Styx: Master of Shadows Critic Reviews

Despite a few rough edges, Styx: Master of Shadows deserves a place alongside Metal Gear Solid 3, Hitman: Blood Money, and Mark of the Ninja as one of the best titles the genre has to offer.

Styx: Master of Shadows may not come out swinging, it may not become a household name, but it doesn't have to be. Treasure always teases the eyes of those who want it, and Styx has all the makings of a potential sleeper hit.

If you’re looking for a game with good graphics and an emphasis on sneaking around in the dark and trying to achieve your aims with as little blood spilled as possible, you have your title right here.

Styx: Master of Shadows is quite good as a stealth based game. Fighting sucks, but I think that is intentional, so that stealth is the main point.

The music throughout the game is used to great effect.

A surprisingly fun and solid game, that loses a bit of edge in the technical department, but will still be appreciated by any stealth game fan.

Despite some flaws, Styx: Master of Shadows is an impressive game. There's not enough real stealth based games and this one fills this little hole perfectly. Styx is not for everyone - you need to be patient, you have to like challenges and high difficulty level. But if you're not easily irritated it will reward you for a job well done. The satisfaction is really big.

Admirably open levels that reward exploration means there’s high replay value if you’re prepared to overlook the back-tracking.

Styx: Master of Shadows is positioned as a prequel to the barely noticed in the game world and almost useless Of Men and Orcs. It seems that developers cut off about 99% of previous content but left untouched the most essential element – creepy old goblin with a pedigree that is longer than the history of the world. After this surgery the prequel looks much better than original and if somebody will work over next Styx series with a file it will be capable to outdo restarted Thief.

This is why Styx's greatest strength is in always providing another option when a passageway appears to be impenetrable.

Styx: Master of Shadows feels like a stealth game from an earlier era. Whether that is a bad thing, however, is the question. If you can look past the somewhat dated graphics, you’ll find that the basic mechanics of the game are well constructed. Also, the open level design and the fun abilities Styx has, make this title well worth the small price tag. Just make sure you remain unseen, as our goblin is certainly not a master of combat.

At its core lies a solid slow game that knows how to shine, especially with its multi-story levels, the multi-paths and Styx 'Goblin arsenal.

The only actual problems with Styx come from the fact that it's not a big budget game. Sometimes, we can clearly feel it. But fortunately, the price tag balanced this little glitch and we can honestly say that the quality of the game is not questionable. Open world and very straightforward at the same time, Styx urges us to try different ways, to play the missions several times to discover all of its secrets.

The action and the feeling of many right paths make Styx truly engrossing for hardcore stealth fans, at a bargain price. Be ready to save often and die a lot — with a smile on your face.

A competent, well-made stealth game that can offer quite a few fun gameplay hours. Unfortunately, the transition from the RPG stylings of Of Orcs And Men to stealth caused the game to lose some of its special atmosphere and charm, mainly due to the lack of banter and dialogue between the two unlikely protagonists of the previous game. Still, if you're looking for a quality stealth game Styx: Master of Shadows is well worth the money.

Despite its shortcomings, Styx: Master of Shadows is an enjoyable hardcore stealth game with the light trappings of its RPG forebear. At $30 and offering around 15-20 hours of sneaky goodness, if you can overlook the poor combat and budget animations, chances are you’ll find a lot to like in Styx. The PC port controls are actually solid, though I still wound up playing the game mostly on the 360 controller, mainly because it was more comfortable. Just keep in mind there’s a reason he’s called the Master of Shadows, not the Master of Fighting, and you’ll likely be very pleased with your purchase.

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.

A very decent effort and a enjoyable stealth game. It´s a bit janky and has its fair amount of troubles, but at the end of the day you are getting a good game for a very good price, with some superb level design, good mechanics and a fair amount of content.

Its greatest strength is to offer a traditional stealth game, studying patterns and watching every corner, but its poor technical execution, with special attention in its platform elements, is too important to highly recommend it.

If you put stealth elements from the thief-, splinter cell- and MGS-series together, and mix them up with a classic fantasy setting, you’ll get an idea, of what it feels like playing the green-skinned goblin-master-thief Styx. While the plot focusing on the amber-drug, cloning, lost memories and the war between Elves and Humans is getting more and more weird through the game, you’ll get a nice stealth-experience with cool game-mechanics, mixed with some rpg-elements. Though the game is fun overall, the AI behaves insufficiently and the jump-and-climb-issue based on the imprecise controls can drive you nuts.