izigame.me

I'd give this a mixed review if it was an option, but I feel leaning negative is more close to my interpretation of it if I have to pick one. Also I don't spoil anything but I do reference the metaphors at the core of the game's theme, which is apparent pretty much immediately at the start of the game, but I figured I'd warn about it anyway.
To begin with, before anything else, the game is buggy. It softlocked me twice, requiring exiting to the menu and reloading - once because a prompt failed to appear and again when a glitch straight disabled the companion. This is in addition to a lot of general bugginess and general feeling of a lack of stability that made the game feel not super great to play in some ways. The companion also seemed increasingly likely to get stuck when pathing to a destination you call for him as you play the game, I don't know why it seemed to get worse later in the game.
Secondly, and this was a big thing I haven't seen many other reviews mention (for some reason a TON of the reviews here seem highly disingenuous at best about a lot of stuff), but the stop motion effect is applied super randomly and loosely and it makes it often come across as a glitch and not an aesthetic. Your companion is a perfect example you can see right away, he has completely normal movement/animations when running, but standing still or doing a scripted animation and then all of the sudden he's stop motion. The world is full of this and it's disorienting, some stuff is animated normally and then some of it stop motion. Heck even the things that are stop motion seem to have a huge variance in the number of frames they utilize, it's not a consistent effect at all. It speaks to a lack of polish and cohesiveness that permeates the entire game.
Next the story, it's....fine. It has its moments, and the overall metaphor at the heart of it is quite good. There are a few really poignant lines of dialogue that I enjoyed, and the core "message" is real and true. But it's just not told all that well and the game struggles to find a balance between the allegory and the world because neither is built up all that well, making much of the ending feel unearned. And no spoilers but the ending is just....meh. The game and the story are also frequently at odds with each other to the point it feels like two separate projects slammed together; without going into extensive detail let me just summarize it this way - "I haven't seen fire in so long I've forgot what it feels like, there are no sources of fire left in this dead world." says all of the characters that exist in the world where there is a giant matchbox full of matches literally EVERYWHERE.
There is a story section about how a village runs out of matches and they all froze to death, you learn about this by doing boring puzzles where you utilize the zillions of full boxes of matches littered all over the village. The whole lore of the world that sits on top of the allegory is that fire, a metaphor for life and perseverance, is fragile and has all but disappeared from existence and you must carry it forward along The Midnight Walk which is a metaphor for unpredictable and unfortunate hardships. But it really seems at odds with the gameplay which is just like "WHOOO FUCK YEAH MATCHES EVERYWHERE BABY. FIRE! FIRE!". Fire should have felt precious and like something you had to work to preserve along the journey. Even in the few moments your companion's flame can be extinguished....you can just grab a match at one of the 50 matchboxes within 3 feet of your current location and re-ignite him. It fliiiieeeesss in the face of the game's themes. Also I'm sorry I keep saying companion instead of "Potboy", but unless you've played the game Potboy is a nonsensical term that sorta sounds like a slur so I'm using companion instead lol.
While the core themes and the world they exist in are cool, it is irrefutable that the game is poorly bolted into it. It's like they never actually really considered the story they were telling and weaving it into the gameplay itself, instead they are just like "game is about fire so screw it, matches and candle puzzles, trillions of them" without even considering the context of their own world. Compare this to something like What Remains of Edith Finch, where the actual gameplay is deeply integrated with the game's themes. Remember in that game (Edith Finch), chopping fish and playing a fantasy mini game side by side to convey via the actual gameplay the context of the story it was telling at that moment? Yeah, absolutely nothing like that here, it's just the most simplistic and repetitive three puzzles over and over and over and over for 5-6 hours even if it makes no sense and conveys nothing of the world and themes.
So, is there anything good? Sure is. The graphics, stop motion inconsistency aside, are fantastic. The game ran really smooth maxed at 4k/120 on a 4090. The voice acting is perfect and has a folksy charm that is befitting to the whole journey as an allegorical tale. A couple of the stealth sections had a genuine touch of intensity. The music is good, a somber classical style that works well. It supports VR for people who want to play it that way, which is part of the reason I think for this game's seemingly hyperbolic positive reception. People still looking for decent VR content to come along are desperate. Anything that releases that isn't a $40 cash grab shooting gallery with 20 minutes of stuff to do is automatically going to get a 10/10 from them. Heck yeah a complete, functional, non shooting gallery VR game!? 10/10!!! Honestly, as someone who has owned virtually every major VR hardware offering and ebay'd them off within months each time....I get it. I really do.
Is this game worth your time and money? It's definitely not worth $40, which even the devs seem to recognize because it's been on sale like 3 times in the barely over a month since it released. Pricing it this high and then just putting it on sale every other week right off the bat is pretty lame of them IMO and reeks of a crappy sales tactic.
If you haven't played it yet go play What Remains of Edith Finch; on top of being a way better take on this type of game, it even has the same general themes that Midnight Walk has as pertaining to life and I think it conveys them more meaningfully. If you haven't played MiSide yet, while very different in aesthetics, is again a far better take on this type of narrative adventure game and has a lot more fun with itself along the way than Midnight Walk does. Another good one is 1000xResist, which while a bit different in gameplay is still a narrative adventure game like this and is way more captivating and enjoyable.
Also, final note, the moment with the guy and his "beautiful stick" was genuinely hilarious and kind of makes me wish the game had leaned into its lightly humorous elements a little more than it did. Maybe I'm wrong but I feel the goal should have ultimately been to make the player naturally feel like they are carrying that fire inside themselves as well, along The Midnight Walk, as opposed to making them feel more like simply just a witness to it.