Credit where credit’s due: Cyanide is a deceptively productive studio, not to mention a rather ambitious one considering the constraints it works under. It might not be the biggest-budget operation, but the French wearer of many hats and waver of many national flags has recently produced a not-entirely-terrible Game of Thrones RPG, Impire, Dungeonbowl, and Of Orcs & Men. The latter, while depressingly flawed, is most relevant here given that Styx: Master of Shadows presumably takes place in the same world. It stars fleet-footed, dagger-tongued goblin Styx, who is apparently the Very First Of All Goblins. The game will be a mix of extremely vertical stealth and fantasy role-playing, which sounds downright fascinating.

There’s just one problem, and I’ll let Jim’s Of Orcs & Men WIT take it from here: “The game is essentially a series of stealth-then-fight setpieces. This would be fine, except it’s a terrible stealth game.” That, um, doesn’t bode particularly well.

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