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[Gatox]

So I had 10 minutes on The Medium last night, didn't think I would enjoy it as its not the kind of game I play lately. But I was blown away, absolutely loved it and finally put the controller down at 1.30am after about 3 hours on it. Got a lot of cues from the old silent hill game which I remember enjoying. My wife enjoyed watching it, other than the sudden scary bits where she bricked it.
I would say to anyone to give it a go, the split screen stuff is fascinating and really well done. It is a bit on rails but hopefully this can be further developed by the team in future games.

 

[davidjaffe]

Played for 3 hours or so...here's my take FWIW:

 

[lame gag1990]

I heard about that tank controls debate. I had to see it to believe it. It feels like someone gets confused about what tank controls are every year.

 

[Self]

Even storytelling wise it's really hard to call this a masterpiece or even 7/10.

A 6/10 I would suggest, which isn't enough if you have no adequate gameplay loop on offer.

After playing two hours I can say "yep, next please". Technically it's a mess. Framedrops, flashing decals, sparklings everywhere and to need to turn of ethernet just to skip the black screen on start because of some fuckery from Microsoft store is too much. Also how can you make such a beautiful environment but fucked up the main player model so bad.

I can't agree with the technical side: The game looks good to me and runs decent on XSX. Neither have I noticed the much talked about 900p scenes. They look fine.

But yes, the player model is unacceptable in 2021.

 

[SkylineRKR]

Played for 3 hours or so...here's my take FWIW:

The thing with the abilities sounds like Lords of Shadow, that game threw a shit ton of mechanics at you during its opening stages and some never returned and others I just forgot about.

The beauty of GP is that you can just try a game and move on to the next if its shit. But the quality of games, yeah, its probably an issue. I feel Sony is quite a bit ahead in terms of overall game quality while with PS3 and 360 they were kinda on par or MS even had an edge (the likes of Killzone failed to deliver like Halo 3 for example). But MS has GP to counter with, its way more cost effective. Which is why I have it in the first place.

 

[SafeOrAlone]

The controls didn't bother me in the slightest. I hardly notice them. Maybe because I grew up on "tank controls" but it's been a smooth ride for me.

I went back for a second game session last night and I may even complete it this weekend. Consider me surprised, as I had no plans to touch this game, but the novelty of new games dropping on Game Pass had me intrigued.

Safe to say I'm enjoying the experience. I'd agree that as a game, it's sort of bare bones. It consists of walking around to explore, occasional prompts, and some high-octane escape sequences. I suppose it's just enough to let you plant your feet into the experience, dictate pace, and have a sense of agency. It's not riveting gameplay to the likes of Resident Evil by any means.
But on the plus side, when it comes to atmosphere, I find it to be much creepier than Resident Evil, generally speaking. And that's what keeps me playing. I want to explore the next environment or come into contact with more of these dark, chilling characters.

It's definitely worth checking out if you like scary stories. The lower scores can possibly be justified if you are focused on gameplay, but if you just want an effective and fun "click and point" adventure, you may enjoy yourself.

 

[cormack12]

It's like saying god of war 3 had tank controls because it was a fixed camera. It's wrong.

I just had the first chase scene. Game is legit creepy. I feel if you play these games with tv sound, daytime, light room, noise/distraction then a lot of the experience is lost.

The walking animation is a bit weird and I think some cameras choose strange times to cut but thats probably a bit of inexperience from the devs.

 

[Clear]

For the record "Tank" controls are defined by left/right turning the player-character anti-/clockwise on the spot, with up and down moving them forwards and backwards along the axis of the characters facing direction.

This was the old-school solution for when screen-relative controls are impossible due to the camera perspective switching as the player moves room-to-room and area to area.

The more modern approach (which I assume The Medium uses) is to use screen relative controls that maintain the orientation of the current view through a perspective transition, with switching only happening when no input is detected.

