Styx: Shards of Darkness Preview - E3 2016

Styx: Shards of Darkness is the sequel to Styx: Master of Shadows, the stealth game created by Cyanide Studio. The latest outing for the goblin assassin Styx promises a bigger budget and ideas, as well as the Unreal 4 Engine. Following the fall of the Arkenash tower, Styx comes out of hiding to seek answers to the mysteries that live within the Dark Elves’ city.

In our E3 preview, I watched Styx slink through the shadows of a swampy port settlement. The first thing I noticed was the gothic fantasy setting, which has a real fairy tale, Fable-esque look, with the slightly exaggerated curves of shacks and bubbling emerald lakes below. The slivers of moonlight glimmering off the waters and twinkles which catch on buildings show that the new engine certainly isn’t going to waste. Obviously, Styx is a stealth game, and verticality is one of your most powerful tools. You need to track movements, environments and literally get the drop on your enemies. As the port stretches out before us, we saw lots of different levels, each functioning like tiny islands with shacks and buildings. Already, though the game was out of my hands, I was planning how I would have tackled it all.

So, our mission in this place was to steal three items, and the freedom of how you could accomplish this task was at the forefront of the demo. You can complete your objects in any order that you see fit. Starting off, we climbed a set of ropes to a platform, taking our time on the edge, then yanked a guard into the depths below. Then, because we have a slightly tricky part on the way, we raided a barrel for some ingredients so that we could craft, on the fly, a clone potion. It’s exactly what it sounds like, and a slimy doppelganger of Styx appeared.

Clones can work like checkpoints or a free life. Such as when we had to swing across a set of ropes to a precariously placed ladder, perilously close to the dock below. You can have the clone tackle this task; if it dies, you’re still safe. If the clone succeeds, you can then warp to its location. Finally, you can use these clones like warp points. If you leave it at a “crossroads”, then complete an objective, you can instantly return to its location—pretty useful. You can also level up Styx as you progress through the game, enhancing your stealth, perception, item crafting and more.

Back on solid ground, we wove our way into one of the shacks, utilizing our “stealth vision” to locate points of interaction on the map and check where our objectives were. As with a number of games at the moment, the overlay is basically a way of singling out useful places. And one such useful place was a barrel, which we could hide in to avoid patrolling guards. When the coast was clear, we rolled up to a crafting bench, where Styx can create items like bolts, bombs, and more for use in his stealthy shenanigans.

Outfitted with some poison, Styx moved on, sneaking through a crawl space and into a larger room. Close quarters in stealth games are when you have to dial up your caution, and with a guard in the area, the goblin quickly scurried up to the rafters to stay out of sight. However, we’d been acting as the pacifist for a little too long, so we decided to creep up on a cauldron of alcohol, sprinkling in a little bit of something that will help us to deal with the three guards in the next room.

One of cool things about any game is when you define your own rhythm. Stealth games have their own sense of unique pacing, especially when you create it yourself and, more importantly, when you have the tools to achieve and enhance this pathos. So, in the next room, we had a guard up top and two on the ground floor. Firstly, we used the clone and had him ready to take out the guard on the stairs above. The clone stealth killed the first guard, then with a quick change back to Styx, we severed a wire that was holding a chandelier, which crashed down on the second guard. The third guard was then taken out by leaping on him from above. Cool rhythm.

Then, it was a just a case of grabbing a couple of the items that we needed and Styx could jump into a little balloon to take off to freedom. However, there are “tokens” hidden in the level, which act like a secondary objective, to imbue each mission with a little more longevity and get players exploring. You can even team up with a friend in multiplayer, if you like, which promises to bring its own style of stealth gameplay independent from the single player experience.

As a huge fan of stealth games, particularly ones that simply hang everything on that one staple, Styx: Shards of Darkness feels like something that is right up my alley. The fantasy environment design, multiple ways to tackle each level, and balance of both verticality and claustrophobia, means I’m looking forward to taking this goblin out for another nightly jaunt. Styx: Shards of Darkness is expected to release on PC, Xbox One and PS4 sometime this year.