Pathologic 3 is the rare game about healing that knows healing can be cruel

Videogames have given us many fascinating healing mechanics and ideas about healing, from the motley support playstyles of Overwatch to the musical cooldown management of Wild Growth, but one thing developers rarely capture is that healing is an expression of power over somebody. However kind, it has the potential to be demeaning, intrusive, even abusive.

In my experience of doctors and hospitals, healing is a competition between interpretations of sickness and injury, where the doctor...