So in essence you can press left to walk into a new area, and even if from the new camera position left would now seem to move you back where you came from, you'll continue moving in the intended direction until you release the movement key/allow the stick to recenter etc. At which point it rejigs the inputs to match the new screen orientation.

 

[Fess]

I just had the first chase scene. Game is legit creepy. I feel if you play these games with tv sound, daytime, light room, noise/distraction then a lot of the experience is lost.

No kidding my first chase sequence was played at night, whole family was asleep, dark room, home theater sound...
I was milliseconds from going nope and uninstall it!

Blooper no doubt stumbles here and there but they really nailed the creepiness, I thought I would get used to it but I’m near the end and nope they still manage to give me the creeps again and again. The slow speed is risky, it’s a slow burner and lots of people will drop it before even experiencing their first really creepy segment. But the speed and lack of action plus hold your breath mechanic really helps to make it creepier, wouldn’t have been the same without that. You rarely feel as defenseless as in this game. Feels unique.

The harsh reality though is that I wouldn’t have played it if it weren’t for Gamepass. It’s going to be a very divisive game. I’m so glad I gave it a try though, haven’t finished it and I’m already looking forward to whatever Bloober does next. Phil should ask for Satya’s wallet here, give these guys a bigger budget and they would compete with the best.

 

[Life]

Game was way too easy. Puzzles were always obvious besides one segment. Every item you needed was an arms-length away, conveniently. Ultimately felt like a walking simulator cos of the linear puzzles and level design. Needed combat - perhaps turn-based random encounters even (easiest way to fit combat without changing the whole level-design), with some RPG progression. Woulda been twice as long that way and actually worth buying.

Also, how can the protagonists, whose face we see so much of, have the facial expressions of a Playstation 2 character, if that? It baffles me when comparing her face to the rest of the environment etc.

 

[kuncol02]

Needed combat - perhaps turn-based random encounters even, with some RPG progression.

Do you have a stroke? Should we call for ambulance or something?

 

[Life]

Do you have a stroke? Should we call for ambulance or something?

Shut up unless you have something constructive to say.

 

[Moogle11]

Game was way too easy. Puzzles were always obvious besides one segment. Every item you needed was an arms-length away, conveniently. Ultimately felt like a walking simulator cos of the linear puzzles and level design. Needed combat - perhaps turn-based random encounters even, with some RPG progression. Woulda been twice as long that way and actually worth buying.

That’s actually a strength of the game for me. I tend to hate combat in horror games. Tends to be clunky, compouned by often having limited ammo and needing to make shots count. I also don’t enjoy puzzles and end up just having my iPad next to me to look things up. My job is full of problem solving etc. so I usually want to turn my brain off and veg out in my hobby time.

So I’ve been thrilled that it’s been an easy, walking sim type game were I can just steadily progress through an interactive story. I’ve been on a kick with these kind of games lately having recently played Man of Medan, Tell Me Why, and Night in the Woods before this. I’m just not in a mood for any challenge or using my brain lately. Even more so this week with recovering from hernia surgery.

 

[M1chl]

I've finished it, overall I would pay 60 bucks for this easily, especially the second half was like really tight. The jump of quality and scale and all that stuff from Blooper is amazing, if compare it to their last game, which was Layers of fear. I am satysfied, more than I expect to be.

Few points:
- Split screen is bad, it should not be done this way, It should be switchable.
- Running towards came in some hall is retarded
- Main protagonist acts the worst of the characters, all of them other are significantly better
- It felt like some sections were done with different team, animations are more smooth
- Lack of music, most of the time it's just atmo, not really anything playing. I expect when you have fucking Akira Yamaoka on the decks, that music going to play constantly, like Shadows of the Dammed
- Troy Baker surprised me, he did really well here
- Virtually no bugs

All in all can't wait for another Blooper game

 

[Clear]

Don't take this as a dig at the game, but it kinda annoys me that by comparing The Medium to Team Silent's games when not only did they have combat in addition to the puzzles, difficulty for both those elements were independently controllable in the options.

