Returned player here. This is the first Styx game which was released in 2014, 12 years ago but I always thought it was much earlier. I think many stealth games were made around that time, but not many got sequels and are still alive today. Styx was one of the lucky ones, why him?

I remember it as a fun game: more than one path for stealth, you can remain unnoticed high on the ceiling or low to the ground in tunnels. The maps are layered with several floors, complicated but fun to explore. A lack of story is compensated for by the rich level design, besides you’re a goblin hero. You don’t get to control goblins much in other games it feels new.

I also tried The Lord of the Rings: Gollum last year, surprisingly, it was not as awful as I thought it would be, given the overwhelming negative reviews and the gameplay triggered my memories of playing Styx, as I found many similars: "evil" protagonists, similar stealth and actions, ridiculous map designs and hard fights and I thought their ratings should be similar, but no. Gollum became a punching bag that even at 90% off people still loathe it. I think the main problem isn’t the core gameplay, but the collapse of high expectations after a high selling price, and the mechanics feeling so outdated.

I also tried the latest Styx game and feel sorry about it. Currently has a mixed 66% rating from a total of 551 reviews, which is low in both score and quantity. The biggest problem is that it still feels like the 2014 Styx, or even worse due to glitches, like guards often walk as if their shoulders hit an invisible wall and keep going, so their bodies slide along where the wall goes instead of their legs walks, happens more often when 2 guards are close together. The maps are much bigger but hollow and plain, stealth is harder and routes are longer.

Original was a success, but times have changed. You can’t rely on a success from 12 years ago and expect it to still fit players’ tastes today. Yet it is interesting: sometimes you need innovation to attract people and other times you need to keep the core unchanged. I think over the years Cyanide Studio has failed to balance this, so even though a new Styx game is made it doesn’t thrive and can’t attract attention beyond “Hey I know that game, great childhood memory.” Before Styx, I thought Sonic had failed to attract players until the recent racing game CrossWorlds. I think it’s high time for Cyanide Studio to rebuild their goblin hero if they want him to survive in this fast changing video game industry.

My curator page

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ technicznie aczkolwiek przyzwoita gra, takie 6.5-7/10, ale ♥♥♥♥♥ za ostatnią misję twórcy powinni ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ na galerze.

An interesting stealth game that clearly takes inspiration from Assassin’s Creed, but still manages to bring its own unique touch to the genre.

The story is engaging and well done. I found myself curious the entire playthrough, always wanting to know what happens next.
The controls are generally solid, though there are some aspects that could use improvement. For example, grabbing and hanging onto ledges often feels unreliable or doesn’t work properly at all.
The missions involving the elves were a low point for me, as they just weren’t very fun compared to the rest of the game.
On the technical side, the game ran well on the Steam Deck.
Overall: 8/10