Styx: Shards of Darkness Reviews
Styx: Shards of Darkness improves from Master of Shadows on many fronts and introduced a lot of new features that adds more depth to the franchise. But the failure to completely address control issues from the previous game prevents me from enjoying the game to its fullest.
Styx: Shards of Darkness is a pleasant stealth game. Just be aware that it's not a AAA title. It looks fine on the surface, but some mechanics are a bit too old-fashioned. However, if you like stealth games or the previous Styx game, you'll not make a mistake picking this title.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
Styx: Shards of Darkness is a promising stealth experience with massive stages and an interesting blend of genres.
Styx: Shards of Darkness is a little big sequel of the first chapter, Master of Shadows. Gameplay, graphics, atmosphere: all is in the right place.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Styx: Shards of Darkness improves the level design of its prequel, and gives the protagonist several ways to complete the missions.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Styx is a mostly enjoyable ride from start to finish
Enormous adventure playground with small blemishes for adventurous Stealth-Fans.
Review in German | Read full review
Despite some flaws still present from its predecessor, Styx : Shards of Darkness is a solid sequel. Even if it doesn't reinvent the wheel, and borrows its mechanics to the biggest stealth games or adventurous ones like Assassin�s Creed, this opus does things well. With its high dosed difficulty that will encourage the player to be discreet and explore the verticality of the great level design, this entry will fulfill players from the outset.
Review in French | Read full review
By no means a perfect game, Styx: Shards of Darkness is still an improvement on the first. As the series continues to progress we can hope to see some better storytelling, world building and crisper graphics and sound, but for now at least we have an enjoyable experience with some interesting ideas to experiment with
Many of the pieces that make up Styx feel dated, but they still come together to make a competent stealth-action experience.
Styx: Shards of Darkness puts its own unique spin on the stealth genre by giving us an unconventional hero that’s not only incredibly powerful, but very crude too. What’s most important though is that it’s fun to play throughout, offering an adventure that constantly entertains and offers plenty of things for the player to do. It has its flaws with some shoddy climbing controls, poor AI, and lack of diversity with its visual design, but none of these issues trump what Styx: Shards of Darkness does right. If you’re looking for an enjoyable stealth adventure that offers plenty of freedom to the player, it’s certainly worth checking Styx: Shards of Darkness out.
A mean-spirited character leads a big-hearted game; you’re unlikely to dwell on its lore but its features combine well to create a satisfying stealth experience.
Styx: Shards of Darkness is everything you could expect this game to be and more. It offers hardcore stealth gameplay for those who are interested in it while simultaneously lowering the skill cap for those who just want to finish the game and do not shy away from a messy slaughter or alarm or two. It is hard to resist Styx’s wits and cockiness even in the middle of situation he gets into. If you were waiting for a sign that Styx: Shards of Darkness is an amazing game worthy of your time, consider this to be just it.
Clearly, a lot of money and skill has gone into making Shards Of Darkness, which only makes the fact that you have to battle past this woeful characterisation to get to the strong stealth meat below all the more tragic.
Styx: Shards of Darkness is an interesting development of the ideas of the original game with an amusing humour and a charismatic main character that suffers from many errors, deficiencies and other problems that will be partly fixed with updates. But this is unlikely change our opinion about the game. I put a rating based on atmosphere, diversity and stealth, but you really have to love the genre to get pleasure from this game.
Review in Russian | Read full review
While not the best stealth game, Styx: Shards of Darkness offers some fun, unique gameplay. It might be filled with mixed messages, but there's still a number of hours' worth of sneaky, fun, stabbing action.
Styx: Shards of Darkness improves on its predecessor significantly without having to steer away from its core attributes. Everything from its visuals and dialogue to its gameplay and story have been upgraded and polished to an impressive sheen. It’s still far from being perfect and its style of stealth and combat might not be for everyone, but it’s definitely a challenging and enjoyable experience that sometimes forces you to think hard first before acting. The foundation that Of Orcs and Men built set the perfect stage for both Master of Shadows and Shards of Darkness and it can only get better and more interesting from here.
And really, pleasant surprises are what we're talking about with Styx: Shards of Darkness. Don't let the reduced price tag or the fact that Styx's previous titles aren't exactly household names fool you. Once you get past the slightly budget look of the UI and occasional control jank, there is a solid core of a pretty damn good stealth game here. Give him a chance, and Styx might just steal your heart (only to pawn it at a fraction of its value, the little bastard).
Styx: Shards of Darkness never progresses beyond being a moderately functional game with low-fantasy aspirations.
Styx: Shards of Darkness sometimes feels like it's the purposely edgy teenager who doesn't want you to like it. It's, by all means, a game any stealth fan should try, but it's not going to grab and keep you coming back for more. Instead, it feels like wading through mud, and the payoff you're receiving is too small to really gloat about. There's potential here, but behind buggy AI, clumsy controls and a lead character who is more annoying than likable, it all feels for naught.