Just saying, give credit where its due.

 

[Keihart]

Do you have a stroke? Should we call for ambulance or something?

Why not? RPG and survival horror does mix well...in fact, it has been done before...


i mean...

 

[Exentryk]

Started this tonight and put in a few hours (got to daycare room). Some thoughts:

Pros:

• Atmosphere
• Music
• Graphics

Cons:

• Poor Optimisation on PC. So many stutters and poor frame rate.
• Poor main character model
• Poor Animations

Haven't gotten into the story much either, but maybe it'll get better. Saving random people seems uninteresting. The split worlds seems fine to me. It's a bit tricky to keep eyes on both halves of the screen, but manageable. I like the fixed camera angles, and love the graphics. There does seem to be some flickering going on, and some blurriness, but still looks nice.

I'm not a fan of escape sequences, and yup, still hate them here. But it comes with the genre, so have to put up with it. I'd appreciate some kind of safe mode like Soma, but no biggie. Anyway, will play some more tomorrow and see how it progresses.

Some screens below:

 

[Great Hair]

I just had the first chase scene.

Spoiler: ya got to be kidding ...

 

[Exentryk]

 

[M1chl]

Spoiler: ya got to be kidding ...

What kind of fucking voice is that?

 

[Chukhopops]

Game was way too easy. Puzzles were always obvious besides one segment. Every item you needed was an arms-length away, conveniently. Ultimately felt like a walking simulator cos of the linear puzzles and level design. Needed combat - perhaps turn-based random encounters even (easiest way to fit combat without changing the whole level-design), with some RPG progression. Woulda been twice as long that way and actually worth buying.

Also, how can the protagonists, whose face we see so much of, have the facial expressions of a Playstation 2 character, if that? It baffles me when comparing her face to the rest of the environment etc.

I was agreeing with you until the RPG part, you can’t be serious. That would not work at all in a game that is building atmosphere.

Only disappointment to me was that the dual reality was underused. It’s a really original, interesting game mechanic and it looked (to me) incredible when seeing it in action, but I thought the whole game would be like that and it wasn’t the case. When you’re not in dual reality you’re basically playing a slightly watered down Alan Wake - not bad at all but not as good.

 

[Great Hair]

What kind of fucking voice is that?

The voice of reasoning.

Spoiler

Someone who does not l*ck a toe like the rest of the youtubers ; got black listed (he is like all of you here anti sony). I don´t like at times some of his reviews, but they´re are for sure spicy af when the BS meter is at all time high like with The Medium.

7 million for an auto run cheat ... ho lee cao

Spoiler

And lets not pretend anything else ... with out gamepass, this would have flopped harder than Tenent.

He is alright, he liked Kingdom Come Deliverance. But that voice he has, damn.

I got no issue with his voice. I think his voice is the trademark behind the persona.

Spoiler

Is this where we trade youtube videos now of some rando people saying one thing and some saying another to try and prove the 'one true opinion'?

No thanks. I prefer to play the play the games and come to my own opinion.

I'm sure he doesn't need to lick anyone's toes when he has patreons who lick his. Like most patreons.

.. at least tag ppl. correctly. If you can not be objective enough .. not my issue. Simple question: would you buy this game for $60+? Or are you playing it, because it´s part of gamepass?

 

[Fess]

Don't take this as a dig at the game, but it kinda annoys me that by comparing The Medium to Team Silent's games when not only did they have combat in addition to the puzzles, difficulty for both those elements were independently controllable in the options.

Just saying, give credit where its due.

I don’t think people mean that it’s a Silent Hill game, for me it pulls on the same strings though, it’s not just simple jump scares but makes you constantly anxious from the hair-raising creepy atmosphere. Love it.

 

[M1chl]

The voice of reasoning.

