The Two Point series is quickly becoming a favourite of mine. After Two Point hospital bringing a modern and frankly amazing splash of paint to the 90s classic Theme Hospital, and Two Point Campus bringing a whole new idea into the field (which was also awesome) we’re now presented with Two Point Museum, a game where – and this might surprise you – you’re tasked with putting together a museum. It’s a big claim, but I reckon this is the best Two Point game yet.
A few years of tweaking and balancing the previous games has clearly been a worthwhile experience for Two Point Studios. With Two Point Museum you have a huge amount of freedom for positioning your historical exhibits, alongside any supporting items such as information boards, donation boxes or objects to support the condition of the exhibits, for example using chillers to make sure your amazing rare frozen displays don’t defrost too quickly. Positioning of your displays as as important as you might imagine, and with limited space to play with in your museum buildings you want to make sure your visitors are getting the best experience possible – you wouldn’t want your perfectly constructed dinosaur skeleton to be in a spot where nobody will see it after all.
The range of exhibits available is really impressive as well. Alongside a few smaller display pieces provided along the way, you can send your staff out on expeditions to find fancier, rarer things to display. This might be a particularly uncommon fossil, a frozen caveman, or something even more impressive that I wouldn’t want to spoil for you – after all the discovery is half the fun! These expeditions aren’t straightforward though. Your staff can get injured or lost, the helicopter can get damaged, and everything slows down as a result. Considering the whole time these expeditions are running you’re down on staff at the museum itself, any delay can be extremely problematic, so it’s useful that you can create a training room in the museum to make your staff more likely to succeed in their missions. It’s a really nice way to unlock and open up new things to put into your museum, and becomes a really neat constant side-game.
For a game with so much going on, it’s great to see how easy it is to find everything you need to access. Everything you could be looking for, whether that’s a new caretaker or just a pretty plant to put next to a bin, is within a couple of button presses. This idea of an easy interface is often where mouse-free console versions of these kinds of games fall over, but practice has indeed made perfect for the Two Point series, and you’ll be flying round the various areas of the interface in no time.
All of this works you through a guided experience where you’re completing objectives to improve your museum, teaching you the ropes and then sending you on your way to try and achieve various requirements to keep things ticking over without running out of money, letting things get out of control or have thieves running riot and swiping your favourite exhibits. But if you want a little control, or a more laid back experience, then the Sandbox mode has you covered. Customising your experience, you’ll be able to disable crime, tweak the difficulty, basically set up the game however you want to play it. Combine that with the amazingly chilled soundtrack and you’ve got the scope for an incredibly relaxing game.
So with Two Point Museum, the series has reached a fantastic point where the balance between gameplay and challenge is absolutely on the money. It’s easy to play, challenging to play well, and an absolute blast along the way. If you fancy something to relax to while building up your collection of dinosaur displays, look no further.
Reviewed on PS5
