The Church in the Darkness Reviews

The Church in the Darkness is ranked in the 17th percentile of games scored on OpenCritic.
6 / 10.0
Sep 24, 2019

Wrapping up, The Church in the Darkness is a small well put together game. Personally, it’s not the kind of game I would play a lot. It is fun for a couple of hours, but with limited content and minimal rogue-like elements, it certainly won’t hold up in the long run. It’s not a bad game; it’s just not my type of game. For these reasons, I will objectively be giving The Church in the Darkness the Silver Award.

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5.5 / 10.0
Sep 3, 2019

While interesting on paper, The Church in the Darkness is mostly just a collection of anti-capitalist audio logs blaring over harder-than-it-needs-to-be stealth gameplay. There's no love lost in this place.

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Sep 3, 2019

You won’t find many games on the market that take on the subject of religious cults and presents them in an all too real light. In that regard, The Church in the Darkness does well by its subject matter, allowing you to investigate Freedom Town in a way that might actually change the way you look at the people who make up the Collective Justice Mission.

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Lee Mehr
Top Critic
3 / 10
Aug 27, 2019

An unholy union of procedural generation, non-linear narrative design, and a Jonestown-inspired cult backdrop.

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6 / 10
Aug 23, 2019

Overall, Church in the Darkness is an ambitious product and while I understand what they were trying to accomplish, I feel they are just slightly off the mark. It’s a fun game, and one I still find myself going back to, but purely in the interest of seeing what endings there are, rather than being pulled in by the story. It just wasn’t everything that I was expecting.

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5 / 10.0
Aug 18, 2019

An interesting idea but mediocre execution. When your game is supposed to be replayed almost 20 times, samey gameplay becomes a major issue.

Review in Russian | Read full review

2.6 / 5.0
Aug 17, 2019

The Church in the Darkness is built on the mechanic of making numerous runs through the story with the aim of encountering all the different end games, but it just doesn’t hold your attention long enough to make it worthwhile sticking with it.

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8 / 10.0
Aug 14, 2019

"The Church in the Darkness" takes the unsettling approach of realism. It's convincing as a story of a 1970s cult, and Freedom Town is a chilling look inside an isolated cult in the middle of the jungles of South America.

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3.4 / 5.0
Aug 14, 2019

A challenging, randomised religious infiltrator game.

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Digitally Downloaded
Harvard L.
Top Critic
Aug 13, 2019

The Church in the Darkness has much more value as an idea and as a story creation tool than it has as a game. For people like myself, it’s interesting how the information the game sets as constant from the beginning, but does not reveal to the player, can influence the way a narrative organically develops, and guides the player to adopt different play styles to suit.

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Gamefa
Top Critic
6 / 10.0
Aug 10, 2019

The Church in the Darkness tries to be different and it is, but it's not always "good different". Gameplay is boring and dull, but the whole atmosphere and story are acceptable and fun at times. Each time that you start the campaign, some things are different, which makes increases replay value. Overall It's not a memorable experience but it's a different one that you can try for its nice atmosohere and story-telling.

Review in Persian | Read full review

75 / 100
Aug 8, 2019

In sum, The Church in the Darkness is a highly replayable game with shifting gameplay goals for each playthrough.

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60 / 100
Aug 8, 2019

There was a lot more to The Church in the Darkness, but it needed a little more time in the oven. If it’s possible to polish up some of the gameplay down the line, there could be a memorable experience to be had here.

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7.5 / 10.0
Aug 6, 2019

That said, The Church in the Darkness is a smart stealth game that impressively warps to reflect your actions. It lets you get in and break out as you see fit. While failure still feels like failure, success is sweet and varied. Once it gets a hold of you, you may not want to break out, at all.

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Aug 6, 2019

While I can't call The Church in the Darkness bad, it's a disappointingly limited experience. Once the excellent setting and the randomization wear off you're left with a clunky top-down stealth game.

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6 / 10.0
Aug 5, 2019

The Church in the Darkness is an okay stealth roguelike that shows humanity can twist religion into a dark monster.

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Aug 5, 2019

The Church in the Darkness seems to have an interesting concept, but the reality is that infiltrating a 1970s cult isn't as much fun as it might seem.

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7.5 / 10.0
Aug 4, 2019

You won’t find many games like this. The mirroring of reality and history, the pensive and sober presentation (unlike the over-the-top Far Cry 5) puts you in a different headspace as a gamer if you’re earnest about the experience from the moment you step into the jungle. If you want to experience something that is distinctive, a far cry from what you might be used to, The Church in the Darkness will give your conscience a workout. The weighty subject matter is not for everyone, however.

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D
Aug 4, 2019

The numerous issues with The Church in the Darkness aren’t gamebreaking, but given how plentiful the problems are, you’ll struggle to extract any fun from the experience.

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6.5 / 10.0
Aug 4, 2019

The Church in the Darkness has created a story that makes you question the cult's motives with every playthrough. No game is the same, but even though their are some neat ideas, the technical issues can really hamper your enjoyment.

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