Spoiler

Someone who does not l*ck a toe like the rest of the youtubers ; got black listed (he is like all of you here anti sony). I don´t like at times some of his reviews, but they´re are for sure spicy af when the BS meter is at all time high like with The Medium.

7 million for an auto run cheat ... ho lee cao

Spoiler

And lets not pretend anything else ... with out gamepass, this would have flopped harder than Tenent.

He is alright, he liked Kingdom Come Deliverance. But that voice he has, damn.

 

[cormack12]

Is this where we trade youtube videos now of some rando people saying one thing and some saying another to try and prove the 'one true opinion'?

No thanks. I prefer to play the play the games and come to my own opinion.

I'm sure he doesn't need to lick anyone's toes when he has patreons who lick his. Like most patreons.

 

[DaleinCalgary]

Played for 3 hours or so...here's my take FWIW:

I'm going to listen to David and wait a couple months to see if they patch gameplay issues.

And he is correct if games are free on gamepass it makes it easier to stop playing. Hell I get all these free games and can't get myself to try lots of them.

 

[Foilz]

I'm playing on game pass PC and so far it's Alan wake+silenthills with resident evil controls.

Visually the game is very nice, runs silky smooth on my vega64 3700x with everything maxed out (no hdr). It's not the greatest visual stunner but it does look good, I have no issue with animations, optimization or player models. The main characters model looks good to me. She kinda reminds me of the chick from syberia

So far I'm enjoying the story. If I was to give it a fake score right now I'd say 8/10

 

[BigLee74]

Alright, this is getting creepier. Gentlemen, we are now approaching ‘Lights On’ territory!

 

[Classicrockfan]

Did this new patch get rid of the blinking lights can’t find patch notes For series x.

 

[Tickle My Tendies]

Spoiler: ya got to be kidding ...

This review was already posted earlier in the thread.

I guess we have reached the "Spec Thread Crew comes in and reposts the same negative opinions over and over and over and over and over again" phase of this game's mindshare.

edit

I have always been an eye for an eye, fight fire with fire kinda guy, so for balance:

SkillUp, one of the best reviewers out there IMO (one of the few who were brave enough to call out the trash gameplay of TLOU2), recommends the game:

I'm playing on game pass PC and so far it's Alan wake+silenthills with resident evil controls.

Visually the game is very nice, runs silky smooth on my vega64 3700x with everything maxed out (no hdr). It's not the greatest visual stunner but it does look good, I have no issue with animations, optimization or player models. The main characters model looks good to me. She kinda reminds me of the chick from syberia

So far I'm enjoying the story. If I was to give it a fake score right now I'd say 8/10

What resolution? I have a beefier PC and have pretty big time performance issues here and there. I wonder if maybe the game likes AMD GPUs more than Nvidia? Or maybe RT just tanks the FPS in certain scenes more so than others (Vega 64 doesn't support RT, right?)

 

[Life]

I was agreeing with you until the RPG part, you can’t be serious. That would not work at all in a game that is building atmosphere.

Only disappointment to me was that the dual reality was underused. It’s a really original, interesting game mechanic and it looked (to me) incredible when seeing it in action, but I thought the whole game would be like that and it wasn’t the case. When you’re not in dual reality you’re basically playing a slightly watered down Alan Wake - not bad at all but not as good.

Just saying with it being a small studio etc - would have been the easiest combat system to implement. Game felt like I was walking a straight line throughout in terms of gameplay. They nailed the atmosphere and the story is decent - but if you're not gonna give me real puzzles and free-roam, at least give me some battles while I tread this boring line.

The game holds your hand from the beginning to the very end - on top of the already easy difficulty.

 

[Sir Vilhelm]

Played only an hour and love it so far. No complaints whatsoever

 

[Fess]

So far I'm enjoying the story. If I was to give it a fake score right now I'd say 8/10

Seems fair, my fake score so far is about the same, maybe 8.5 just to show it’s closer to a 9 than 7. There are some oddities that’s dropping the score from what otherwise is a slow but solid and unique horror adventure.

