Description

No one is forced to join a cult. It welcomes you. It understands you. It envelops you until the words become more than truth - they make you whole.

In the late 1970s, the charismatic Isaac and Rebecca Walker lead the Collective Justice Mission. Labeled radicals and feeling persecuted by the US government, they relocate their followers to the one place they believe they can create a socialist utopia: the jungles of South America. There they build Freedom Town. But relatives left behind in the US become worried: what exactly is going on at this compound in the jungle?

You play as Vic, an ex-law enforcement officer who has snuck into Freedom Town to check on their nephew, Alex. Whether you choose stealth or violence, you must infiltrate the commune, find out what’s going on within, and locate your nephew, before it’s too late. The dynamic story of The Church in the Darkness changes every time you play. It's up to you to explore Freedom Town, figure out the shifting personalities and motivations of the cult leaders, and decide what to do.

How dangerous are the Walkers? How far will you go to uncover the truth and save Alex? Could it all have turned out differently?

The Church in the Darkness is coming to Nintendo Switch, Steam, Xbox One, and Playstation 4 on August 2, 2019.

Features

• What ending will you get? Will you get Alex out, whether he wants to go with you or not? Will you confront the cult leaders? Will you join the cult?

• Unlock every ending for each scenario by trying different play styles or making different choices.

• Multiple ways to play: Avoid detection completely, taking out guards and civilians non-lethally, or kill anyone who gets in your way.

• Interview characters from Freedom Town and search for clues. Documents and letters scattered around camp will hint at the true nature of the commune.

• Fully voiced game, starring Ellen McLain (best known as GLaDOS in Portal) and John Patrick Lowrie (the Sniper from Team Fortress 2) as the cult leaders, Rebecca and Isaac Walker.

About the Developer

The Church in the Darkness is directed by Richard Rouse III, who previously led development on The Suffering franchise, in addition to his work on titles like State of Decay, Quantum Break, Sunset Overdirve, and Rainbow 6. This project reunites him with a number of developers from The Suffering as well as other AAA veterans and some game development newcomers.

The game stars Ellen McLain (best known as GLaDOS in Portal) and John Patrick Lowrie (the Sniper from Team Fortress 2) as the intense leaders of the Collective Justice Mission. Richard had worked with John on The Suffering games and knew he wanted him for the role of Isaac Walker. When they met to talk about the game, the two realized Ellen would be perfect to play against John as Rebecca Walker. The veteran actors have been involved beyond just their performances, consulting on the story and collaborating to flesh out their characters.

Richard has been working in dynamic storytelling in games from his very first project (the open-ended Mac RPG Odyssey - The Legend of Nemesis), up through the branching narratives of The Suffering, and the zombie-survival narrative/simulation hybrid found in the State of Decay games. With The Church in the Darkness the goal is to make a game that players need to replay if they want to see all the sides of the uniquely dark subject matter.

• "Games to Watch 2018"
  - Ryan McCaffrey, IGN

• "10 Games To Look Forward To"
  - Emma Kidwell, Nerdist

• "One of the 'Most Anticipated Video Games'"
  - Matt Peckham, Time Magazine

• "One of the 'Most Anticipated Video Games'"
  - Keith Stuart, The Guardian

• "One of 'The 15 Best Games at PAX West 2016"
  - Cameron Kunzelman, Paste Magazine

• "We’ve never seen this type of setting seriously tackled in a video game, where we’re more accustomed to fighting black-and-white wars against caricatured manifestations of evil. Rouse chose this approach because he thinks the medium is capable of reaching beyond that scope. "
  - Matt Bertz, Game Informer

• "In this game, it's less that the story is changing. It's that the actual choices are changing underneath players."
  - Dave Tach, Polygon

• "That's something Rouse wants to inject into The Church in the Darkness... humanity. Isaac and Rebecca are extreme, but they can also be compassionate and caring. Or they can be power-hungry monsters. It all depends on which story you see. "
  - Jessica Conditt, Engadget

• "It's a creative form of narrative direction that I hope will influence how players choose to go about infiltrating camp. If they're a nice crew, the moral impetus might be to get in and out without harming a fly. If they're bloodthirsty zealots, well, a few flies won't matter. "
  - James Davenport, PC Gamer

• "Rouse’s new game, the murkily titled The Church In The Darkness, is a gamble. No one has done it before, so no one knows what the potential is for a game about infiltrating a religious cult in a South American jungle in the late 1970s. No one knows what the potential is for an action-infiltration game, for a throwback to one of Rouse’s old favorites, Castle Wolfenstein, with the twist of having a malleable story... Hopefully The Church In The Darkness will also be as interesting in its finished state next year as it seemed when Rouse showed it to me last month in San Francisco."
  - Stephen Totilo, Kotaku

Church in the Darkness DevBlog
churchinthedarkness.tumblr.com.

PlayStation Blog Announcement
blog.us.playstation.com.

Xbox Wire Announcement
news.xbox.com.

Spencer Boomhower Portfolio
cupolagraphics.com.

Devan Browne Portfolio
devanbrowne.com.

Jason Bennett Portfolio
spikytiger.com.

Garrett Bacak Portfolio
insidiousone.com.

Paranoid Productions - Developer

Richard Rouse III
Director, Designer, Writer, Programming

Ellen McLain and John Patrick Lowrie
Actors, Story Collaborators, Music

Chandana Ekanayaka, Spencer Boomhower, Martin Murphy, Devan Browne, Jason Bennett, Kyle Miller, Frank Garoufalis
Art

Brigitte Samson, Veronica Beller, Garrett Bacak
Animation

Boyd Post
Audio

Carl Chavez Young, Ben Young
Programming