Styx: Master of Shadows

This isn't a game that takes itself overly seriously and it knows it. It's a good budget stealth game that actually takes the stealth part seriously.

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Styx may stumble in its quicktime combat and its spotty edge detection, but it makes up for most of its flaws with challenging stealth action across massives levels. It's not a pretty game by the standards of the current generation, but its presentation thrives on the snark and sailor-speak of its memorable title character. At $30, it's a steal even Styx himself could appreciate.

Styx: Master of Shadows is the brand new Stealth RPG from Cyanide Studios set in the same world as 2012’s Of Orcs and Men, though taking place long before the story of that game. You play the titular role of Styx, an expert goblin thief as he tries to break into the deepest parts of the heavily guarded human tower of Akenash and steal the heart of the World-Tree. Styx is definitely a master of stealth, but is the rest of the game up to such lofty titles? Read on for our full review.

Pure stealth that you’ll gleefully die your way through.

Styx almost feels like a quite literal step back in time to when full performance capture was barely even on the horizon and when games didn’t hold your hand and let you get away with mistakes. There are numerous flaws that definitely detract from the game, and these things are indicative of the smaller studio and production compared to modern AAA games, but then again, Styx costs nowhere near as much and knows what it wants to be: a hardcore stealth game.

Styx might be a master of shadows but he’s completely incompetent when it comes to swordplay which is unfortunately where the game starts to fall apart. Getting seen means an almost immediate death as every guard in the vicinity rushes over to introduce your ass to their boot. If one gets close enough to you then the game will lock you into combat mode where you’re basically forced to fight back since the camera stays locked on the enemy even if you try escaping. You hardly do much in the combat anyway since you have to hit the attack button at the exact moment to parry and then you can perfor...

Better kept in the dark.

Without a doubt the most difficult game type to succeed with is stealth games. When done right stealth games can be some of the best gaming experiences ever made, but there’s so much that can go wrong. In every stealth game it all comes down to control. If you feel perfectly in control of your character and his/her actions, the game will succeed. If you feel like your character doesn’t respond the way they should, you’ll be in for a bad time. So in which camp does Styx: Master of Shadows fall?

As such, it’s difficult to recommend Styx: Master of Shadows to all but the most hardcore shadow skulker when the many other games that have come before it have all done the whole stealth thing that much better.