excellent, excellent!

Poland is beginning to lose control of the situation, but its still a strong base and needs to go.

Now, THIS is a great event for us!

Attack! Attack while they're weakened!

Zombies and humans are now equal. Only Bolivia, Spain, and Greenland are free of zombies entirely.

NOT GREENLAND ANYMORE!

We want that base in the UK gone too. Z-Com has 4 surviving bases, and it means nothing but bad things for us if they last a minute longer!

Thanks to that event earlier, Z-Com lost control over the situation and now our zombies will defeat them. And if we can take out that base, we can take out any base!

Poland and the UK are almost gone, meaning Italy is the last place with any chance of survival. We've ALMOST got the win, but the thing is, almost all the zombies in the countries around it have either decayed or were used up in our assault on Poland!

Oh, this is what things look like when I scroll up and zoom in. Z-Com's bases look like little skyscrapers.

I send some of the last zombies I have over there and upgrade them. Italy had better die!

Z-Com's behavior is honestly heroic, but also really stupid. They have absolutely no hope of making a surviving base over in South America, even if there are still people to save.

Excellent! We just need to beat Italy!

We're so close! I have to win this!

Despite the fact that Italy's in complete anarchy, Z-Com has formed a new government. They're still holding out, but only JUST BARELY. The thing is, I don't have zombies left to send to them!

I kind of didn't want to do this, but it looks like we have to. With Regenerative Action and Ambush Predation evolved, that gives us...

Another active ability! Use it on Italy, and...

Another few million dead are revived to assault the living! And there's nothing they can do about it!

After that, it only takes a little bit for Italy to become completely doomed. Notice on the sidebar it looks like there's a third active ability. I THINK it's an adrenaline rush ability that lets us make our zombies attack better in a specific country for a little but, but the chain to evolve it is more complicated, and we ultimately didn't end up needing it.

Maybe it's a bit late, but okay.

We've done it! We have successfully cured the world of all pain!

*"Sweet Victory" song begins playing in background*

Wow, FIVE Biohazards, the best score I've ever gotten for Brutal! I honestly thought I was doing badly, but I guess I was wrong!

Our next thing WOULD be the Nano-Virus, but I'm going to do something else instead.

So, I was trying the multiplayer a little while ago, and I thought it would be kind of boring, but I was wrong! A lot of the mechanics have been changed, and there's an entire progression system! I don't know too much about it, but the next update will contain some of my EPIC BATTLES against other random people from the internet!

Also, now I need name suggestions for Bio-Weapon, the very last "normal" disease. It's thing is that it kills people REALLY FAST.

[Darrman]

Well, the zombie apocalypse just consumed everything. Yay!

Hmm... Maybe have bio-weapon dogs do the job or something. Bite, dead.

[X-Naut]

Boolits. Or some variation of smallpox, maybe Hugepox?

[TheMoniker]

Good suggestions! I'm going to wait on doing Bioweapon for a bit though, so if anyone has more feel free to say it!

Now, it's time for an ULTIMATE SHOWDOWN in...

Moniker's Multiplayer: Round 1: VS. pedrolucasfrota

We're really doing it today! Trying out the brand-new multiplayer mode!

It seems like I don't have any friends we're doing Quick Match!

What to name, what to name...

PERFECT!

Huh? Oh hey! Multiplayer has its own gene unlocking and progression!

Let me explain how these work. In singleplayer, each gene had its own flat benefit, with maybe a downside if it was a BIG benefit. Here, the genes all have equal-ish upsides and downsides. For example, Frigophobe buffs you in hot climates, but makes you weaker in cold ones. Same for 8 of the other 11 traits. The last 3 are Benign Infection (Easier to cure but gives more starting DNA), Unstable Inception (Starting Country Randomized but lots more starting DNA), and... I'll explain Safe House later.

