Needless to say if an educational institution taught me incorrectly on purpose, I'd ask for my money back. "Tugboat Terror" is a student project from DigiPen that ignores that 3D graphics became mainstream in the mid 1990's... there's no such thing as a gaming PC without 3D graphics. The faculty at DigiPen apparently didn't feel it necessary to tell students about that. It's going to be tough for any student to go find work in the industry if they can't even show they know about 3D video games.
The students made a laughably bad 2D "platespinner" game, you know the types of games where you run around doing little minijobs to keep operations going. Usually these are restaurant themed, but today we have a tugboat and an absurd fish with legs. I guess it's up to developers what kind of theme they want their games to have, no rules there, but the technical delivery is pathetically bad, especially for a student project.
We also have to question what value there is for gamers on Steam when institutions flood the store with low quality 2D video game homework assignments... sure, it might make the students feel good about themselves, but this has no benefit for gamers who have to wade through this stuff to find professionally made 3D games.
In terms of visuals, this features really godawful MS-Paint tier "art" instead of real graphics. It's hard to say if this was because the developer didn't have the skill to do the job of creating 3D visuals, or couldn't afford to hire someone who does, but it also doesn't matter. What matters is that this looks much worse than most other games because of that decision, and that's a major deterrent to gamers. The deplorably bad visuals here come across as an insult to gamers.
You're forced to sign a highly questionable yet legally unenforceable End User License Agreement... for such a relatively low effort, low quality product, this comes across more as a delusion of grandeur than anything else. This agreement includes questionable requirements that may attempt to revoke consumer law protections that gamers expect to have, which is also highly problematic. Developers must learn they are here to serve gamers, not control them. I had my cat walk over the keyboard while the EULA was displaying, which fixed that problem for me.
Next is pricing and what value this has for gamers.
It would be unethical for students to try charge money for their homework assignments, so you don't have to pay any money for this. But you'd still have to spend your time downloading this, and "time is money", as they say.
There's the other problem, too... as a student project, this wasn't made for gamers. There's no requirement for them to polish and balance the game properly, all they need is something to show the faculty so they can get their grade and move on. Let's once more ask... why is that good for gamers?
It's obviously not delivering a solid product. Yet here it is, on the store page, and here you are, reading my review for a student demo that's going to waste your time. While genuine amateur developers who made real products get ignored because they have to compete with this stuff.
In some ways, this deluge of student projects on Steam is harmful to everyone.
Even as a free game, this couldn't find an audience. With a peak of [b]only 3 players[/b], it's clear the Steam community took one look and walked away. They literally couldn't pay people to spend time playing this.
Keep in mind this student project won't increase your game collector count or show up in your Steam profile showcases, and because it's a short, unpolished and unmaintained student homework assignment, I can't recommend you spend your valuable time on this one when you could be playing any of the thousands of fully made games for gamers.
[b]Note: Joke reviews[/b]
As usual, with some of the worst games on Steam, all the comedians come out of the woodwork. The vast majority of the reviews for this game are joke reviews, mocking the game for just how bad it is. The comedians give us the usual "this game cured my cancer, saved my marriage, changed my life" story... sarcastic, but not useful if you want to know if the game is worth it.
Because most of the reviews are humorous but also insincere and not reflective of the actual quality of the product, the positive review score for this game should be taken with a grain of salt.
