Styx: Blades of Greed Review
When it comes to stealth games, Styx has a winning formula. You play as a goblin, a perfect character for sneaking around. Short in stature, he can slink through vents and under tables, he’s got lockpicks, arrows and mines to help out, and then he can vomit poison, create clones and has magic powers on top of that! Then there’s the enemies, ranging from humans and elves through to roaches, all of them a threat to little Styx if he’s caught out. It is a great foundation for a stealth game, and yet the games can’t quite nail the landing, resulting in Styx: Blades of Greed feeling less than the sum of its parts.
It picks up after the rather abrupt ending of the previous game, and Styx is now looking for Quartz, a glowing blue crystal that he can absorb to gain more powers. Naturally, he wants to get more of it and, after meeting up with some returning characters from the previous game and stealing a zeppelin, they set off to get some.
The opening feels almost like a different game to everything that follows it. It has regular cutscenes whilst you’re still getting everyone together, and feels like the set up for a story-led game set across various locations. However, shortly after escaping the blockade and being given access to three locations, including the one you just left, you’re simply told to find Quartz in each of them. The next actual cutscene is eight whole quartz pieces away, which is hours of gameplay, and that’s just for one mission before it dumps you back to another Quartz hunt across the same maps.
It’s a real shame, because as far as thieving games go, Styx: Blades of Greed is still one my favourites for quite a while. To start with, the locations are huge and many levelled – seriously, the verticality, to use a late 2000s term, is off the scale. More important than all that map, however, is that there are tonnes of holes in walls to find, climbable pathways, rafters to skulk over, just an embarrassment of riches when it comes to infiltrating places really. They’re packed full of enemies, sure, but there’s plenty of routes around them, boxes to hide in, and cracks in their patrols to slip through.
You won’t be earning money to upgrade your tools, or have a shop to replenish your resources. Instead you’ll steal blueprints to upgrade your equipment, level up from completing objectives and looting resources, and after absorbing a certain number of Quartz crystals you’ll get a point to unlock a power. You start with cloning abilities and invisibility, which can be very helpful on their own, but you’ll be able to unlock the ability to possess enemies, or move ultra fast, for example. They’re very useful, but limited by Amber, which they cost to use and must be refilled using potions that can be crafted, found, or pickpocketed. In addition to these are a few standard open world/metroidvania additions including a grappling hook, a glider and claws for climbing certain walls, but by far the coolest is the ability to dash through grids. It doesn’t sound big, but it is exceptionally useful.
Unfortunately, a lot of the voice acting isn’t very convincing. Many of the lines don’t match the intensity of the situation they’re in, like there was minimal direction, or the context of the line changed through development but it wasn’t re-recorded. One voice actor in particular doesn’t give a bad performance exactly, but simply doesn’t match the character – an orc with a higher pitched voice that just never sounds right . Styx fares the best, but everyone else is a bit off. The cutscenes have issues as well, specifically that every single time there is a cut all the background and textures stream in, really marring what can be some pretty nicely “shot” cutscenes otherwise. “Can” is the operative word, as there are a couple that don’t really make sense, especially in regards to stealing a zeppelin.
Speaking of not making sense, you steal that zeppelin and are immediately free to return to where you stole it from. It will just float there unmolested by authorities as if it wasn’t a big deal, even though it should have been. There are a few things like this throughout the story that make things feel inconsistent, and one supposed twist that was so obvious enough to me that I will be truly shocked if anyone doesn’t see it coming. The story, despite a pretty promising start, didn’t manage to keep me invested as it doesn’t really explain or show things very well. I know that Styx is supposed to be getting negative effects from the quartz because it tells me, but it barely ever shows outside of some blue colouring his palms. If it’s bad for him why isn’t any of his crew trying to stop him, why is Styx so blase about it? Why not just steal it instead of absorbing it?
Much like with the previous games, I get the feeling that Styx was originally envisaged as a goblin thief, but without a solid story or character arc to wrap around that. Styx has a few characteristics, but they’re shallow; he’s a smart arse, he’s sneaky, he laughs when he pushes people off ledges, and he wants power. That’s it, and I can count them on the fingers of one hand. All of the characters are like that, but with even fewer fingers required. The result is that a functional story that can lead you between things, but doesn’t leave much of an impression. It’s a shame, not just because there’s plenty of potential here, but because the opening gives a different impression and some of the cutscenes could capture your imagination, if the delivery were better. It carries through the quest design as well. So much of it is not just to go find a key, but to basically go find multiple keys. The game wants you to steal things but can’t think of a compelling reason, so here’s five seeds to find and steal that will open this door. It just feels like busywork and padding instead of a thrilling heist.
Then there are the technical issues and bugs. I’ve only experienced frame drops on PS5 after moving quickly on the glider, and this only on a couple of occasions, but there are other issues. There’s some minor platforming awkwardness with ledges that can’t be grabbed or can be, but not how you would expect. Styx also isn’t built for combat, which is good because it’s a bit unresponsive and feels ropey whilst you’re doing it. Again, there are a few crafting resources that could do with being a bit more accessible, as you can go for extended periods without being able to use your toys because you’re just missing one particular, and supposedly common resource. It’s usually iron. There are also areas that are so dark you literally can’t see anything at all, making it practically impossible to find your way through.
