The legendary goblin thief is making his grand return. Styx: Blades of Greed, developed by Cyanide Studio and published by Nacon, brings back one of gaming's most cunning protagonists for another hardcore stealth adventure set to release in 2025 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. This time, Styx faces his most ambitious heist yet in a world teetering on the edge of war, armed with reality-bending powers that transform the classic stealth formula into something completely fresh.
The Quest for Quartz
At the heart of Styx: Blades of Greed lies a dangerous obsession with Quartz, the most precious and perilous resource in the Iserian Continent. In a world on the brink of conflict between elves, humans, and orcs, this mysterious substance holds the power to unlock someone's true potential. For a greedy goblin like Styx, the temptation proves irresistible.
Styx becomes the leader of a group of misfits and outcasts, all seeking to get their hands on this coveted material. But acquiring Quartz isn't just about wealth or power—absorbing its energy grants Styx unprecedented abilities that break the traditional rules of stealth gameplay. These include Mind Control to manipulate enemies, Time Shift to freeze moments and create openings, enhanced invisibility, and the ability to create controllable clones.
The Quartz power system represents a massive evolution in how players can approach missions, offering unprecedented freedom and creativity in tackling objectives. Unlike previous Styx games that focused purely on traditional sneaking, Blades of Greed embraces supernatural elements that make every encounter feel like a puzzle with multiple solutions.
Three Massive Playgrounds
Cyanide Studio has designed three distinct "massive playgrounds" for players to explore, each offering a different flavor of stealth gameplay and environmental storytelling. These aren't linear levels—they're expansive vertical environments begging to be explored from every angle.
The Wall serves as your introduction to the game's mechanics and the world's power structure. This imposing fortress city represents Imperial control masked in grandeur, divided into clear hierarchies. The Upper District gleams with military precision and elite guards, the Middle District bustles with merchant activity and bureaucracy, while the Slums below suffer under corrupt guards and gang rule. Here you'll master core stealth fundamentals like staying in shadows, peering through doors, stepping on carpets to muffle footsteps, and using the environment strategically. This is also where Styx pulls off the audacious theft of a zeppelin, because subtlety only goes so far for this caustic goblin.
Turquoise Dawn offers a stark contrast—a lush, vibrant area full of greenery and life that remains just as hostile as The Wall. This environment reflects conquest's toll on tradition and how survival twists culture. Despite its beauty, danger lurks around every corner, forcing players to utilize Styx's full arsenal of equipment including the grappling hook for quick escapes and the glider for traversing vast vertical distances.
Akenash represents pure madness—a tomb of forgotten stories and shattered dreams. Once a place of miracles, it's now infested with Feral Elves driven mad by spiritual collapse, hostile goblins trying to kill Styx, darkness-adapted roaches spreading like disease, and desperate Inquisition scavengers hunting for Quartz. This environment serves as a reminder that nothing lasts forever, creating an atmosphere thick with dread and mystery.
Vertical Level Design That Changes Everything
One of the most significant improvements in Blades of Greed is the enhanced focus on verticality. While most games favor horizontally expansive areas, Cyanide Studio has built environments that encourage climbing to dizzying heights and descending into shadowy depths.
To facilitate this three-dimensional movement, Styx now has access to new traversal tools. The grappling hook allows him to quickly scale buildings, swing between platforms, or make desperate escapes when guards get too close. The glider enables him to descend gracefully from great heights, opening up aerial approach routes that were impossible in previous games.
This verticality transforms the gameplay into a true playground for sneaking. You can string together moves through doorways, over balconies, out of windows, and across rooftops—all while avoiding enemy sightlines. The level design is dense with details and hiding spots that encourage exploration and experimentation. Every environment offers multiple paths to your objective, rewarding players who take time to scout and plan their approach.
Hardcore Stealth With Deadly Consequences
Make no mistake—Styx: Blades of Greed is a hardcore stealth experience where direct combat means almost certain death. As a squishy green goblin with limited health, you must rely on cunning rather than strength. Getting spotted usually means reloading your last save, creating genuine tension in every moment.
Fighting is something you avoid at all costs. When you must eliminate enemies, it needs to happen before they see you coming. Styx has numerous tricks for staying undetected beyond basic crouching and hiding in containers. He can turn temporarily invisible, though this ability isn't always available and requires careful timing. Touching anyone while invisible breaks the effect, adding another layer of challenge.
