Unreal, have you surpassed the best score of your girlfriend's son now or is he getting even better? In what country do you typically like to start if you don't mind me asking? There are so many possible strategies, it's hard to find a reliable one - well, at least it's hard for me!
Yes, i have beaten his 266 score, but he might be better and not tell me. I usually start in china, depending on my mood, cough/rodent or cysts/abscess/rodent start. Necrosis at some point, but before "no healthy" or it takes too long. Dysentery is another infective + lethal symptom. Track 2 things, (1) Islands not yet infected and (2) infectivity vs lethality. Until all islands infected keep lethality no more than 1/3 to 1/2 infectivity. To much lethality and countries close land, water and air routes, which means you may not infect every country/ island.
I'd echo all that, infectivity is the key without lethality. I went a new way and equalled my 266 by going cyst/abscess/cough/sneeze (but crucially, after rodent) rash/sweating/skin lesions. This makes the disease very infective very early, if you add the other transmission vectors interspersed with abilities (I'm still not sure whether bacterial shell is better than cold/hot) then once countries start being infected you can beat a path to necrosis and dysentery fairly sharpish before borders begin closing etc. One other thing - if I get any of 'medicines slowing infection'/'ships use new sterilisation' etc. I write the game off - unless you're ahead of those chances are you will struggle to break 290 days.
Thanks much for all the advice! I lucked out with DNA points early in the game, and managed to get my new record of 259 days! Once all the islands are infected, I'm always left trying to infect the rest of Africa - Morocco is now the bane of my existence rather than Greenland
Sooooo...spill then....did you double-up on abilities or transmissions, find a use for 'bacterial shell', or miss any symptoms?
Okay, so my strategy lately (including the one used for the 259 days) has been more-or-less: Start in China, then evolve nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, rodent 1, coughing, sneezing, fever, skin lesions, then usually ships 1 and 2 or ships 1 and necrosis and/or dysentery depending on the number of DNA points I have. After this I usually get either cold 1 and heat 1 or bacterial resilience 2-3 followed by drug resistance 1. Depending on how quickly other countries are getting infected and how many DNA points I have, I'll evolve cysts/abscesses and/or anemia/hemophilia, as well as air 1 and 2, livestock 1, insect 1 and/or blood 1, making sure to keep an eye on islands infected and severity vs. lethality (see advice from Kayg0000 and Reptile_16). Once all the islands are infected, I'll evolve pulmonary oedema and pulmonary fibrosis then total organ failure. I also usually add systemic infection either before or after total organ failure, and then start to add more lethal symptoms like hemmoragic shock. If I come up with anything to add that I've forgotten, I'll be sure to add that as well. I've also gotten 260 days using this strategy, so I hope this helps you guys as much as you've all helped me!
Random thought for future "disease" Vampirism. And no i am not a twilight nut. Play with blood and insomnia/paranoia attributes for transmission and infection Cure could be garlic/cross/holy water
What would be great on the next update is more detailed statistics, which can be saved in your records. Statistics such as what day first person was infected, first day virus was detected, day everyone died, total days, first destroyed country, last destroyed country, including the graphics of how complex/evolved the virus looks, among others, all in one sort of record sheet. This is one is pretty cool for geeks like me. Another would be a replay-fast forward mode after every completed game. Where you get to view, in super fast forward, the world map as the virus spreads, and everything turns red then black.
Yep - released on Android yesterday. The game is free to download but to get the full game (i.e. what you get on iOS) - you have to pay $0.99 in the game. If people are interested in what genetic modification involves (coming to iOS in update 1.4) - its in the android version now. Heh - could be cool - have added it to my cool ideas list but no promises for now The stats thing is really cool and something I want to do but no promises when - lots of other things to do first. The super fast replay mode would be extremely hard to do so don't get your hopes up I'm afraid.
253 days...the key is to get lucky with spontaneous mutations that are helpful, such as necrosis or dysentery. I've been using the same strategy I posted earlier, but there's also a lot of chance involved.
Fastest world destruction Here is an interesting challenge. How fast can you destroy the world. No holds barred! Meaning any difficulty, any plague type, and any modified genetic code goes. I just started trying this today. I've got it down to 90 days! Note: I'm on android and do not have neurax worm plague
