Plague Inc: The Breakdown

Well I would have played an actual game, but I'm too busy getting sucked into Destiny, so I'm doing another app review/ breakdown! I would also just like to point out that even though I didn't technically review Destiny in my last post, It has been a week and I'm still playing the game so that has to be an indicator of how much I like that game.

As this is another app with no real set story or plot, I'm going to make one up, so if you wanted a serious review, skip this section.

SPOILERS?

The world has become corrupt, and political powers now control all of humanity, the world doesn't yet know this and the everyday people have become brainwashed mindless slaves, all obeying their government and it's leaders. You are a mad scientist who wants to save humanity, BY DESTROYING IT! So you took control over a secret lab in an undisclosed location and hijacked some satellites to give you an aerial view of the earth. You experiment and manage to create a base virus that you inject into a random person in a country of your choosing, you can now take control of the virus and modify it to make it a super plague that you will use to free mankind of it's freedom... and life. Good luck in destroying the world.

The whole strategy of the game is to infect everyone on earth and kill them off, using different viruses and combinations of symptoms to create a plague that kills humanity before they can cure it. New player advice would be to play on Easy and use the base bacteria to learn the symptoms and abilities and what kinds of combinations and abilities you need to evolve to combat humanities attempts to stop you. (for example a random event is a love fest, so if you evolve nausea, which gives a slight chance of infection while kissing, it boosts infection) The best thing to keep in mind is that the DNA points don't expire, so save up a good amount in case something unexpected happens so you can react properly. And as the game tells you,  this is a highly researched simulator, meaning if you're trying a maneuver that would not pan out in real life, then in the game it wouldn't work either, so be prepared for what each country's actual government would do to combat whatever disease you made.

The game came out on iOS and Android, and there are some web versions as well  as a PC variant called Plague Inc: Evolved, but I only managed to play the normal version on iOS. The game is 99 cents and it is well worth the money. You can unlock several disease types, as well as special diseases like a zombie disease, a brain parasite, and the new Planet of the Apes virus. There is also special scenarios like "Black Death" or "Humans have robotic organs" that recreate a specific challenge you have to beat. As far as I know you have to pay for these, but everything else, including the normal disease types and some disease variants, you can unlock. i would highly recommend buying this game and if you ain't got time for unlocking the diseases, then buying them is a good option (not that I endorse DLC) and it goes to the dev, who is a cool guy. The game does just about everything right and that makes it one of the best games on the App Store.

App Review: QuizUp

Quick summary of why I did an app review instead of a game review. I went on vacation and didn't have access to my PC, only my phone. There, now the review. Keep in mind it will be a shorter review because it is only an app. Also sorry it's a day late, didn't have internet. Whoops

Made by Plain Vanilla Corp, which is another dev I only really know from one game, QuizUp is a very neat little trivia app for iOS and Android that has tons of categories and a very clean style. It is very well made and there are next to no glitches or problems. It is online with leader boards and I'm addicted to it. But can it make a name for itself in the over saturated market that is the app store?

Honestly, coming into this game I heard it from another reviewer who just happened to mention it on his podcast, so I expected it to be at least fun. The game is very professionally made, yet it stays modest. Whereas other trivia games boast about how many categories they have, QuizUp just puts its cards on the table and leaves them there, it never shoves promos or In App Purchases down your throat. In fact, there are IAP's and I didn't know about them for the first couple months I played this game. It handles itself professionally, never whoring itself out for rates and purchases. I liked that part a lot. The second thing you notice about this when going to get it is that it is free. No money to download it. The In App Purchases are all XP multipliers which you never need to progress. I've been 5th in the world in Games: General category and never paid a cent. This is maybe the best part of QuizUp.

The graphical style of the game is simple, which makes it much more appealing and easy to play. It is mostly text on screen but the font is nice and the animations of text showing up and disappearing is fluid. Any pictures that show up are mostly high definition and the preset character avatars are simple and funny. The statistics page for your play time and win/loss ratio is all pie charts and it makes it look much nicer than just plain numbers. The whole game looks nice and is very consistent with the art style.

I normally save game play for last in my reviews because it is the longest section but because this is a trivia game there is little to talk about. It is a competitive, timed multiple choice game. So the way it works is you and your opponent are asked seven ABCD type questions in a round based system where each question is it's own round and you are given ten seconds to answer. If you answer correctly, you get ten points plus however many seconds left on the timer when you answered. The round ends after both people answer or the timer runs out. The seventh question is worth twice as many points and then the game decides the winner based on who got more points. You can score up to the maximum of 160 points and if both you and your opponent have the same amount of points it is a tie. You can then challenge them to a rematch or continue playing other people. During a match if you feel outmatched you can also surrender, instantly making the opponent the winner but not giving them points for the questions not asked yet. 

Another feautre is that there is also a leader board system that has global and country specific leader boards based on all time and monthly levels. You level up by winning and playing matches where you get XP equal to your points in the match. Another cool feature is the way you can play friends. You can send friend requests and be friends with people, then challenge them to games exclusively. You can play a normal match or if they can't play at the moment, you can play by yourself and when they accept your challenge they will play your ghost. It is pretty cool. The only other thing to do after getting bored is you can earn titles and achievements. Titles are earned every ten levels in a category up to level 50 and are different each category. They are displayed below your name in any place your name is displayed. Achievements are earned by completing special tasks and are really just to feel a sense of completion because you can't use most of them as titles. And that is the game play of QuizUp. The only bugs or cheats I encountered are that you can close the app in the middle of a game and instead if declaring a winner, the game will say you disconnected and will stop the match, so there are people with a record of no losses that cheated to get that. 

So in light of having no PC access, I played this game a lot, and I recommend it to anyone who plays phone game's and would like to test their knowledge. With a huge category list and short rounds, QuizUp marks one of my favourite mobile games.