Your limited inventory of tools must be used strategically. Sand can extinguish lamps from a distance, creating safe passages through well-lit areas. Darts allow silent kills without getting close. Alchemical bombs provide area effects when you need to clear multiple enemies. The scarcity of these resources forces meaningful decisions—do you use that last dart now or save it for a tougher encounter ahead ?
Environmental traps add creative assassination options. You can sabotage cranes or chandeliers, causing them to crash down on unsuspecting guards. A particular favorite among preview players was pulling a lever to drop a massive, candle-adorned chandelier onto tavern patrons, eliminating multiple targets in one satisfying moment.
New Challenges and Enemy Types
Blades of Greed introduces complications that force you to evolve your tactics. Some guards wear heavy armor that prevents the classic "sneak up behind and one-hit kill" approach. You must first remove their armor through environmental hazards or specific attacks, then deliver the killing blow. Attempting the standard assassination on armored foes results in them turning around and swiftly ending your life, teaching you quickly to adapt.
The learning curve is intentional and rewarding. Each mistake teaches you something about enemy behavior, environmental opportunities, or ability timing. The quick save feature becomes essential, allowing you to experiment without losing significant progress when your ambitious plans go sideways.
The Clone and Mind Control Abilities
Among the new Quartz-powered abilities, Clone and Mind Control stand out as game-changers. Clone creates an illusionary double of Styx that you can control separately. You can send this duplicate to eliminate guards, trigger traps, or scout dangerous areas while the real Styx remains safely hidden behind cover. Watching your clone execute a perfect kill while you crouch unseen behind a crate delivers immense satisfaction.
Mind Control lets you manipulate enemy behavior directly, turning their own forces against them or creating distractions at critical moments. Combined with Time Shift, which freezes time temporarily, you can set up incredibly complex assassination chains that would be impossible through conventional stealth alone.
Styx's Caustic Personality Returns
Beyond the mechanics, Styx himself remains a compelling protagonist with his signature caustic sense of humor. He's not a noble thief or reluctant hero—he's a greedy goblin pursuing selfish goals with sarcasm and style. This personality keeps the experience entertaining even during tense moments, and his witty commentary on the absurdity around him provides levity in an otherwise dark world.
Why Blades of Greed Stands Apart
In an era where many stealth games have softened their difficulty or added action-oriented alternatives, Styx: Blades of Greed commits fully to hardcore stealth. It doesn't apologize for punishing mistakes or demanding patience. Like Hitman, it offers multiple solutions to every problem, but unlike many modern stealth games, it refuses to hold your hand.
The combination of classic stealth fundamentals with reality-bending Quartz powers creates a unique identity. You're simultaneously limited by Styx's physical fragility and empowered by supernatural abilities, forcing constant risk-reward calculations. The verticality-focused level design expands the possibility space exponentially, making each playthrough feel different based on your approach.
Looking Ahead to 2025
While the exact release date remains unconfirmed beyond "2025," anticipation continues building for Styx: Blades of Greed. Preview impressions from events like Gamescom have been overwhelmingly positive, with players praising the enhanced mechanics, beautiful environments, and satisfying stealth gameplay.
For fans of hardcore stealth games like Dishonored, Thief, or the original Styx titles, Blades of Greed represents exactly what the genre needs. It respects player intelligence, rewards creativity, punishes carelessness, and never compromises its vision for mass appeal. The Quartz-powered abilities inject fresh possibilities without abandoning the core stealth formula that made the series special.
Final Thoughts
Styx: Blades of Greed looks poised to deliver the definitive goblin thief experience when it launches across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC in 2025. The combination of massive vertical playgrounds, reality-bending powers, hardcore stealth mechanics, and Styx's entertaining personality creates a package that stealth enthusiasts won't want to miss.
Whether you're dropping chandeliers on guards, using Mind Control to turn enemies against each other, gliding between rooftops, or simply staying invisible in the shadows, Blades of Greed offers unprecedented freedom in how you achieve your greedy goals. Get ready to embrace the darkness, master the vertical playgrounds, and prove why Styx remains gaming's greatest goblin thief.
