Great presentation featuring strong environments, good voice acting, and a great score. Unfortunately, that's pretty much the end of the good things I have to say about this game. Like a few other Bloober Team games, this one falls into the "walking simulator" category. They attempt to mix things up by adding this second spirit world that can be explored simultaneously with the material world, but it never is really fully explored as a gameplay mechanic, and usually amounts to you just switching over to it so you can flip a switch or gather some energy.
The other "gameplay" is collecting trinkets and letters, finding keys a few feet from their doors, and the occasional clunky stealth segment that only takes about 15 seconds to clear.
Everything about The Medium as a "game" is decisively unimpressive. It's too bad, because it often looks great and sounds great, and in the most fleeting of moments can even remind me (aesthetically) of classic survival horror games of years past. If only Bloober Team would actually take the time to design more "game" around these stories they want to tell. Not necessarily saying they need to add combat encounters, but needs to be something that evokes the fear and dread their environments and characters are telling me that I should feel.
The other "gameplay" is collecting trinkets and letters, finding keys a few feet from their doors, and the occasional clunky stealth segment that only takes about 15 seconds to clear.
Everything about The Medium as a "game" is decisively unimpressive. It's too bad, because it often looks great and sounds great, and in the most fleeting of moments can even remind me (aesthetically) of classic survival horror games of years past. If only Bloober Team would actually take the time to design more "game" around these stories they want to tell. Not necessarily saying they need to add combat encounters, but needs to be something that evokes the fear and dread their environments and characters are telling me that I should feel.