I agree with Life though that the puzzles are too easy. The ground work is there for some really cool puzzles but they just aren’t going there, or at least not up til where I’m at. (Red house)
In the end it’s the atmosphere and story that makes you stay. Gameplay-focused gamers probably won’t even exit the appartment at the beginning, which is sad because they’ll miss all the cool stuff but that’s how it is.

 

[TheMooMan]

The performance of this on my 3700x/1070 is pretty bad, even at 1080p/high.

It looks nice but not nice enough to justify the performance issues.

The game itself is fine - would be better without the fixed cameras, and much more of an adventure game than a horror game, but as a big adventure game fan that's fine with me.

 

[Elpidio Valdés]

I'm around 3 hours in and I'm loving the game. Amazing atmosphere, it's creepy and the story is pretty interesting. I also like the gameplay with the fixed camera, it's old school Survival Horror. That first encounter/chase with the son of Thanos that died cuz he hadn't seen Aliens was real tense.

I just hope the game doesn't pull a Sadness was the evil one all alone. That would be a straight up rip off of Murdered: Soul Suspect. Either way I can't wait to play more.

 

[Balducci30]

Man, I mean I have gamepass so it was nice to try the game but it is definitely NOT FOR ME. I straight up don’t get the appeal of these type of games, it’s primarily moving around and looking at things but the moving and looking around feel super clunky? I don’t get the philosophy.

 

[Tickle My Tendies]

with the son of Thanos that died cuz he hadn't seen Aliens was real tense.

 

[Redlancet]

dont cry my little boy,momma its busy dinning with me

 

[Redlancet]

I kinda wanna try detroit, is it too easy to kill characters becuase you miss a qte?! or characters die mostly for bad choices?

nah you can save the game,or repeat chapters

 

[sainraja]

I heard about that tank controls debate. I had to see it to believe it. It feels like someone gets confused about what tank controls are every year.

OK. I tried walking away from the conversation but since it keeps coming up I had to go back and replay the games.

I just booted up the following RE games for the PS1:

• Resident Evil 1
• Resident Evil 2
• Resident Evil 3
• Dino Crisis 1
• Dino Crisis 2

I think many people who were arguing otherwise with me haven't really gone back to the old games recently and I also think people have forgotten that the PS1 did ship with analog controls later on its life (not all RE games supported analog control mind you); regardless, in any of the games above, YOU do not need to stop and turn. Your character will continue moving in the direction you push the stick. In certain areas, and this happened more so in RE3, like the alley ways, you had to stop to turn, only because of the little space you had. For the most part though, I was able to push forward in a direction in continuous motion and change directions.

Dino Crisis 1 is the closest to The Medium in control since the camera does follow you in certain areas while its fixed in others.

My point simply was, if you are going to group every old RE game together and state they all have tank controls then The Medium, by that definition, also has tank controls. I came to learn after saying that if you don't have to stop to turn its not tank controls. Hell, I wasn't even being specific, the way The Medium controls is very close to how the old RE games use to control, just because I said that, did not mean its exactly the same!

 

[Redlancet]

quite a shock that you dont like an xbox exclusive

must be hard for you,i know,be better not bitter

 

[Tickle My Tendies]

OK. I tried walking away from the conversation but since it keeps coming up I had to go back and replay the games.

I just booted up the following RE games for the PS1:

• Resident Evil 1
• Resident Evil 2
• Resident Evil 3
• Dino Crisis 1
• Dino Crisis 2

I think many people who were arguing otherwise with me haven't really gone back to the old games recently and I also think people have forgotten that the PS1 did ship with analog controls later on its life (not all RE games supported analog control mind you); regardless, in any of the games above, YOU do not need to stop and turn. Your character will continue moving in the direction you push the stick. In certain areas, and this happened more so in RE3, like the alley ways, you had to stop to turn, only because of the little space you had. For the most part though, I was able to push forward in a direction in continuous motion and change directions.

