Can your team make it through the year; face month after month of set backs and fleeting victories to save humanity? pic.twitter.com/Vnh6UeDLz2
— Z-Man Games (@Zmangames_) January 13, 2015
Risk Legacy shook up the board gaming world in 2011 by taking the tried-and-true mechanics of Risk and reinvigorating them with permanence and an evolving metagame that persists between individual matches. Players sign the board at the start of a campaign, and decisions from one game carry over into the next. The box comes filled with sealed envelopes that add new mechanics to subsequent games based on what happens.
The precise board layout and combination of rules in effect by the end of the 15-game campaign is entirely unique to that particular group of players. Designer Rob Daviau gave a presentation on the game’s design process at the 2013 Practice symposium at the NYU game center. Daviau is currently also working on SeaFall, the first Legacy game built from the ground up.
Pandemic, first released in 2008, is a cooperative game wherein players work together to stem the spread of four diseases before the world descends into panic. It’s basically the inverse of Plague Inc. Like Settlers of Catan, Carcassonne, and Ticket to Ride before it, Pandemic serves as a gateway into modern board gaming for many new fans, particularly introducing many people to cooperative games. A modern classic with elegant mechanics, Pandemic is a perfect follow-up to Risk for developing a Legacy game, global map board and all.
There are few details about how Pandemic Legacy specifically works beyond its basic premise. The campaign takes 12-24 games to conclude, according to the publisher’s website. The “Season 1” label indicates that the publisher intends to extend the game through multiple releases. Zombicide is another contemporary cooperative game that uses a seasonal release structure, adding new characters, scenarios, and items with each subsequent release.
