Pandemic on the Brink Board Game EXPANSION - Face New Challenges and Save Humanity! Cooperative Strategy Game for Kids and Adults, Ages 8+, 2-5 Players, 45 Minute Playtime, Made by Z-Man Games

There are a number of options within this set to expand upon classic pandemic, but I was most impressed with the box insert accommodating all of the classic + expansion pieces--allowing me to discard my original pandemic box and keep all the pandemic play options together! Great game, quality pieces, and identical cards.

Pandemic is one of my favorite games and does not need to be expanded. However, if you feel like the game is a little stale like you've played it so many times that you need new challenges or just something a little different, this is almost a must-have expansion. In this box are several new role cards, a 5th infection cube color, a 1-vs-all variant, cards to make a disease tougher, and a box insert that lets you store the base game, this expansion and the 2nd expansion: "In the Lab" (fitting all 3 expansions with the base game is quite difficult).The 5th cube color is used in 2 new game variants: bio-terrorist and mutations. The 1-vs-all variant has everyone trying to win the game while a bio-terrorist player is also infecting locations. The mutation variant adds a few cards to the player deck and a few cards to the infection discards and drawing one of those cards will add purple cubes to the board. Curing the purple disease is a little harder since there are half of those cubes than the original 4 colors.This expansion has Virulent Strain epidemics that can replace your epidemic cards. Instead of just following the basic 3 actions of an epidemic, you now have a new ongoing- or one-time effect like "remove 4 infection cubes from the virulent strain supply". You determine which disease has the least cubes available and dub it the virulent strain the first time you have an epidemic and will make curing that disease harder.The game comes with more events, roles, and a few blank role and event cards. With all the new events comes a new method in using them: 2 cards per players get shuffled into the player deck before dealing cards.I like the new roles, the new events, and the virulent strain variant a lot. The bio-terrorist has been played once in the ~100 times I've played with this expansion but everything else in the box has definitely been worth buying. If you can only afford 1 expansion for Pandemic, this is the one to buy. I recommend this expansion above the other 2; then "In the Lab" and "State of Emergency" last. (However, all 3 expansions are great and have new variants well-worth the money.)

I picked this up along with the 2nd edition game, but this came in first and I had a 1st edition game available. It turns out that there are some disadvantages in mixing editions. The expansion card backs do not match the 1st edition card backs, so it is rather obvious when the next card to be drawn is an expansion card. This could change player behavior when they see that the next card drawn has a high likelihood to be an epidemic simply because it has a different pattern on the back.That said, it meshes perfectly with the 2nd edition (when that came in later), and adds a lot more complexity that I and my fellow players appreciated.The addition of the BT adds a "scotland yard" twist to the game, though the players tend to have a difficult time adjusting to this - they focus on capturing the BT the first few times, when in reality the BT simply bides his time in capture and escapes... his capabilities are hardly diminished simply because he is captured. The players really need to focus on cures more than the BT, and it's hard to make that decision (particularly when the BT is thumbing his nose at the other players) :).With the "Virulent Infection" piece of the expansion, epidemics can now have side-effects that change the way you deal with infections. Some of these are immediate effects that are resolved on the spot, while others have on-going effects that continue until the disease is cured. This added complexity meshes well with the base game without necessarily increasing the difficulty by much - yes, it's more complex, but it's not necessarily more difficult.The "Mutation" expansion, however, does increase the difficulty quite a bit. You only get 12 mutation cubes, compared to the 24 you get for the other diseases. This means when you run out of mutation cubes in the infection phase, it's game over... so mutations need to be dealt with quickly. I've had quite a few games end early simply because the players forgot about the 12-cube limit until it was too late. On the other hand, I enjoy the game more with the mutation expansion in play, so despite the added difficulty, it's still a lot of fun to play.

We love Pandemic because it is a team player game rather than “I win, you lose.” You have to discuss your plans with the other players to find the best way to cure diseases while battling potential outbreaks. On the Brink is a great add on to the game because it adds a whole other layer to really spice things up. My kids are 9 and 8 and I feel that this game is a good challenge that they can handle. Younger kids may not fully understand the planning but can still be helpful to the cause. It’s a great family game for a range of ages.