TouchArcade Rating:

[appicon url="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id700793523?mt=8"]The TouchArcade Borg Collective was pretty enamored with Pandemic: The Board Game ($4.99) when it came out in the halcyon days of 2013. We called it “a tight, focused package that demonstrates some of the best that tabletop and iOS design can offer," high praise for first-timers F2Z Digital Media. Good news, then, that the game is finally getting iPhone support later this week.

Pandemic is a cooperative game that tasks up to four local players with cooperatively grappling with outbreaks of virulent, color-coded diseases. Each player has special abilities to help the team quarantine infected cities or stockpile resources, but global decimation is often the most likely situation. An update in January 2014 added new specialists and events and expanded Pandemic to five players, but F2Z has been quiet since then.

This Friday, however, F2Z is rolling out a Universal update to bring the game to iPhones and iPod Touches. To celebrate, there’ll be a weeklong sale: Pandemic: The Board Game will be a breezy $4.99 from the 17th to the 24th.

It’s not uncommon for iOS games, even well-received ones, to simply run out of gas after a few months, so it’s nice to see F2Z revisiting Pandemic. I asked spokesperson Kalinda Patton about the renewed interest, and she explained that they hired some extra developers to help support the game. “We needed some more people than just the one guy we had to develop the app further," she says. “So now that we have new members in the Digital team, we are able to update the app that was unwillingly left alone for too long."

Also notable is that this Universal update doesn’t actually change any of Pandemic‘s features or content: you can still play solo or local hotseat with friends, but don’t expect new online co-op multiplayer modes.

Pandemic: The Board Game for iPhones and iPod Touches should hit the App Store this Friday, the 17th.