Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 - Thoughts

[contains minor spoilers]

Brief note about aforementioned spoilers: I try not to specifically spoil anything important from the game, but know that any details that are different from the base game of Pandemic are technically a spoiler, so just be aware of that. If the game is currently sitting on your board game shelf, I recommend skipping this whole article and just starting it right now.

Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 is a fascinating experiment. Four diseases break out across the world every time you sit down to play, and you must globe hop in an attempt to stymie the infections, biding your time until you have enough city cards to eradicate each plague. Being a legacy game, what happens in one game can affect all future games; if Paris begins rioting early into your playthrough, it'll probably burn itself down to the ground in a future session. While Pandemic Legacy has a lot of fantastic mechanics at its core, I'd contest that what keeps players coming back to the game is this simple question: when the world begins to crumble, how would you mitigate casualties?

I've never really loved Pandemic. It's a palatable blend of soft strategy and random card pulls, but I've always preferred as little RNG as possible in my board games. At times Pandemic can feel too dependent on what cards your team draws, and it's also a game where one player can effectively make all the decisions. My board gaming group lives a considerable distance away from me, so rather than bug them about playing a legacy game every time I visit, I decided to solo Pandemic Legacy to see what all the fuss was about. I was concerned about the difficulty playing alone—especially since I lost the two practice games I played beforehand—but it honestly wasn't all too bad! After a few plays you get used to when the epidemic cards pop up (ie cards that worsen the condition of infected cities), and every unlucky card pull is usually counterbalanced by a narrow victory.

Pandemic is plenty of fun on its own, but the Legacy version is where the premise of the franchise really shines. Early on in my playthrough, South America and Africa got hit hard with disease. In the base game I would've helplessly watched as the continents rapidly went dark, but here I could try and slow their decay. And doing all you can is a good idea too: Pandemic Legacy lasts a full year in-game, with each play session covering a month or half a month, meaning you'll play anywhere from 12-24 times total. And while losing cities is bad in the base game, here they'll become frequent hot spots that spread infection every time you play. So when South America and Africa began deteriorating in the first quarter of my year, I was faced with a grueling choice: do I run my operatives in to halt the outbreaks there, or focus on the main objective in the hopes of finishing the game faster? One session I chose the former, and it cost me my win that month.

But as my campaign continued on, it became harder and harder to save cities on the brink of disaster, especially when I received ways to quarantine those danger zones. One of the coolest things about Pandemic Legacy is that it has a lot of "unlockable" content that's tucked away in boxes and portfolios, which the game will tell you when to open. And it doesn't add more to the game as much as it starts to transform how you'll play and interact with it. You'll acquire more options for moving your characters, empowering your cards, or stopping diseases—all of which are frequently backed by the game's military forces. So rather than send in medical teams to treat sick citizens, I was marching troops to the border to prevent anyone—infected or healthy—from leaving. One month I was rushing operatives into Africa to save it, the next I was setting up blockades and reporting that everyone inside was already lost. As I watched Africa fall, I told myself "this is the only way to keep the world safe!"

Moments like that and many others are what elevate Pandemic Legacy above its parent game. In the base game, the novelty of seeing a continent wracked by disease loses its impact after the first experience, but in Legacy you have to live with your decisions. I had failed Africa, and was forced to watch as South America slowly, month by month, descended into chaos. And every now and then the damage would bleed over into Europe and North America, and I'd reconsider my priorities. The casualties were already so high—could I really condemn Atlanta and Madrid to the same fate? (The answer was eventually "yes" to the former.)

Besides having difficult decisions, Pandemic Legacy is phenomenally well-balanced and fun to play. Every major unlock adds a new mechanic to the game, keeping it from getting stale while not overloading you with too many moving parts. The game is easy to learn and gives you plenty of customization in the form of end-game upgrades for your characters and cards. It layers on a good amount of strategy at a very natural pace, but the game's biggest draw still goes to the tough questions that'll arise as a city begins to fall. The only thing I was really disappointed in was the scoring system you're given after Pandemic Legacy ends (one specific category is cruelly "all-or-nothing"), but it's a minor complaint to an otherwise excellent campaign.

Pandemic Legacy isn't the best introduction to modern board gaming, but it's accessible nature basically means there's no reason not to play it. It's a stressful game, but it's never punishing; you might panic over the state of the world as epidemic cards are pulled in quick succession ("no not Khartoum again!"), but you'll learn to accept the consequences and move on. And as you do so... as you quarantine another dying city... as you replace all your medical personnel with generals and soldiers... you'll start to wonder, "is what I'm doing necessary? Is it right? Could I have done more?" And the answers will range from bittersweet, to downright haunting.

Even if you're not a big board game person, you should still play Pandemic Legacy—you won't regret the experience.
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Images obtained from: spieledeluxe.com, richcontext.com, boardgamequest.com, polygon.com