> I was a freshly baked postgraduate in Melbourne

Oh man I knew this was going to be a disaster when I head they were going straight into a grad degree.

I'm still on the fence about if CS students can actually program before working in industry, but doing a grad program that isnt paid for by Industry was a major red flag.

On the bright side, it sounds like OP learned tons and tons and tons. While the game flopped, I bet they could throw together a top notch program in a year with their lessons learned.