Two Point Campus - University Management Sim from the creators of Two Point Hospital

[Halo]

Looks like the follow-up to Two Point Hospital has been leaked early on Microsoft Store:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/two-point-campus/9pcw1smn9rgg

 

 

Build the university of your dreams with Two Point Campus, the follow up management sim with a twist from the creators of Two Point Hospital. Get to know your students, explore their personalities and fulfill their wants and needs. Craft buildings, choose courses, hire the best staff and build an academic institution to stand the test of time.

 

 

[Broker]

 

Quote

Build the university of your dreams with Two Point Campus, the follow up management sim with a twist from the creators of Two Point Hospital. Get to know your students, explore their personalities and fulfill their wants and needs. Craft buildings, choose courses, hire the best staff and build an academic institution to stand the test of time.

 

Build your university, your way! It’s time to spin academia on its head! Got a yearning for learning? Or just keen to build an educational masterpiece? Campus is jam-packed with new creative tools to help you build the university of your dreams. For the first time, build in the great outdoors as you develop your own delightfully educational campus environment, housing the top teaching facilities in the land. Whether you prefer building on simple foundations, or placing every tree, you can build the university you want.

 

Lay down pathways with new easy-to-use tools. Plant glorious collections of outdoor flora. Place benches, fountains, sculptures, hedgerows – even picket fences. The only limit is your imagination (and your in-game bank balance). Not the usual fare But, of course, it wouldn’t be a Two Point game without a twist. Rather than typical academic fare, students in Two Point County enjoy a range of wild and wonderful courses: from Knight School (hey, we all have to learn jousting at some point in our lives), to the salivatory Gastronomy, where your students will build mouth-watering concoctions like giant pizzas and enormous pies. The academic year… is here! Take advantage of the opportunity to spend way more time with the little people in your university.

 

The academic year begins with a summer break, giving you enough time to get everything looking great before your students move in. Build libraries, hire the best staff (from eccentric professors to madcap researchers), kit your campus out with the best courses and watch the academic potential of your students get unlocked!

 

But it’s not just hard work. Get to know your students, explore their individual personalities, wants and needs. Keep them happy with clubs, societies, gigs. Surround them with friends, help them develop relationships, furnish them with pastoral care and ensure they have the right amount of joie de vivre to develop into incredible individuals who will do the legacy of your university proud.

 

 

 

[Alex W.]

If I can’t trap professors in an agonising hellscape of job insecurity and brutal competition for funding then what is the point.

[bradigor]

4 minutes ago, Alex W. said:

If I can’t trap professors in an agonising hellscape of job insecurity and brutal competition for funding then what is the point.

I'd assume there are two of them.

[Alex W.]

It took 22 hours but I just got that joke.

[f2097]

Love two point hospital (got it on PS4, switch and now Xbox thanks to gamepass). It was great how long they supported the game and the sheer volume of extra content. Felt like a 90s PC strategy title with all it's add ons.

 

Not 100% sure how they will do the concept with this but looks good from the screenshots and is probably better they are doing something totally new.

 

[Darren]

I’ve merged the two (point) threads.

[AlexM]

This looks like a laugh, can't wait. 

[deerokus]

It's an original premise for one of these anyway. 

[Hexx]

https://www.eurogamer.net/two-point-campus-delayed-until-august

 

Delayed from 17th May to 9th August. Seems an odd/unprepared for move as loads of previews etc had started appearing...

 

It's not a good sign is it?

 

[Captain Kelsten]

23 hours ago, Hexx said:

https://www.eurogamer.net/two-point-campus-delayed-until-august

 

Delayed from 17th May to 9th August. Seems an odd/unprepared for move as loads of previews etc had started appearing...

 

It's not a good sign is it?

 

I wouldn’t worry too much - the devs seem to know what they’re doing and two point hospital was a fun (if not too derivative) take on the comedy management sim, so I have faith. My wife works at a university so I can’t wait to talk to her like I’m suddenly an expert in university management after playing this game for 30 mins.

[pledge]

Bumping this so I remember for Tuesday. Will be on Game Pass.

