This has to be one of the most boring and insulting games I've played in a long time.
The message in this game rivals the message in We Happy Few as one of the most dangerous messages in video games.


If you want the TLWGAS (Too Late Who Gives A Shit),
The game is all about trauma, may it be physical, sexual, or mental we all have some sort of trama, and at times we may feel that our pain, are trauma is hurting people around us and that we should try taking our lives to save other people around up (I know I felt that way for a long time).

Well, this game tells us we should kill ourselves, that we are "Lost Causes" and if we do kill ourselves we'd be making the lives of our loved ones better for it since they can't fix us, and that is bullshit.

Suicide is never the answer to any problem especially ones you have no control over.

(If you feel suicidal please call this number 800-273-8255)

I don't know if this was intentional or not but I can not stand for this kind of message being in Xbox's first next-gen title.
I don't even care that there are aspects to this game I do enjoy because it's all wrapped up in this awful game with an awful message.

Fuck this game and fuck Blooper Team.

(Side-Note I forgot to add this part of the game which adds to why I hate this game so much)

At one point in the game, the game tries to make you empathize with a child molester.
The game shows you how he went down this path because his dad died, he had an abusive step-dad, and his best friend was taken by Nazi
granted those are all awful things
but I don't think that gives him enough for me to forgive a child molester.
That's just another thing to add to the shit cake that is this game.

fun that awhile back Bloober Team said something about wanting to be the Blumhouse of video games (what a high bar that would be...) but they can barely even match the quality of studios that shit out things like Lights Out, The Forest, or whatever streaming service fodder. my least favorite active developer working on primarily horror games and it isn't even close.

i'd probably be more forgiving if they didn't constantly step in it with regards to the sensitive topics that they themselves choose to delve into. if it was the first go around maybe one could think it wasn't completely thought through and not actively malicious but this is how many times now? Blair Witch pulled similar shit and that's not even speaking of the other games i haven't played.

i'm glad Akira Yamaoka got paid.

Short but haunting story. It has some dragging moments and perhaps Team Bloober did not go far enough with the mechanics of the dual world, but I still enjoyed my time in this game.

Akira Yamaoka's work on this soundtrack is up to their usual par, and the ending credit song is one I think I'll be listening to on my commute.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjrl1XpUxY0

Name The Thing They Stole This Imagery From 4

Not only is this game just utterly lacking in atmosphere and any sort of narrative drive (their beksinski "influence" is almost insulting to the visual diversity in his work when the locales have more in common with darkseed 2's cut-and-pasted hr giger painting world) but it also lacks any sort of faith in its audience to understand literally anything that happens. Marianne will narrate EVERYTHING CONSTANTLY regardless of how minor or unimportant it is meaning that the entire game is one long, boring monologue of Marianne explaining plot elements that have JUST been played, and every narrative beat that they're obviously setting up as a twist is so blindingly obvious the second its introduced that the story has no momentum whatsoever. Theres some bizarre attempts at broaching capital S Serious subjects like the holocaust - its trigger warning doesnt even bother to mention any of them, by the way - that are basically just spicy window dressing and go nowhere further than mentioning them as A Thing That Exists.

The game's """iconic""" monster is maybe the least scary thing I've ever seen in a game (oh no, its troy baker doing a stupid voice non-stop), and is also suspiciously similar to Hellboy 2's Angel of Death, a character who resides...wait for it...inside a Beksinski-inspired underground ruin! for fucks sake lmao.

The ending of this game is perhaps the worst I've seen in any game, it's so ill-thought-out and straight up fucking offensive that bloober team should be reminded of this absolute garbage any time they try to be prestige. Fuck this video game, fuck bloober team.

While it may have been hyped as a spiritual successor to the Silent Hill franchise, it’s not and should stand on its own merits. From my point of view, it was a decently made horror game that tried its best to capture the classic horror experience, and regardless if it succeeded or not, it’s still my favourite Bloober title to date. Life was brought to the character of Marianne, and I appreciated the cinematic quality that remained a constant throughout.

That said, the story itself was where things got complicated. When it comes to being deep and tackling sensitive subjects, it can either come across as respectful or the polar opposite, and I feel The Medium verged on the latter.