Alright, I have bad news about the very first game I played. So, Plague Inc. actually has a bug in its current state: If you close the game window and open it up again, the world map glitches up MASSIVELY. I try to take screenshots while I play, and the stress of multiplayer makes me hurry, and the Pause/Break key is RIGHT NEXT to the PrtSc key... it only takes one little slip. A lot of the footage was unsalvageable, and it wasn't a very exciting game anyway.

After I minimized it the first time, this is what happened.

The second time made THIS happen.

You can see why I'm not posting the full game now.

Eventually everyone died, but not fast enough, leading to my VICTORY!

But now we'll try again! And do it properly!

We got Hydrophone! It might not be helpful, but I'm equipping it because I have nothing else to equip, and I need to show off my 100% win ratio to my enemies!

Domination vs PAX-98! Here we go!

Now we REALLY get started. There's a lot to cover about the differences, but as the game says here, "this changes everything!". The win condition is either to eradicate the enemy plague, through cure or other means, OR to infect everyone in the world before the opponent infects everyone in the world.

As the game explains, our starting country gives us a slow supply of DNA before the opponent finds it, and our opponent a BIG supply of DNA when they find it. Same for us. And "finding it" consists of infecting the country they started in.

Saudi Arabia! Lower population, heat bonus... we'll do well there!

Also, the starting DNA you get depends on the country you choose. "Good" countries like China don't give much, "bad" countries Iraq or something give more.

Let's not waste time! The first thing to know is, the transmissions menu has been changed and now gives new transmissions. The first is dust, the second is droplets.

They're basically other versions of Air and Water, but less expensive and without the help in Air and Plane Transmission.

We want lots of transmissions right at the start. Let's go look at the world map!

Okay! At the top of the screen, it shows a big red and yellow meter. The RED meter is your favorite LPer's disease! The YELLOW meter is our dirty, filthy, EVIL enemy's disease! Root for whoever you like, just so long as that person is me.

The meter doesn't just take into account how many people infected, it also shows how many buffs our disease has (displayed as tabs below our sides-the tab right now is the "starting country unfound" tab). Still, it can change fast and doesn't account for ALL situations, just gives a general overlook.

Also, that strange-looking bubble is our special starting country DNA bubble!

Wait, what's that new bubble?

GASP! Easier to cure? How could you, my opponent?

I'll show the "abilities" screen shortly, but there's a boost that lets you make your opponent easier to cure. It's the only thing we can do to DIRECTLY affect their disease, but this is way too early for it! He should be getting transmissions, not blowing money on stuff like that!

Speaking of transmissions, we'll want more and more of them!

This active ability works basically the same as a Neurax Worm plane, except its an active ability, and doesn't happen on its own.

It costs 5 points to send a plane right now, but every time we use it the cost goes up by one. Still, it means that situations where Greenland's border closes and we can't go there anymore will never happen again. The only thing we have to be worried about from the world is the cure.

When we've both infected a country, it's displayed on the pie chart as red and yellow. I'll explain more later.

For now, let's do something about that "easier to cure" nonsense!

So, you're probably wondering something. Victory is when everyone is infected, right? So why not lay low? Evolve transmissions? Try to race your opponent and avoid the world's notice? This is why. This gives you income based on how many deaths you cause. The more you kill, the richer you'll get!

He's catching up! We need to do something about this!

The symptoms tree has been changed as well, and its a lot more complicated now! We've got our basic symptoms, which I get a few of, but there's other stuff too.

Big news! We've found his starting location! This cuts off his income, and that yellow bubble gives us a BIG burst of DNA!

I spend this getting more infectivity. Also, see those orange upgrades on the side? What they do is, they have their own trees that affect the other player's disease. Cysts at the bottom starts a tree that makes it harder for the other disease to infect or kill people with my disease. Inflammation at the top starts a tree that makes it easier for me to infect and kill people with the other disease.

Look at the news feed in the bottom: The world's started cure research on me, and the enemy found my starting country. Not good for us.

