When it comes to business simulation, few developers have as much fun with the genre as Farnham-based Two Point Studios. The developer has seen great success with both Two Point Hospital and Two Point Campus in the past. This isn’t a surprise when you spot that the team behind the game was foundered by members of Bullfrog Productions. Theme Park, Theme Hospital and Black and White are just a few of the huge titles made by the Peter Molyneux-helmed house. Two Point Museum, the newest instalment from the studio, swaps a hospital and university in favour of a museum.
Foundational Systems
Two Point Museum blends the foundations of both Two Point Hospital and Two Point Campus to deliver a game that has a surprising level of urgency. The game provides a fun toolbox of options, while maintaining the series’ high skill bar.
Two Point Museum wonderfully balances creative gameplay with finance management. For example, having Wonders to view is great for prestige, but a drain on the accounts. Your facilities and exhibits also need constant upkeep as they will perish over time. Failing to keep on top of this gameplay element will see visitor numbers drop, or worse, people being hurt.
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Commanding and coordinating your team of experts and janitors effectively is a vital skill, in what becomes a bit of a micro-management sim. You can plot their daily routes, personalise their wages and even change the colour of their uniforms. You can even name them.
And on top of all that, you’ll need to keep an eye on the moment-to-moment goings on in the museum at the same time.
No Easy Mode
Two Point Museum can get very deep very quickly. However, you don’t need to get knee deep in the management side if you just want some creative fun.
You can focus more on securing exhibits, going on expeditions to find interesting artefacts. This side-quest adds a bit of wieght and character to the ancient crap that is the bread and butter of your business. It’s not just a drag-and-drop insta-buy from a menu. What’s more, the higher the risk of the expedition, the greater popularity it will have.
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There’s a nice balance to the expeditions, and the systems that support them give the mechanic some depth. You may choose your best people to go on the adventure, but you have to spend time training them up which puts them out of action elsewher. Or, you could just send in a team of lesser and untrained staff to risk having the whole thing go horribly wrong.
Main Stage
When not globe trotting, you’ll have to put your newly secured wonders on show. Each exhibition has two main figures of merit to keep an eye on. ‘Buzz’ generates greater visitor numbers and money. ‘Knowledge’ will bring in a higher grade of visitor, while it also unlocks some buffs to help the exhibit along.
However, the more buzz and exhibits you have, the more thieves will try and steal them. So, this brings in the need for a strong security presence. But, the more guards and camaras you have the more uneasy your guests will feel, so it’s a bit of a balancing act again.
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Like past entries, you’re aiming to earn as many stars as you can during the Two Point Museum‘s campaign. Stars unlock new and interesting exhibits, as well as features for your museum. However, Two Point Museum isn’t just capped at three stars per location like previous Two Point games, so you can earn as many as you wish from the same location.
There a number of different museums you’ll get to oversee during the campaign, each with their own themes and with that very Two Point sense of humour too; like Prehistory, Supernatural, Science and Sport to name a few.
Sandbox Archaeology
Outside of the campaign there is the sandbox mode. Here, you get to go wild, firstly setting your starting cash, how fast the exhibits decay, whether or not thieves exist etc.. Sandbox is where you get to truly dial in the game to your skill and taste.
You get access to all the museum sites and themes, but will still have to run expeditions to get the exhibits you want to show.
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Returning fans will feel at home here, as a lot of the tools for building are similar to those in Two Point Campus. The only limit is your imagination, as you can build an uber museum that would house all themes under one roof.
Graphically, Two Point Museum keeps that signature animated style the series is known for. There are tonnes of little funny moments if you’re paying attention. The gameworld and its characters are chunky and colourful in equal parts. Two Point Museum‘s UI is very clean and clear, and it handles a surprising amount of info well without dumping info on you every other second.
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The UI system can get a little messy when building. Info panels often pop up and cover the other items on your build library. And you can’t make them go away so they are there until they time out. This is a more of a pain than a deal breaker, but if you’re a heavy builder, it may drive you up the walls.
Consolisation and Consolation
That said, for a native PC game it’s doing a solid job on the console. You can, of course, tell that things would be a bit quicker, smoother and more precise with a mouse and keyboard. But, the care in transferring to a control pad is readily visible and you won’t feel short changed by the control scheme.
Two Point Museum‘s audio is solid across the board. However, praise is due to the in-game radio station, which had me laughing out loud a few times, as it pokes fun at the series as well as the game itself and honestly never felt dull or boring even after an hour of time playing.
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Two Point Museum embodies the series’ signature tropes while also being a perfect blend of what’s came before it with something new to wring some fun. Two Point Museum delivers a well-rounded title that may not be as groundbreaking as some would hope, but it’s a game can be enjoyed by newcomers and returning fans alike.
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