‘Two Point Campus’ gross sex bed has raised questions I never want answered

I need to talk about Two Point Campus‘ sex bed. 

To be clear, I don’t want to. I think we would all be better off not thinking about this video game’s plasticine-looking people in the throes of passion. But society cannot progress unless we tackle the hard questions, and I aim to leave this world better than I found it. 

Developed by Two Point Studios, Two Point Campus is a university management game that allows you to construct and run a hallowed institution of higher learning. Running courses such as Knight School, Internet History, and Virtual Normality, your task is to create the optimal conditions for students to thrive. It’s an enjoyable game that will scratch an itch for any management simulation fan.

Providing classrooms and teachers isn’t the only thing you have to look after, though. You’re also in charge of their wellbeing, having to provide food, shelter, and entertainment for the entire student body.

Unfortunately, this includes supplying a designated bed for them to bang in.

From scrubs to schools

If you’ve played its 2018 predecessor Two Point Hospital, Two Point Campus will be very familiar. From its Wallace and Gromit-esque character design to Two Point Radio’s eclectic DJs, much of Two Point Campus is instantly recognisable. The majority of the gameplay is largely identical as well, with both Two Point Campus and Hospital requiring you to build specialised facilities, hire skilled personnel, and cater to numerous clients with differing needs.

Even so, there are some notable changes, one of the most significant being Two Point Campus‘ timeline. While Two Point Hospital does have an end of year award ceremony, Two Point Campus has a clear class schedule throughout the entire year, which runs from August to July. 

Once you hit summer break, school doesn’t resume until you allow it, giving you time to construct new rooms, hire new staff, and plan for the coming year. Two Point Campus also doesn’t let you take on new scholars until the start of the new school year, and they stay for several years (unless they’re expelled or drop out).

Managing people’s moods is a significant part of the game too, as students’ ability to learn and thus their grades are influenced by their happiness. Miserable people aren’t terribly good at studying, after all. You’ll therefore be spending much of the school year micromanaging, scheduling parties, then assigning students Private Tutoring once they’re happy enough.

Thus, in order to be a top university, you have to provide facilities to address student needs such as hunger, thirst, hygiene, entertainment, and, of course, relationships. 

This brings us to the sex bed.

The Sex Bed (aka the Double Jump Bed)

To be fair, this plush pink monstrosity it isn’t explicitly marketed as a sex bed. Called the “Double Jump Bed,” it’s ostensibly for Sweethearts to jump on together, which upgrades their relationship from level 3 to 4 and turns them into Soulmates. 

But, look. It’s pretty clear what the Double Jump Bed is really there for. It’s bright pink and covered in hearts. There’s an equally pink trunk at the foot of the bed, which is also covered in hearts. It’s designed for two people to bounce on. We all get the euphemism.

There’s a lot going on here, but one of the main issues is that the setup of this place is a dormitory. So unless you build an entirely separate room just for the sex bed, you end up having all these normal single beds in this room, then this one bright pink sex bed as the focal point like the setup of an incredibly uncomfortable experimental theatre piece.

For the record, students do not appear deterred from using the sex bed even when it’s placed in a row with many other, non-sex beds.

This could be my own fault. A less utilitarian university administrator might create dozens of tiny dorms to circumvent such situations, rather than cramming all the beds into one big room like an army barracks. However Two Point Campus‘ students tend to prefer communal sleeping arrangements, meaning mitigating the potential for exhibitionism would only be for my own comfort.

Students even share beds, with one bed required for every five students. This makes sense from a game design perspective — it wouldn’t be much fun to have an entire campus building dedicated to hundreds of beds. Unfortunately, the result is that I’m running a university with over 100 students and one sex bed. This is not maths that I want to contemplate.

I know that this is not what Two Point Campus wanted me to focus on. But at the same time, if you orchestrate the situation such that I’m compelled to put a bright pink heart-adorned sex bed in the middle of a grubby student dorm, you can’t be surprised if I fixate on that a little bit.

Requesting permission to bang

An interesting aspect of the sex bed is that, if you do not have one of these sin mattresses on campus, students have absolutely no qualms formally requesting one. Personally, I cannot conceive of a situation where asking your university’s dean for furniture on which to bang wouldn’t immediately result in devastating psychic damage to all involved. Yet the Two Point universe appears to be free of such shame, for better or for worse.

The Double Jump Bed is one of many items students may request to achieve personal goals or complete assignments, along with Scientography Bookcases, entire Ramen Kiosks, or even the ostentatiously decorated Lover’s Bench. Just as a sex bed is required for intimate moments, apparently some students can’t confess their love unless seated on a bench adorned with pink hearts. (I’ve spent about 15 hours in the game, but have yet to unlock any emotional maturity courses.)

However, many of these items need to be unlocked with in-game currency Kudosh. Not to be confused with your money, which you earn from tuition fees and use to build and staff your university, Kudosh is a separate currency which you earn by completing objectives and challenges. Such challenges range from levelling up students, to developing new romances, to earning $1 million in rent from your students. Who, I will remind you, all share one big room with a designated bang bed.

In the first few maps I found I wasn’t earning enough Kudosh to fulfil these requests, turning the game into a frustrating exercise in watching my students’ admittedly weird dreams slip away. Fortunately, accumulating Kudosh gets easier once you unlock the ability to earn it at the Research Lab. Having enough Kudosh to fund school equipment also gets easier once you realise not every request for an arcade machine requires a positive response.

As such, I technically didn’t have to approve my students’ written application to bang. Two Point Campus‘ Double Jump Bed costs 150 Kudosh to unlock and $4,000 to actually buy, which seems like a lot for the garish piece of furniture. In contrast, a normal bed is only $1,200. These funds could be better spent on bookcases, or classroom equipment, or practically anything other than a sex bed. 

My students’ sexual frustration also seemed like the sort of problem they could solve themselves, perhaps by taking a discreet excursion to a nearby hotel and not involving the dean.

But on the other hand, who am I to deny assistance to young love? University is a time to meet new people, form connections, and explore yourself — as well as consenting others. It may not technically be on any university’s official timetable, but nurturing a student’s social skills is just as important a part of their development as their grades. 

Therefore, if I am to create the best, most welcoming and nurturing university I can, I should help facilitate romantic attachments, and be glad my students feel comfortable enough to ask me for a sex bed. This is what I keep telling myself.

So fine. Two Point Campus‘ students can have their expensive school-funded communal sex bed, and bounce on it to their shameless hearts’ content. I’ll allow it. But they still only get one.

Two Point Campus is available August 9 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC and Nintendo Switch.