Forget The Last Of Us; forget Saint Row and Death Stranding. Troy Baker’s best role in video games yet is here, and it’s in Bloober Team’s The Medium. Today’s trailer for the new Silent Hill-inspired game from the creators of Layers of Fear, Observer, and Blair Witch partially teases the origins of the game’s antagonist, The Maw.
Born from rage, The Maw is a mysterious entity that stalks the otherworld — another reality that protagonist Marianne enters to find answers to the game’s grand mysteries. Actor Troy Baker channels his inner Mike Patton to constantly alter the verbal inflections of The Maw, going from sing-songy to sinister every couple of syllables. As a fan of 2K’s dormant The Darkness series and Patton’s performance as the titular monster, I’m quite pleased by the direction Baker took for this role. Part of me wonders if Bloober Team was also inspired by Tarsem Singh’s The Cell when devising the game’s world and The Maw.
While the “It Came From the Rage” trailer teases The Maw’s connection to the otherworld — and introduces a child named Sadness — Bloober Team’s last Behind The Scenes video (see below) offers a nice sample of Baker’s performance.
The Medium releases for Xbox Series X and PC this holiday. Pre-ordering the game now gets you a 10% off discount, the original soundtrack, and a digital art book.