[bradigor]

Playing the opening tutorial level now and it feels much more welcoming than TPH did. But still feels nicely familiar.

[b00dles]

I finished two point hospital but I did think the campaign was a bit weak in how it was structured. A lot of games like this (tropico did it as well as some of the settlers games) have this way of making you start from fresh on a new map but then just adding a new thing in, rather than just allowing you to evolve on one map and introduce new things like cities skylines does it. 

 

Two point hospital also had really quite strange objectives that I could only ever complete by just doing that one thing to complete it and then removing those things as it was way too expensive/ time consuming to have a sufficiently working hospital and that one objective. For instance things like enough toilets or a high percentage of happiness or cleanliness, always easier to just spam a load of decorations or bins and janitors for a short period and then remove them or you're always chasing it as your hospital grows etc. 

I might have been doing it wrong but that was the only way I could get through a lot of the campaign missions in terms of the objectives, I could have a profitable and working hospital but not also that and complete x task. 

[Hexx]

2 hours ago, bradigor said:

Playing the opening tutorial level now and it feels much more welcoming than TPH did. But still feels nicely familiar.

 

How?

[deerokus]

1 hour ago, b00dles said:

I finished two point hospital but I did think the campaign was a bit weak in how it was structured. A lot of games like this (tropico did it as well as some of the settlers games) have this way of making you start from fresh on a new map but then just adding a new thing in, rather than just allowing you to evolve on one map and introduce new things like cities skylines does it. 

 

Two point hospital also had really quite strange objectives that I could only ever complete by just doing that one thing to complete it and then removing those things as it was way too expensive/ time consuming to have a sufficiently working hospital and that one objective. For instance things like enough toilets or a high percentage of happiness or cleanliness, always easier to just spam a load of decorations or bins and janitors for a short period and then remove them or you're always chasing it as your hospital grows etc. 

I might have been doing it wrong but that was the only way I could get through a lot of the campaign missions in terms of the objectives, I could have a profitable and working hospital but not also that and complete x task. 

 

 

It was very much the same structure as Theme Hospital iirc. It definitely isn't the best way to do it.

[bradigor]

1 hour ago, Hexx said:

 

How?

 

I can't quite put my finger on it. I think it is a more relaxed pace at the start 

[pledge]

35 minutes ago, bradigor said:

 

I can't quite put my finger on it. I think it is a more relaxed pace at the start 

I think he meant how are you already playing it. Such as you have a review code.

[bradigor]

2 minutes ago, pledge said:

I think he meant how are you already playing it. Such as you have a review code.

 

Oh, yeah got an early code. 

[Hexx]

Ah. Lucky Sod. 

[b00dles]

3 hours ago, deerokus said:

 

 

It was very much the same structure as Theme Hospital iirc. It definitely isn't the best way to do it.

Didn't theme hospital work like theme park in that you had a plot of land on it that you expand into? Or was it the whole 'different hospitals and different illnesses' for the campaign?

 

I can't remember tbh, it's been ages since I played it. 

 

I do think the way to do it is have the ability to build a massive hospital and then deal with flare ups of a particular illness or something than resetting each time they introduce the new machine/ illness. I get that the level design is a bit involved there with the existing maps but I also just find that a false complication because if you had the money you do, you wouldn't just demolish a boulder or something to build a new hospital wing, it's daft. 

[deerokus]

3 minutes ago, b00dles said:

Didn't theme hospital work like theme park in that you had a plot of land on it that you expand into? Or was it the whole 'different hospitals and different illnesses' for the campaign?

 

I can't remember tbh, it's been ages since I played it. 

 

I do think the way to do it is have the ability to build a massive hospital and then deal with flare ups of a particular illness or something than resetting each time they introduce the new machine/ illness. I get that the level design is a bit involved there with the existing maps but I also just find that a false complication because if you had the money you do, you wouldn't just demolish a boulder or something to build a new hospital wing, it's daft. 

It was the same as tph.

[b00dles]

6 minutes ago, deerokus said:

It was the same as tph.

Weird. Probably why they did 2 point like that I suppose but unless it's for a tutorial, I really think it's strange. 

