General Gaming News

Plague Inc. developer says fans shouldn’t look to game for info on coronavirus

Plague Inc.

The spread of the coronavirus across the globe has sparked alarm in many countries. The disease possesses pneumonia-like symptoms and has been identified as part of the SARS family of diseases, although health officials suggest that this virus will not be as dangerous as SARS. What was originally tracked to a now-shuttered fish market in the Wuhan province of China. The coronavirus has so far killed at least 17 people in the country and infected more than 500 others. Possible spread has now identified via human-to-human methods. This has led to possible cases in Canada, the US and other countries.

Plague Inc. has since rocketed up in terms of users in response to the spread of the disease. This week Plague Inc. was the most-downloaded paid game on iOS in China and reached sixth place in the overall mobile game charts in China. The clear intent here is that Chinese people are looking for any and all sources of information about the disease or how to prevent becoming infected.

This fear has now caused a response from the developer, Ndemic Creations. The game was originally designed as “a tool to teach the public about outbreaks and disease transmission,” but Ndemic Creations would like to remind folks that there are some problems with that model.

“However, please remember that Plague Inc. is a game, not a scientific model and that the current coronavirus outbreak is a very real situation which is impacting a huge number of people,” the statement continued, noting that players and fans of the game should not look to the simulation for information or insights into the coronavirus or it’s spread. This point is crucial, as the game doesn’t take into account the variety of variables that a more accurate model would, making it very unreliable for gaining insight into how real diseases spread.

Ndemic Creations also pointed users to the WHO which has put out a variety of resources in multiple languages on the virus.

The products below are affiliate links, we get a commission for any purchases made. If you want to help support ISKMogul at no additional cost, we really appreciate it.
10976 posts

About author
ISKMogul is a growing video game publication that got its start covering EVE Online, and has since expanded to cover a large number of topics and niches within the purview of gaming.
Articles