The Church in the Darkness Reviews

The Church in the Darkness is ranked in the 17th percentile of games scored on OpenCritic.
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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3 / 10
Aug 2, 2019

There are some intriguing ideas at play here. Decent stealth mechanics and a captivating cultist backdrop will reel you in though there just isn't enough substance to make The Church in the Darkness a lasting, worthwhile experience.

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4 / 10
Aug 2, 2019

Aside from the vastly eclectic endings, the gameplay just isn’t enough to sustain it through several attempts to find them all. The gameplay never deviates from avoiding vision cones and knocking some people out if necessary. And as the game is encouraging you to experience it over and over again, it really needed a compelling reason to work your way to another ending. The premise and the endings are the clear standouts. It’s the bit in-between that makes it feel like The Church in The Darkness is a squandered opportunity.

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4.5 / 10.0
Aug 2, 2019

The Church in the Darkness is full of bold narrative topics, but the gameplay and presentation fail to match, making it quite difficult to experience the message.

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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

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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5 / 10.0
Aug 2, 2019

The Church in the Darkness tells an engrossing and chilling tale, but it's technical problems will suck you right out of the experience.

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5 / 10
Aug 2, 2019

The Church in the Darkness has some good ideas, but they're not properly realised. Gameplay never ventures out of its basic boundaries, while the narrative doesn't offer up enough variety or compelling subplots to engage with. The Church in the Darkness is competent for a couple of playthroughs, but it's an experience that you'll quickly forget about.

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5 / 10.0
Aug 2, 2019

Procedural generation does little to bolster the one-dimensional gameplay and lack of a compelling narrative

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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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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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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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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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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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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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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

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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6.5 / 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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3.4 / 5.0
Aug 14, 2019

A challenging, randomised religious infiltrator game.

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7 / 10.0
Aug 2, 2019

The Church In the Darkness offers a neat concept with some solid gameplay quirks albeit a little sloppy in execution at times. Fans of stealth will enjoy what’s on offer here and those with an interest in finding out various fates of the cult will have fun replaying to see all endings (which are text and song based rather than cut-scenes). It’s a nice game and worthy of a look in despite its relative simplicity. By the end of it though Issac and Rebecca’s chilling words might get the better of you.

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