Dino Crisis 1 is the closest to The Medium in control since the camera does follow you in certain areas while its fixed in others.

My point simply was, if you are going to group every old RE game together and state they all have tank controls then The Medium, by that definition, also has tank controls. I came to learn after saying that if you don't have to stop to turn its not tank controls. Hell, I wasn't even being specific, the way The Medium controls is very close to how the old RE games use to control, just because I said that, did not mean its exactly the same!

The Medium simply does not have tank controls, period. No matter what kind of equivalency you try to muster up.

Tank controls - Wikipedia

The term "tank controls" comes from the steering mechanisms of old tanks, which had to stop completely before turning.[2] Tank controls were common in 3D games in the late 1990s, such as Grim Fandango and the early Resident Evil and Tomb Raider games.[1][3]

You're Wrong.

 

[sainraja]

The Medium simply does not have tank controls, period. No matter what kind of equivalency you try to muster up.

Tank controls - Wikipedia



You're Wrong.

I am FINE with admitting I am wrong but what I am actually pointing out now is that we've been inaccurately calling RE games as having 'tank' controls. I just played all the games I mentioned and controlled the character and I did not have to: "...stop completely before turning".

If I can find my Elgato, I will record comparison videos for you guys to prove my point. Not that it matters.

 

[RoyBatty]

Finished; great art, OST and story.

 

[TheMooMan]

Played more tonight - I need to find the red house now, and the story is kicking up a notch. Dark themes. I like it.

The 'avoid the monster' mechanic is so played out now though. I didn't finish the newest Amnesia because it bored me so much, and I hate the sections in this game. Thankfully they're short, but also clunky. Can we please retire this mechanic from gaming now? SOMA is also a great game that was bogged down with it.

 

[Moogle11]

Finished it and really enjoyed it. Solid 8/10 game for me. Definitely not a game people who don't like walking sims/point and click adventure games are going to like, and even for that genre the puzzles are very easy and it's very linear. Personally, those are strengths as I'm really into these mildly interactive, story-driven games, but I get they're not everyone's cup of tea and especially on a site of hard core gamers where most prefer heavily gameplay driven games.

Glad it's doing well as I definitely want a sequel and in general would love more 5-10 hours story driven games on Gamepass. There's only so many times a year I want to throw myself into long games vs. play a bunch of shorter ones these days.

 

[Mussah92]

what do we think guys.... worth a download?

 

[Fess]

Finished it!
I’m so glad I kept going after the slow start. One area was tedius, some stiff animations here and there, easy puzzles, but otherwise I have nothing important to complain about. Hair-raising atmosphere up until the end. Loved it!
8/10.

 

[Moogle11]

what do we think guys.... worth a download?

As I’ve aid throughout the thread, definitely! With the caveat that you have to Iike walking sim/point and click adventure type games and be good with not having much traditional gameplay. There’s not combat, just some easy puzzles and a few very easy stealth and chase sequences.

I gave it an 8/10 above as a fan of these games. Even with that score I wouldn’t think it was nearly worth the $50 asking price, but 100% worth playing on Gamepass for those that have it and are fans of this style of game. And that’s a great thing for Gamepass for me as there’s lots of games on it I enjoy but wouldn’t buy. I.e. I also played and enjoyed Man of Medan, Tell Me Why and Night in the Woods recently and all were things I obivously hadn’t bought despite having interest in them. It’s really only the cream of the crop personal GOTY contenders I feel are worth buying and there generally aren’t enough of them to fill my gaming time. It’s nice having Gamepass (and PS+ and Epic freebies) to help fill those voids between games I’m super stoked for instead of agonizing over what to buy among games I’m on the fence about.

 

[Balducci30]

what do we think guys.... worth a download?

Eh.. depends on taste. I’m just gonna play RE 2 remake I think this kinda sucked to me. Maybe I’ll play Nier automata cus people say that’s good