What? It looks like he's evolving those symptoms I was talking about earlier! He's getting infectivity and lethality BONUSES with regards to my disease, and I'm getting penalties! My only choice is to respond in kind.

Auto-Immune Support 1. What does this do?

+100% Infectivity penalty with regards to my disease! He had a +15% boost before, so that's why he's at 85% now.

We should go to Greenland! Not the "Unknown" there. You can't see the infection rates of countries that you haven't infected yet, so for all we know, our opponent might already be there...

(He wasn't, I don't think)

We're ALMOST to Extreme Biohydroaereosol!

Now, this is interesting. South Africa, the opponent's starting country, is 100% infected with BOTH diseases, the poor guys!

I accidentally closed the window and reopened it once. You guys can handle a few slight distortions, right?

More DNA! More!

With that, we also can get "Opportunistic Infection", which... gives +100% infectivity boost to the other disease, for our disease.

You can imagine how things tend to pan out into a giant arms race.

ALL SHALL BE INFECTED.

Keep sending out the planes! The faster we get places infected, the faster we win!

Great. He is ALSO killing people. He doesn't have many infected, so that strategy might not work out well for him!

Despite all the cool and alluring abilities to get, we can't forget the basics like hot and cold resistance. I went and played a lot of games on my own (after this, this was the second one I played) and a lot of people would just try to get abilities to stop me, not transmissions or basic symptoms. You can see it with the "easier to cure" upgrade the enemy got early on.

We also get Benign Mimic-our second active ability! This makes any country we put it on work more on the cure for the enemy disease and ignore us more.

Really, right now, everything is going well! We just need to keep doing what we're doing.

Surely, some symptoms couldn't be a bad idea! This will continue to hem in the other disease and make them have a difficult time. See, when your disease basically works as a vaccine against the other one, and you have so many people infected, it makes it almost impossible for the other disease to spread without mitigating that chance first.

More severity and lethality in the name of hurting the other disease! Surely, this won't backfire and blow up in my face.

Haha, our bonuses are glowing they're so high! Big bonuses to infecitivity, big bonuses to lethality, big bonuses to cure research... wait, WHAT!?

(Unfortunately, it seems past Moniker failed to notice)

We are DOMINATING EVERYONE! The opponent makes a plea for mercy in the form of "Hi". I respond with a cruel, horrible rejection of their surrender in the form of "Hey".

China, how the heck are you still holding out? You should die early on!

76% cure!? Ah! Panic! PLACE CURE SLOWING ACTIVE ABILITIES EVERYWHERE!

Clearly, this would be the best time to get the third active ability that kills people faster, and not Genetic Hardening or Reshuffles!

(What were you DOING, past Moniker!?)

NO! 100% CURE! GENETIC RESHUFFLE NOW!

IT DIDN'T EVEN DO ANYTHING! NO! NO!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN!?

MY SHAME IS THAT OF A THOUSAND SUNS! I HAVE LOST TO THIS GUY WHO SEEMED LIKE A NOOB, BUT ACTUALLY HAD AN OKAY STRATEGY THAT I WALKED RIGHT INTO, WHEN I GOT COCKY AND THOUGHT THAT I HAD THE ADVANTAGE!

STUPID OPPONENTS BEING ACTUAL HUMANS! STUPID ACTUAL HUMANS BEING SO HARD TO PREDICT!

It's too late to do anything.

I am defeated.

But no... no! I can't let this be my multiplayer legacy! I will try again, against a different totally random online opponent!

AND THIS TIME, I WILL WIN!

(I'll probably show the Nanovirus update first, though.)

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

your overconfidence was your downfall.

[Fateborn]

Should had kept an eye on cure progress lol.

[Darrman]

Domination did not dominate. At all. It ate a cure. That is the opposite of domination.

[Serranade]

rip domination

i never liked you because you were one of those dumb press a button really fast minigames that I'm bad at

Time for the next attempt to hopefully go a lot better.