by usaretamA
rmsgrey wrote:
Pandemic and other fully co-operative open information games (vanilla Pandemic does say to only share your hand with other people by telling them which cards you have rather than leaving them face up, which makes it harder to access the open information, but the Legacy Pandemic games all have open hands instead, so even that quibble doesn't apply) have the property that you can group the actual people playing in any way you like to form "virtual" players who are each assigned a role in the game rules. For example, you could have three players controlling four characters, with each controlling one character and the fourth controlled by all three collaboratively, or four players controlling three characters with two players sharing a character or with three players each sharing control of their one character with the fourth player, or you could have four players controlling four characters by having one player control all four characters while the other three just spectate...
In general, the only differences between a fully co-operative open information game and a true solo game is that it's practical to break up the game into individual player roles and assign them to people, and that there can be too much going on for one person to keep track of.
So, while the Pandemic series are designed for multiplayer, it's pretty reasonable to play them solo, particularly when compared to something like Chess, which is purely competitive.
In general, the only differences between a fully co-operative open information game and a true solo game is that it's practical to break up the game into individual player roles and assign them to people, and that there can be too much going on for one person to keep track of.
So, while the Pandemic series are designed for multiplayer, it's pretty reasonable to play them solo, particularly when compared to something like Chess, which is purely competitive.
Well yes, if you're treating each game merely like a puzzle to solve I guess solo works just fine. Table management might be somewhat a hassle when controlling 4 characters, but other than that, sure.
My point was mostly about my personal feeling that the social/group interaction in solving that puzzle is, to me, what makes games like these shine. Hence the question to the OP how his multiplayer experience compares to his solo play.
Marctimmins89 wrote:
It always surprises me that people are baffled by solo play on a thread that is titled for "Solo" by a solo reviewer.
Ok Marc, thanks for sharing.