 

Or if you do it as though they're all under your umbrella company* and in different cities, that could work to an extent but having each one as a unique "level" ended up being a bit of a pain I thought. 

 

*I know that's kind of how it worked with 2 point and you could go back to levels to get higher points and ratings etc, I was thinking more like you could have outbreaks in a particular city that would require you to go back or something (but then that could be an arse if not done carefully but leave me alone, I'm not designing it! )

[Captain Kelsten]

Two point hospital suffered from being a poor imitation of the much better, much funnier, much more original theme hospital. Without that hanging over them this time, I’m hoping two point campus really comes into its own. 

[pledge]

On 05/08/2022 at 12:18, bradigor said:

Playing the opening tutorial level now and it feels much more welcoming than TPH did. But still feels nicely familiar.

 

When are you allowed to post a review/more impressions?  My partner has only ever really played two game series. All the Yakuza and Two Point Hospital. So she's super excited for this, so I hope it can live up to her expectations.

[bradigor]

6 minutes ago, pledge said:

 

When are you allowed to post a review/more impressions?  My partner has only ever really played two game series. All the Yakuza and Two Point Hospital. So she's super excited for this, so I hope it can live up to her expectations.

 

Ah, I'm not covering it. I got given a code through contacts just to play. I'll check the embargo and give a heads up on what I think. 

 

Edit: Ah there are already reviews. 

 

For me, iot is much more of the same so far, in a good way. However it feels like being released from the expectations of being a spiritual successor to Theme Hospital, it is allowed to be more free. 

 

The basic premise is still there, build, manage, profit and the charm and character is still there. 

 

Everything so far seems 'easier' in terms of actually playing the game, but it still has all the challenge this sort of game lives and dies on. I'm still not overly far into it yet (I made the mistake of loading up Slay the Spire) but I also went back to TPH and am finding TPC to be a much more rounded experience. I can't put my finger on it exactly though. 

 

I like how the students have to pass classes to meet some challenge criteria, you need to get like x% passing at grade y it makes so much sense and there is the part I get on with this more than TPH so far. 

It is really good, is what I am getting at. 

[Hexx]

First level 3 starred. Really like that - it's change from the TPH but you can easily see the cycle coming. Keeping them happy to pass makes a lot of sense.

 

Wish everything wasn't behind Kudos again - especially when you're "challenged" to "I want Item X" and it cost 100 currency and you have 15

 

[MagicalDrop]

Enjoyable so far, very much in the 2PH blueprint. Console completely locked up after about 90 mins play though. 

[Hexx]

3* second level - yeah I think this feels like a refined more focused TPH. Which is no bad thing, the added systems help progress.

Getting really annoyed at requests for Kudos items that are 100s above what I have though

 

[thesnwmn]

3* the first campus over about an hour this morning and another couple this evening. Very enjoyable. Bright and cheerful management SIM at this point.

 

A few little confusing things where I wasnt really sure what an icon on a room meant, or how to work out how many staff I really needed.

 

And I really didn't understand course points. Levelling up science (or whatever it's called) to 4 turned it red which I thought meant I didn't have enough points. So I exited and gained a few campus levels. Only to find it was still red next time and it actually meant it was the max level. Such terrible colour choice. Simply disabling the plus button would have been enough.

 

But I'm sure I'll get my head around all the aspects over time as I explore more.

 

 

I'll echo the comments about personal requests for items I've not unlocked and don't have enough kudos for as being annoying. The whole concept of that seems flawed.

 

Unlocking optional objects via kudos (or similar) is fine. That's a basic (if uninspired) but passable progression system in which the player can choose what types of items they're most interested in having available to place.

 

But making specific requests against them, making them so in your face, and throwing at you constantly is nothing but frustrating. And seems obviously so. There's no pay off either. You don't feel any real satisfaction from clearing those mails. Not sure I can imagine any play-tester not mentioning it and it not being changed very quickly. It almost feels like they might have debated micro transactions to buy kudos.

 

Anyway, a minor blip on an otherwise good fun start which doesn't really impact the game once you learn to just start ignoring all of them.