The world is full of deadly diseases. Your job is to create the most powerful fictional virus. Build a unique strain, choose where it begins, and watch your mutations infect new hosts and spread across the world map.
PATHOGENEER is an ecology strategy game built around evolution, mutation, and a living world simulation. Shape a branching genome, pick a starting location and host environment, then discover whether your strain finds a foothold, crosses an ocean, or breaks into a new host species.
BUILD A VIRUS THAT PLAYS YOUR WAY
Choose an EVO trait and develop a branching genome. Unlock gene modifications through successful infections, then decide what your strain becomes:
• Improve transmission and regional spread
• Build survival, stability, heat, cold, and moisture resistance
• Specialize in mutation or host compatibility
• Strengthen land, air, migration, and ocean routes
• Trade raw speed for a strain that survives difficult environments
This is an evolution strategy game where every gene choice changes the simulation. A strain that thrives in one habitat may stall in another, while a carefully adapted descendant can open an entirely new route.
FIND YOUR NEXT HOST
Begin with plants and unlock insects, birds, land animals, and humans. Each host layer contains different targets, habitats, population patterns, movement networks, and barriers. Spread through a familiar host or invest in the mutations needed to cross into a new species.
The host ladder changes how each run unfolds. Insects move differently from birds. Island populations create different challenges from connected land regions. A successful host jump can transform a small outbreak into a global cascade.
CHOOSE YOUR GROUND ZERO
Select a starting point from 36 ecological zones and choose the local target for your release. Climate, moisture, habitat density, isolation, nearby routes, and host availability can help a tiny foothold grow—or bring the attempt to an early halt.
Ground Zero is a strategic choice, not just a backdrop. The same genome can produce a very different result when it begins in another region or host environment.
WATCH THE WORLD SIMULATION UNFOLD
Follow living infection fronts across the map. Switch between host layers, zoom into affected regions, and watch distant founders, ocean crossings, regional breakthroughs, and host jumps change the shape of the run.
When new opportunities or barriers appear, make decisions that can alter the cascade. Reinforce a foothold, adapt to a climate barrier, ride a movement route, preserve an earlier host, or gamble on reaching somewhere new.
BUILD ON YOUR BEST RUN
Every cascade produces a record of what actually happened. Review infections, spread, host shifts, routes, deaths, score, and the moments that defined the run. Archive memorable strains, preserve successful genes, and create descendants that carry their lineage forward.
Open Threads suggest a useful next objective after a run: continue a lineage, test a mutation, unlock another host, or chase a personal best. The next experiment can deepen a successful strategy or take your virus in a completely different direction.
SHARE THE MOMENT
Share the part of the run you are proud of. Create a card from your specimen, your maximum world spread, or the cascade statistics that tell the story best.
If you enjoy ecology strategy games, evolution games, world simulations, branching upgrades, and strategic map games, PATHOGENEER gives you a new fictional strain to shape every run.
How far will your next creation go?
PATHOGENEER is a fictional ecology strategy and simulation game modeled on real-world environments and habitats. Its organisms, mutations, and outcomes are designed for entertainment, not real-world pathogen engineering.
Ecology strategy game: create a virus, evolve its genes, and spread worldwide.