The Church in the Darkness

Release Date: August 2, 2019

Action, stealth, isometric view, indie games, religious, action adventure, 60s and 70s, singleplayer

57%

Steam

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A sandbox action-adventure game and the debut project from the independent team at Paranoid Productions. The Church in the Darkness takes us back to the late 70s, and the story focuses on a pair of characters – followers of a radical cult, who run away to South America and try to create a utopia in the jungle.

Videos and Screens

[1:26] The Church in the Darkness story trailer

[1:37] The Church in the Darkness trailer

57%

STEAM Score

All Reviews: Mixed (108)

STEAM

The Church in the Darkness is adventure action game with high randomness and fanatic cult as a main adversary. It has been developed for PC, PS4 and XONE and is a debut title of Paranoid Productions studio.

Plot

The game takes us to the late 1970’s and focuses on Isaac and Rebecca Walker, who are behind a radical cult that was forced by authorities to flee to South America, where they tried to create a true utopia.

We play as a former policeman named Vic, whose nephew got deluded by Walker’s sermons and followed them to South America. When the game begins, there hasn’t been any contact with him for a long time, so the protagonist travels to the same place to find out if he is alright.

Game mechanics

There are two things that distinguish The Church in the Darkness for PC, PS4 and XONE: freedom and randomness, the latter being the result of procedural creation system. It shapes not only locations’ form and characters placement. Even dogmas of the titular church are randomly generated and affect the gameplay. Characters can have different personalities, meaning the every game will offer very different story.

Players also get full freedom when it comes to the way they deal with given tasks. They can do it by force, infiltrating and destroying the cult from the inside, through stealth approach etc. There are also many difficult decisions to make.

Technical aspects

The Church in the Darkness shows the view from far above the hero’s head and uses slightly cartoonish, three-dimensional graphics. It should be noted the Walkers have been voiced by Ellen McLain (known from her role as GlaDOS in Portal series) and John Patrick Lowrie, who players might known as the voice of Sniper from Team Fortress 2.

Last updated on April 3, 2017