Plague Inc - How to beat the Fungus-type disease

Why was the mushroom popular at parties? Because he’s a real fun guy... All jokes aside, this isn’t about the familiar types of fungus, like Shiitake or Oyster but about something far more unpleasant and deadly. The Fungus-type disease in Plague Inc presents a unique challenge to players, but one that can be overcome, if you follow the right approach…

Essentially, the main advantage and quirk of the Fungus is that it does not necessarily require peer-to-peer transmission. Well, not only doesn’t require it, it actively discourages it. The Fungus will not spread as easily via natural transmission, or via boat and air (although these can still play a part of course), instead, it relies on the natural ability to create Spore Bursts to infect countries. Spore Bursts have the advantage of being able to infect a large number of people at any given time, but don’t rely solely on them to achieve your objective.

To win, you’ll need to focus on increasing your transmission, so pursuing upgrades like Air and Water should be your main focus (rather than livestock or avian transmission). As always you should be careful not to develop serious symptoms too quickly; remember, it’s easier to infect everyone and then start developing lethal symptoms than deal with an early start to cure development.

For symptoms, remember that the Fungus is primarily airborne, so developing Coughing and Sneezing will greatly increase transmission without needing to use Spore Bursts. But, also keep in mind that by its very nature Fungus is a much slower-spreading disease, so you’ll need some patience as well. Water and Air will help you gain access to international transmission but will take longer than other diseases.

Follow the general guidelines, and use Drug Resistance to infect areas like North America if they’re proving to be troublesome. And remember, with the Spore Burst ability you should be able to infect any remaining countries, so save at least a few for later use.

By the time you’ve infected most of the Eastern Hemisphere, you’ll be well on your way to developing the Extreme Bioaerosol transmission method. Use that to infect the rest of the world, and once you have total - or near enough - coverage…use your accumulated DNA points to develop lethal symptoms as quickly as possible to stymie the cure.

• Focus on Transmission via Coughing and Sneezing, then develop the Water and Air transmission methods to achieve widespread transmission in your starting country.
• Utilise Spore Bursts in order to spread to the next country, until you can access Extreme Bioaerosol you’ll have trouble crossing borders.
• Then, focus on Drug Resistance to infect wealthier countries. By this time the Cure might have started, so you should then develop Insomnia and eventually Insanity down the branch.
• As always, focus on transmission and only then should you pursue lethality, Immune Suppression is excellent for this and can lead to that gruesome means of death, Total Organ Failure.

With that in mind, be patient, and be ready to try a few times. Fungus is unique due to its relative weakness, but being able to spread from almost anywhere means that you have unique strengths too.

Check out our guide on the tips and tricks you need for Plague Inc to learn more about winning in this morbid game of pandemic-spreading disaster!