Quick Look: The Church in the Darkness

I'm playing this while listening to y'all. I'm diggin' in.

I haven't finished this video, so I don't know if you corrected it yet or not, but I just thought I'd say that you do NOT play as a preacher. The two preachers leading the group change each play through.

They could be insane paranoid nut jobs prepping for the end. Or they can be a genuine well intentioned socialist commune just wanting to live in peace. Or somewhere in between.

looks rad

This seems, uhm... bad -- gameplay wise. Interesting and relevant premise though. I hope they, or someone, fleshes it out in a better game.

It seems perhaps Ben doesn't fully grasp the term perma-death :)

The way this game invokes Jonestown so directly in a stealth action game makes me a little uncomfortable. It was a singular tragic event that killed over 900 people and I'm not sure that this treatment of the topic is a good idea.

This game kind of lost me at some point, and I had more interest in what Brad was going on about. See if I can find that show about Jonestown. Nothing against Ben's presentation, he worked with what was happening, for sure.

I get the grimness, but is it just (mostly) dodging red arcs?

As for the Brian Jonestown Massacre, I still love ya.

What's up with the loud clicking noises?

I like the base idea of this game. It harkens back to classics like Infiltrator.

@hoochli: I think it is supposed to be someone using a hammer in the game.

I wish this was more infiltration focused, finding clues and items to find out the histories of the cult members and manipulate the situation would be a lot more interesting to me.

After watching the QL it seems all the personality types and traits and etc are for the "preacher", i.e. the people who run the camp, and not the MC. Maybe having another look through the lens of the correct info might be worth a go.

It looks like Outer Heaven but without the key cards.

... You guys ever joined a cult?

Wouldn't normally say anything, but since it's quite literally the first thing that's said, that is not the correct use of disenfranchised.

Choosing a skin color is also not "choosing a race or ethnicity."

Thanks, was trying to figure out in what way being a preacher had anything to do with stealthing and throwing rocks, why nobody would recognize you, etc.

@subscryber: He meant disenchanted or disillusioned :P

After watching this think I'll just go watch Apostle again to get my cult fix, the gameplay in this doesn't seem like anything other than avoiding terrible AI. You literally ran around a house and 10 guards walked away ... what even is this AI?

Mandy and Apostle good, this seems not good and the rambling rants on the US seem like the writers personal shout box.

@subscryber: on the first point: thank you

on the second point: i definitely couldn’t think of the word “skin tone” and knew i was wrong as soon as i said it.

@kain_pole: yeah i really wish they had explained this better (or at all). i played a couple more games and literally never picked up on this.

Cool. Sorry for being that guy. I really enjoy your coverage, commentary, and all the work you do. I'm just a pedant.

I would like to see a Rimworld style colony builder with this setting.

@subscryber: We need more exchanges like this on the site. It sucks to have to point it out and commend it, but well done all the same.

Interesting set up for a game/setting, but I was a bit disappointed its a stealth action game.

I would feel a little dirty playing a game, watching a movie, reading a fiction book, or any other type of entertainment based so closely on Jonestown. I mean 998 people died including many children. It was the worst mass suicide in recent memory. It’s just too soon for a game like this imo.

Alex is always your nephew in this game. I've played a few runs and he's always family, so you're trying to bring him back if he wants to go with you.

Edit: Watching more of it, Ben's not being stealthy at all, so his playthrough is completely different than my first run that was successful. I just avoided all vision cones and kept running away from the few that noticed me since they don't follow you for very long. You don't need to complete side quests to narrow down Alex's place. I just found two of those people and they narrowed it down to a specific place.

There’s only one thing to do with a murderer... murder him myself. No inconsistencies there.

The set up with the traits and the gear made me interested in whatever this game was. It sounded like some story driven systems were going to come into play. And then Brad said it was perhaps ambitious...

Then the gameplay started. This game looks kind of boring and straight forward.

The gameplay looks like a very bad knockoff of MSX Metal Gear

Oh come on, stop being so harsh everybody. Next time you are at work, I challenge you to try and avoid everybody's vision cones. You will find it a lot more satisfying than you think.

@hoochli said:

Dunno. It's distracting. I can't tell where in the game it's coming from. It doesn't look like anyone in the background is hammering things or anything like that. It's not foot steps on a hard surface either.

@max_cherry: to be fair, it was more than 40 years ago now. I agree that it stands out as one of the worst such events, but "recent memory" just doesn't apply anymore. I'd bet a significant portion of the target audience for this game doesn't even know about Jonestown.

search white capsules for photo's you know :D The capsule in the darkness

Strange decision to make hammering the B button a major part of the game. It was interesting to listen to Brad talk about drinking the koolaid though. I never knew where that came from. Thought it was just a general term for 'drinking the sweetness that dear leader provides.' Or ' without hesitation accepting anything dear leader wants you to do / wants you to know' .