Styx: Blades of Greed – Our Grumpy Goblin's Latest Heist is a Chaotic, Janky Delight (Mostly)
AI Gaming News Author · IGN South Africa ·
Styx: Blades of Greed delivers a rare, pure stealth experience with massive, intriguing maps and a grumpily charming goblin protagonist, though it's undeniably hobbled by frustrating jank, tedious backtracking, and persistent performance issues.
Right, gather 'round, mates, because I've been tinkering with the latest word on the digital streets, and it concerns our favourite curmudgeonly goblin, Styx. You know, that cheeky bloke who basically keeps the pure stealth genre alive single-handedly? In a world full of 'stealth-optional' adventures and games where you can just shoot your way out of trouble, Styx is that one wizard who actually insists on doing things the proper, sneaky way. Well, his latest outing, *Styx: Blades of Greed*, is out in the wild, and bloody hell, it’s a bit of a mixed bag – like trying to conjure a perfect spell but accidentally turning your shoes into sentient jelly.
We're talking about a game that doesn't pretend to be *Hitman* with its incredibly creative murder playgrounds or *Dishonored* with its polished, rewind-time wizardry. Nah, *Styx* just wants to be *Styx*. And for those of us who yearn for the days of pure, unadulterated sneaking, climbing, and throat-slitting, that’s often enough. *Blades of Greed* largely sticks to the tried-and-true playbook: you’re a grumpy old goblin, creeping through shadows, pilfering shiny things, and assassinating unsuspecting dimwits – humans, elves, even some beasties – with all the grace of a shadow-demon ballet dancer. Or, y'know, a goblin.
This sequel does pull a few interesting rabbits out of its hat, mind. For starters, it's ditched the rather lacklustre multiplayer elements of its predecessor, which, fair dinkum, felt about as necessary as a screen door on a submarine. The refocus on a solo stealth experience? That's a good call, giving our goblin ample room to shine in his own janky, brilliant way. And instead of smaller, mission-based maps, *Blades of Greed* throws us into absolutely massive regions. Now, this is where my curiosity starts sparking like an overloaded mana crystal – what happens when you give a master sneaker an entire digital continent to play in?
Well, for one, it allows for some genuinely cool moments. You'll find yourself staring at an objective a metaphorical mountain away, forced to actually *think* like a stealth operative. Do you scale the crumbling towers, making daring leaps of faith between precarious ledges, hoping no guard spots your flailing form? Or do you slink through the sewers, dealing with giant bugs (because, of course, there are giant bugs) in search of a quieter path? It’s here, in these moments of true environmental puzzle-solving, that *Blades of Greed* feels like a proper adventure. The game has some truly awesome locales too: 'The Wall' is an absurdly cool vertical labyrinth of concrete castles and rickety slums, 'Turquoise Dawn' is a lush jungle infested with deadly roaches, and 'Akenash Ruins' are these wonderfully weird, floating kingdom bits straight out of an *Elden Ring*-esque fever dream. Exploring these places, finding hidden nooks and crannies to hide in, or just watching a guard walk unknowingly past your barrel prison – that's the good stuff. It really highlights the unique, strange, and magically-infused world our curmudgeonly goblin calls home.
But, and here's where my gently sceptical wizard brain kicks in, these massive maps come with a few caveats that are as expected as they are frustrating. Remember that feeling when you're casting a complex teleportation spell and you end up just slightly off course, tumbling into a pond of angry pixies? That's what traversing these huge areas can feel like sometimes. You spend a bloody long time just *getting* to your objective, slowly sneaking along, often through areas that offer no real obstacles until you're right at the 'meat' of the mission. It feels less curated, more like a long hike before the actual fun begins. And if you try to sprint through to save time? Prepare to reload. A lot. It can be exhausting, frankly, and the sense of focus that smaller, more linear levels offered is sometimes lost in all that digital real estate. Apparently, a significant chunk of a 20+ hour playthrough can be spent just figuring out *where* you're going next, rather than actually *doing* the heist itself. The objectives themselves are often quite small, too – steal a key, open a door, shut down a machine. These can be over in minutes, then you're back to the long trek, often backtracking through areas you've already seen. It's a whole lot of fat before you get to the meat of the main objectives, isn't it?
And then there's the jank, mates. Oh, the glorious, frustrating jank. If you've played a *Styx* game before, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about, and sadly, *Blades of Greed* hasn’t exactly polished these rough edges away. Movement, especially those crucial leaps onto ledges, can be finicky enough to make you tear your hair out (or your goblin's ears off). I lost count of the times I plummeted to my death or got spotted simply because my grumpy goblin decided to defy gravity in unexpected ways. Combat, which should ideally be a last resort, feels about as graceful as a walrus trying to tap dance – sloppy and simplistic. You *will* get caught, and you *will* probably die trying to fight your way out.
But the real kicker, the one that makes me want to perform an exorcism on my graphics card, are the performance issues. NPCs turning invisible mid-conversation? Frames dropping to horrifying levels after extended play? It's all here, and it feels even worse this time around, presumably because of those massive, sprawling maps. The framerate can get absolutely shocking when there’s a lot happening on screen, turning what should be a tense stealth moment into a slideshow of existential dread. It's almost like the game is trying to sabotage its own excellent stealth mechanics with a relentless assault of technical woes. You can forgive a bit of jank in an indie-ish stealth game, but when it actively undermines the core gameplay, it makes you wonder why these issues keep slipping through the magic portal.
So, who is *Styx: Blades of Greed* for? It’s for the purists, the stealth fanatics, the ones who crave the thrill of pure evasion over all else. If you can sneak past its numerous rough parts – the bland story about collecting glowy crystals (despite Styx himself being genuinely unique and interesting!), the long treks between miniature objectives, and the persistent performance gremlins – you'll find a genuinely compelling stealth experience. It's a game that makes you work for your fun, both in-game and sometimes, out of it, dealing with its quirks. It’s certainly not for everyone, but for those of us who appreciate a good, old-fashioned, janky sneak-a-thon, it offers a fix that’s harder and harder to come by these days. You just need to be prepared to cast a few 'patience' spells along the way.
Tags: Stealth Game, Action-Adventure, Styx, Gaming Review, Indie Games
Original article: IGN South Africa