Somehow every review I write on this ends up
hampered by issues in clarity,
issues of both creative phrasing and,
technically, meaningful content.

For certain, my critique on the game is simple;
on any grounds, the writing and story are harmful,
routinely espousing the most toxic of views towards victims.

Clearly, Bloober Team relies on shock tactics to earn clout, an
underhanded attempt to earn viral attention through harmful
notions and rhetoric. I'm not writing in clearest terms, and
that could be chalked up to being tired of thinking about this
shit for cunts.

Come for the impressively bad performance on powerful machines and poorly thought out camera angles, stay for the Source Filmmaker cutscenes and miserable gameplay. I can't even be offended by The Medium's portrayals of pedophilia and mental illness because that would ascribe more intention to its writing than I believe Bloober Team is capable of - this game does not have themes, characters, or plot in the way a genuine narrative would and simply isn't worth engaging with on any level. I don't think the creators gave a second thought toward what it would mean by presenting Humbert Humbert's internal excuse for why he wants to fuck kids as a literal, tragic event - right down to quoting Lolita's opening line verbatim - nor do I think they understood the potential implications of Lily's... "arc" is probably too strong of a word. At least some of the environments and music are good?

Terrible appropriative studio copying other artists' work and claiming it as their own while wildly misinterpreting the meaning of its inspirations.
To further my anger towards this game, it does a poor, even harmful job at portraying mental illness, so far as to demonize victims of depression and anxiety as though they're "unfixable," and their demons are an inconvenience and impediment to those around them.
The emotional intellect is completely missing, and the storytelling is amateurish and immature, blatantly favoring style over actual substance and subliminality.

I'm left wondering if some of the patter I've seen surrounding this is from folk who actually finished the game, or are just doing that internet thing of parroting what someone they like said about it.

Seen some visceral reactions to its poor handling of the subject, but I never felt anything other than bored of it all. I think the way I had heard the game discussed meant I was waiting for some truly wild transgressive shit that just isnae really there for me. But then none of it applies to my life so I can only speak from this position.

Never did I get the impression that they were saying trauma cannot be overcome and so you must die. I do think there is space for stories that touch upon the very real fact that some people can never get through a horrible thing that happened to them. There are endless cases of it that many of us will be far too familiar with, but Blooby Squad are absolutely not the folk to be doing it.

Bloober Team's attempt at a Silent Hill game in a era (which we are still trapped in) of a lack of a serious presence of the series as a whole.

My only experience with Bloober's work has been Observer which I played last year out of sheer curiosity. This game oddly enough shares most of it's strenght and weaknesses which it shouldn't be surprising knowing it's comming from the same studio. Unlike Observer's cyberpunk-dystopian inspired setting, The Medium goes back in time to 90's poland and the camera shifts to a third person perspective. To my surprise there are differences as much as are similarities between both titles: scripted chases, limited combat, great atmosphere and very linear progression. But underneath the superficial aspects, The Medium hides it's true face and there are a lot of reasons it didn't reasonate with me as much as I hoped to.

The Medium for the most part is a walking sim, with puzzle elements here and there. And the most important aspect of all the "The Medium™ mechanic" which let's you see both realities at once, thank you next generation! It is a strong selling point which isn't even used that much in the game, keeps itself simple for a couple of puzzles to solve...and that is pretty much were it dies. Now, there are moments were it's use is justified and arguably the best use of this mechanic was in the very ending. It left a lot to be desired as it never goes beyond being an extension of the "Material World". Not entirely different. it offers nothing a quick change in scenery would have done with the power and speed M.2 and SSD provide just for a quick puzzle solution. Very hardware taxing too, specially for PCs. It is a neat idea on the surface, but one that ends up being heavly underutilized for whatever reason.

It takes some cues from the Silent Hill games, and definitely noted some influences from SH2 the most. In interviews, developers clearly stated their love for the forgotten Konami franchise. But does Bloober Team made a commendable effort to differentiate or at least be a game that adds to the genre as a whole? Not much. Let's be honest, the most famous Silent Hill games aren't exactly known for their deep gameplay mechanics rather it is the heavy opressing atmosphere of the town, the music score, beloved main characters and by times dark stories. But The Medium isn't any different, at times it can even be worse than the game released 20 years ago. First off, no map is needed to explore or mark notes on as the exploration is as linear as it gets. Total anhilation of your only limited guide through the game, it could've come in handy in the very last section. And second, combat is totally ditched outside certain scenes were it's not even required to continue. I'm all for a combat-less horror game, but this is straight up boring. Puzzles were fun and that is pretty much were my praises end.

