lol… yeah, I mean, it’s no Godfall, right?
I played it up to the Title Card/Intro movie. I really like it so far.
This has a very old school feel to it. Like the old resident evil games.
This looks amazing - and rather spooky. I actually didn’t think it was out for a few more months- nice!
My very early impressions are that this is more like old school Resident Evil games, and less like Resident Evil 4.
Some folks really like those games, and dislike RE4, but for me personally, I preferred RE4 and its more smooth movement and action.
However, I’ve only seen a trivial amount of this game, so I can’t speak to the more complex mechanics yet.
One thing, is that it does look very good on the XSX.
I thought there was no combat in this game, so the Resident Evil comparisons would seem limited. I’ll give it a go this weekend myself, looks interesting.
I’m on PC but I doubt this is different on Xbox, I think the environments look fairly nice but the character animations are really stiff and not great.
I kind of like the old school feel of the fixed cameras but I’ve also only played the prologue and haven’t really got to the split screen stuff yet but I feel like I’m not going to enjoy that gimmick much.
This is the part which makes it like the old RE games. Some folks like that, although I’m not a huge fan.
Although the cameras are not literally fixed… it’s not like the old RE games where they pre-rendered the backgrounds. The cameras move around, but they’re essentially on rails.
Silent Hill is the more apt comparison. It always had a real time camera that would fluidly track the character and reframe scenes. And then there’s the emphasis on rooting the horror stuff in character psychology and trauma, dual worlds, Akira Yamaoka doing music, and Mary Elizabeth McGlynn doing vocals on tracks.
I don’t think The Medium is as good as a Silent Hill though - at least not one of the Team Silent ones. I never played anything past 4. Its a way more linear and constrained experience, and I think you lose something when you pull out the combat. It’s alright though, and damn is it pretty.
I’m about an hour into this so far.
The one thing frustrating me is that it’s really difficult at times to tell that there are actual pathway to the side in a number of sections. Wish they had made it more obvious. Also, I get the fixed camera lets you do a lot of stylistic camera angles and stuff, but I basically have to reorient myself on each screen.
Also, the perfect American accents seem really weird for a game that is clearly set in Poland, circa 1999.
Recouped development costs already! Yay! Good for them.
I started the game Friday evening and finished it earlier this afternoon. It’s the first Bloober game that I’ve bothered finishing, so I suppose that says something for it. The rest of their games up to this point have kept me interested for an hour or two at most before I’ve bowed out.
It’s basically a less interesting Silent Hill. No combat, but there are plenty of puzzles to solve - a few of them fairly in-depth. I just don’t think the writing is good enough to make it anything more than a fairly average game.
This was okay. I liked it better than I did Bloober Team’s Layers of Fear 2, Blair Witch, or Observer, but I still liked the original Layers of Fear more.
Spooky in some parts, and the setting, a haunted worker’s resort in 1990’s Poland, is just different enough to be interesting. More interesting to me than the actual “horror” stuff.
Certainly good enough as a Gamepass entry to spend some time completing.
Finished it yesterday. Visually it was fantastic, great setting and atmosphere. Story was fairly interesting, though nothing I will be thinking about in a week.
I hate the gameplay though. Hate hate hate static cameras. Constant running into walls trying to find out where I can and cannot go while searching for lore items. And the stealth and run away sections…much more annoying than frightening.
The split screen gimmick was cool, but still a gimmick. Game would not be substantially different without it.
6/10 from me - decent game, and fans of this genre/type of gameplay will probably enjoy it lot more than I did.
Ya, this was the main issue for me. Just not a good design decision, from my personal perspective… but some folks don’t mind that, apparently.
I can’t tell you how many times I walked into a wall or furniture because the camera changed position.
I can tell you that, for me, it was approximately equal to the number of times the camera changed position.
Obviously you guys never played Alone in the Dark.
I made it as far as the first camera change and refunded it.