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Over the years, I developed a very effective defence mechanism against video game hype, and I must admit it really worked so far. No matter how good an upcoming game is, I always try to avoid watching trailers or reading anything in general that might spoil that particular feeling that discovering a brand-new game can produce.
However, no matter how hard I tried or how well I hid myself from Crimson Desert, the hype was so big that it was simply impossible. Pearl Abyss, the developers behind this massive RPG, made sure the whole world knew about their game, but it seems they overlooked one very simple rule about marketing: it is definitely a double-edged blade.
If people start to compare your game with the likes of Elden Ring or The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, then every small mistake is worth double, even triple. In my opinion, Crimson Desert took such a large and hefty bite that it started choking on its own delicious sweetness, and once the bite is swallowed, the damage is already done.
A Slow Burn Worth the Wait
Apart from the ‘Small Fish in a Huge Pond’ problem Crimson Desert obviously has, the second worst thing about it is the extremely slow start in almost all areas of the game, especially in the narrative. The story in RPGs is very important. One of the best RPGs ever created, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, is famous for its incredibly designed quests, and since the gameplay in those games is always a slow starter, a strong narrative is exactly the thing that will keep you hooked from the beginning.
In Crimson Desert, the beginning of the story will bore you to the bones, and not just that, you’ll be very confused, and you won’t be able to connect the dots for a huge chunk of the game. Everything begins with Kliff, one of the game’s three protagonists, arriving at Greymane’s camp. Greymanes are Kliff’s people, and for some reason, they are being attacked by Black Bears – their rival faction.
In the attack on Greymane’s camp that will soon follow, Black Bears will erase Greymanes. Our hero is defeated and literally slaughtered by their leader (he stabs him several times and slits his throat) and thrown into the river. The next scene shows Kliff inside some strange, futuristically designed dimension, and after the game shows us some basic tutorials, Kliff is back in the world of the living. How he survived is a mystery that never got fully unveiled.
After that, you’ll meet a man who claims to save your life by fishing you out of the river and who will accompany you to the nearest town. There, you’ll arm wrestle some bloke in a local tavern, be prompted to give a coin to a beggar, rescue an imprisoned lady, and all that will be some sort of test for you to see if you are worthy. Confusing as hell, trust me.
From that moment on, I took part in many main and side quests and followed many stories and substories, but none of them made any sense to me, until they suddenly did. That breakthrough happened after almost 20 hours invested in the game. Imagine playing a game for twenty hours following the story that makes zero sense, and after so much time, it started to get interesting. A very poor design if you ask me.
The entire plot of Crimson Desert revolves around Kliff trying to restore his tribe to its former glory. In doing so, he will form political alliances, fight with different factions to overthrow other factions, and also get good old sweet revenge on Black Bears who caused all this fuss in the first place.
However, if you think you’ll get one such big RPG without magic and otherworldly involvement, you couldn’t be more wrong. A beautiful world of Pywel is intertwined with the Abyss, the world situated above the clouds, which only a few are privileged to visit, and, of course, Kliff is one of them (he proved his worth after all). In fact, a huge part of the story is tied to this mysterious world, its meticulous design, and the secrets it holds.
As I mentioned earlier, the story really opens up after twenty hours or so in the game, which is a really considerable amount of time, but this game is definitely made to be played for a long time, and if you’re not ready to invest more than a hundred hours in it, it definitely isn’t made for you. Luckily, your attention will be occupied by phenomenal gameplay anyway, so waiting for a good part of the story to come won’t be as boring.
Chaos, Mastery, and a World That Never Lets Go
Crimson Desert is a game designed to burn your time like few games are able to. From the very beginning, you’ll have a pretty picture of what to expect from it; however, even after ten hours invested in the game, or even more, it will still introduce you to new mechanics.
At its core, Crimson Desert is an action RPG featuring a massive open world full of various activities and distractions that will sidetrack your attention so easily; most of the time, you won’t know where you are headed because you’ll start with one goal in mind and finish with a fourth or even fifth activity at the end. I know that happened to me all the time.
To fully understand what kind of game Crimson Desert is and what the players can expect from it, it is best to dissect its gameplay, explaining it segment by segment, so let’s start with the combat. