I used to think everyone saw the world the way I did. Divided. Torn between two realities. But no… I was the only one. It all starts with a dead girl. The Medium is the newest game from Bloober Team. A developer becoming a modern-day mainstay for the direction of horror. Does The Medium stand up on its own, or is it an unfortunate flop?

Atmosphere. Horror games of the modern age are defined by how great of an atmosphere they can get across. The Medium excels in this area. The game does a fantastic job of keeping you on edge, making you feel uncomfortable and unnerved. There are moments of reprieve to allow you a breath of air before it plunges you deeper into this spiritually confusing world.

I am incredibly difficult to scare, an unfortunate by-product of having grown up on horror games, movies and books. The Medium did a fantastic job of keeping me feeling uneasy. Keeping me guessing and leaving me just a bit nervous about moving forward. The atmosphere shines here, and it really cares the game through some of the rougher areas.

The big part of the atmosphere aspect is the sound design and visual cues. The spirit world is full of windy sounds, crunching and crackling. Heavy breathing. It’s so full of sound and yet so empty. The physical world feels as abandoned and desolate as it should. It’s eerie, the silence can almost be deafening at times because of how much it makes the rest of the world seem so loud.

Visually the spirit world made me uncomfortable. In a good way. It’s decaying, devoid of colour and life. Ghosts have no features, hidden behind porcelain masks. It’s jarring how dehumanising this loss of features are. It makes interactions in that world never feel safe. The spirit world comes across as a place you wouldn’t want to be in. There’s a weird decay to the spirits, with ‘living flower’ like growths on everything. It’s truly uncomfortable.

In contrast, the physical world feels as desolate and empty as it should. A decaying resort in Poland, all falling apart. Staircases broken, strewn belongings, but a sense of stability as well. You are alone in this world, for the most part. Physical reality feeling safe, the spirit world fraught with danger. It’s empty, but a place to feel okay. Until, well, it’s not.

While the story is somewhat confusing at the best of times. However, this sort of lends to the nature of the game. The story is good, it is incredibly enthralling. It makes the game quite difficult to put down. It’s a story worth experiencing, worth braving the dangers of the world. There is very few characters, the main character only really interacting with a very small cast. It doesn’t drag, and it constantly changes the viewpoint to reveal a little more. There is something more going on beneath the surface, and it demands that you keep going to find out why. There is little stories woven in through the bigger one. Some of them, whilst not going into detail, could be incredibly painful for some people to deal with. It would perhaps be best for there to have been a little more warning about some of the incredibly dark themes that come up, but they seem almost necessary. Almost.

The Dual Reality aspect of the game is interesting. Controlling both the spirit and physical halves of the character at the same time. Sometimes having to do things with only the spirit to allow the physical part to continue on. There always seems to be a new feature added as you progress, and it keeps things feeling fresh. All previous features continuing to be used in conjunction with the newer ones. Unfortunately, despite the Dual Reality being the big selling point doesn’t really get used as much as I would have thought. Maybe only a third of the game? Whilst this may not seem like a problem, the Dual Reality sections are some of the more fun “puzzle” sections of the game.

The controls are reminiscent of earlier Silent Hill games. The character feels janky to control, never frustrating, but just a little awkward. This sort of lends to the unease that comes during sections with the Maw, because you don’t feel to be in control enough of the character to feel safe. People who grew up on Silent Hill and Resident Evil will probably feel pretty comfortable with controls, but newer people into the horror game genre may find the controls daunting. It’s something worth keeping note of.

The point of the game that really stood out to me, however, was the danger. The Maw is terrifying. It’s raspy whispered words, it’s subtle sexual remarks, whilst also being violently repulsive. It talks about wearing your skin, but how nice it would be. Or that it wants to hold your hand, and be with you forever, but to wear you at the same time. These being some of the less unnerving things it says as it stalks you through the spirit world. At about the halfway point however, the game turns your world upside down. You can protect yourself in the spirit world and can hide. However in the physical world, it’s a much scary entity. Without giving anything away, you may not be able to see each other, but that makes it even more terrifying. The Maw is horrifying. The Childeater is horrifying. The spirits you encounter are truly horrifying and make you aware of how dangerous the world in the game truly is.

A really good eight-to-ten-hour experience, the replay aspect is somewhat low. This is an experience. Perhaps sections of the story you may not have understood, will make more sense on a subsequent playthrough, there is little reason to go back into the world again. There is ample collectibles, and an array of achievements, but replay value is somewhat low unfortunately. The game is definitely worth picking up, for the experience it brings, but if you are after a game that will bring you back many times over, this one is unfortunately not for you.

The Medium is an incredibly sound game. Despite being somewhat visually lacklustre as a Xbox Series X/S game, it makes up for this in almost every other aspect. The unnerving atmosphere and visuals; The discomforting sound design and the enthralling storyline. Dual Reality should have been even more prevalent than it is, but it’s a small gripe. Smoother controls could have aided to an easier to play game, but it’s a trope of good horror games to have these janky controls. The Maw is one of the most disconcerting enemies in a game that I have experienced in a long time, and truly made me feel uncomfortable. This is a fantastic horror experience.