The story surprisingly isn't all that bad, as Marianne our protagonist pieces the puzzles that is her past through her powers as a medium. It gets really dark after a while, tackling some sensitive issues such as suicide or even child trauma. Not talking "My mon hid my DS" child trauma, but rather problems that do occur in our society frequently that are hard to erradicate/change. A cycle of victims and perpetrators which share a common demon, no matter the time or person. Interesting topics to assemble a narrative, though I would say the overall message it delivers by the end fumbles what good will started to build in the beginning. It is possible to save someone with enough care and time into it. But there are times were it is truly impossible, that is all I'm going to say.

The Medium is full of design issues that kill what efficiency, time and resourses could've poured into other Bloober projects. The worst you can do is a game to feel longer than it really is while keeping yourself always comming with new maps, and new ideas that end up being never used ever later into the game. Misses the shot, and it misses again and time again with each oportunity they have to redeem themselves from it. Think about it, they have to create two whole different worlds for each scenario that end up being the same in layout just with different decoration. Highly inefficient from my point of view as it harms development time and resources. The more I think about this unique mechanic, the more issues I see.

But it's ok, they hired Akira Yamaoka...right?

It takes a lot of inspiration from Silent Hill, but ignores a good chunk of what made those games so great. Like its incredibly obvious symbolism, if you can even call it that. It makes the meaning of the monsters and other supernatural figures in the game so clear to you that they lose all impact. They literally explain it all to you through dialogue.

The gameplay again takes a huge amount of inspiration from SH and other survival horror games and I always enjoy that stuff, so it was a pretty enjoyable game overall. I really do believe that the story could have been so much better if they just chose to favour a more symbolic and thought-provoking way of telling its story, which in the grand scheme of things is actually quite interesting.

This is easily one of the worst games I've ever played through.

Part of the problem with this game comes from Bloober Teams dire handling of mental trauma, which is EVIDENT from playing the game. This tweet thread explains it far more succinctly that I would ever be able to:
https://twitter.com/bobvids/status/1356295962524835840?s=20

The gameplay is also a boring mess. There are no puzzles to be solved, there is no combat in the entire game. You simply walk from place to place, find items and insert item in to something to unlock the next room. Somehow this game manages to be the worst kind of walking sim, while attempting to sell itself as some kind of Survival Horror experience.

The visuals are nice, but the game ran like poop on a modern, high-ish end gaming PC at launch. Putting aside the atrocious handling of trauma, the writing and dialogue in this game are also just bad. Listening to the protagonist talk becomes like nails on a chalkboard within an hour or two of starting this experience.

There's nothing of value here, just avoid this "game".

I reviewed the Medium with a key provided by the publisher.

The Medium is Bloober Team's best outing yet, and with more refinement I think their next title could be truly great. It suffers from many shortcomings, namely technical bugs and meandering plot lines. Despite this, it handily excels at controlling atmosphere and directing the player's experience while presenting a compelling protagonist to follow. The Medium is not one the best horror games I've ever played, but it is one of the most unique and ambitious ones. The Medium boasts some features, like the dual reality puzzle solving, that I would like to see iterated on in the future of the genre. And with it coming to Game Pass on day one, I advise all horror fans to dip their toes in to the spirit world and see what's on the other side of the mirror.

Read the full review here: https://techraptor.net/gaming/reviews/medium-review

On the one side, it's great to see a return to psychological survival horror with emphasis on puzzles and exploration, fixed camera third person gameplay and, of course, some more bangers from Akira Yamaoka, teaming up with composer Arkadiusz Reikowski.
And then on the flipside, the horror is usually silly and ineffective, the gameplay clunky and slow and the puzzles usually consist of finding a missing key item usually metres away from where it needs to go. The writing also embodies the worse depiction of abuse and mental health in maybe all of gaming.