Eriksholm: A Necropolis of Silent Footsteps

Karak Malanthrax
Jul 14
4 min read

In the pale light of a world undone by its own heartbeat, Eriksholm stands as a monument to simplicity and sorrow.

A City Caught in the Grip of Heartpox

Imagine a city so riddled with disease that even its rats probably carry tiny gas masks. Welcome to Eriksholm, where the plague of the moment isn’t dragons or zombies but dear old Heartpox. You play Hannah, a plucky chimney-sweep–cum–rogue who has just returned home to help her brother, only to discover that “family therapy” in Eriksholm means a squad of overzealous guards with billy clubs and all of you running away from them together. So what do you do? You channel your inner Spider-Man, shimmying down pipes like a caffeine-fueled squirrel, climbing through chimney vents, and sometimes, Jon Jonsing some fool who makes the mistake of turning his back on you. Eriksholm present Hannah and friends with a huge slice of locations within the city as the story progresses, working through guarded locations, picking up elements of the story every moment and overall, consistently delivering amazing game-play in the stealth genre.

My Youtube Review

Mastery Through Austerity

—just you, a pebble, and guards who seem to have the hearing of bloodhounds hopped up on espressos.

There exists in Eriksholm a lesson in elegant restraint: the game’s mechanics are distilled to and amazing simple form, granting the player mastery not through the accretion of gadgets or combat prowess in their nighttime activities, like they are trying to fill the moon with icons as it rises, but by the subtle manipulation of light, sound, and space, and 1 item each that you can use.

The Singular Artisans of Stealth

If the adage warns that a jack of all trades is master of none, then Eriksholm’s protagonists are master of one: the art of slipping between shadows and knowing jack-all about much else. Each playable character emerges as an exquisite study in specialization used in desperation. Sneak behind an enemy and use a blowgun to drop them into nap time, while another character makes a distraction on the other side of the level, while the other lets himself be seen for just a moment all in realtime.

The world is a mix of Bioshock lite and Desperadoes 4

A Social Diapason in Stone and Sewers

All of this work, every location, in Eriksholm is incredible. Eriksholm doesn’t discriminate. Whether you’re a beggar, a baron, or a barista, if you’ve got Heartpox you’re as doomed as a snowball in a blast furnace. The poor scurry through rickety slums, the rich discuss subjects that no one needs to hear, while you sneak below them watching for guards on terraces. But one thing you glean from everyone is that the world sort of sucks but my god it looks great while doing so. Amazing lighting highlights the darkness of shadows, the green of moss you can now sneak across without making sound, the eyeball like main light from a lighthouse instantly alerts you to the danger it presents. Everywhere you look there are vistas worthy of an art museum—if that museum specialized in “Post-Apocalyptic Scandinavian Noir.” Meanwhile, the sewer levels? Let’s just say they make Labyrinth look like Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.

Symphony of Silence and Strain

Eriksholm’s audio design is a masterclass in “less is more.” One moment you’re serenaded by wind chimes and distant church bells, the next you’re colliding with metal grates like a startled shopping cart. When you hack a valve or shatter a lantern, the resulting cacophony summons guards faster than you can say “oops.” Voice acting unfolds not in grand declamations but in whispered curses, resigned admissions, and the haunting possibility that brick and timber themselves are bearing witness to an 80's pound girl who had the stealth capabilities of a ghost who is also a ninja.

A Visual Palimpsest

Graphically, Eriksholm is like that indie film you watch at Sundance—stylish, thoughtful, and slightly pretentious in its attention to cobblestone cracks. The isometric perspective gives everything a delightful diorama vibe, as though you’re playing with a dollhouse designed by a particularly gloomy interior decorator. Characters animate with just enough realism to make you forget you’re controlling them. The games cutscenes are amazing but its that in game scene presentation that is amazing. Enemies pace and walk around fires requiring you to change your location of stealth and switch on the fly. They interact with the scenary during talking points that shines a light on how often in game cutscenes in these games so frequently switch perspective because it shows the weakness of the clipping, or technical abilities of the models to do stuff without making it look like the world is a hologram.

On consoles and PC—from midrange cards to back breaking 4090—Eriksholm sustains its performance at all times. Death is frequent but never punishing; auto-saves cradle your echoes two steps past oblivion, ensuring that each failure remains fresh in memory, a lesson carved into muscle and mind rather than an endurance of tedium.

The Quiet Cost of Elegance

I can say this though, Yet there is a price to the purity here. In forsaking an arsenal of tools and an overture of tension, Eriksholm sometimes drifts into a zen suspense, and almost cosy style. For some, the absence of a grand conspiracy or a revelatory twist may feel like a betrayal of genre expectation—yet therein lies the game’s tragic grace.

Epilogue: A Warning in Every Shadow

It’s not about frantic gunfights or heart-pounding chases; it’s about plotting the perfect heist as though you’re auditioning for the world’s quietest circus. If you crave a game that lets you feel like a shadow nincompoop slipping through daylight, all while chuckling at the absurdity of it, Eriksholm might just steal your heart—pox and all.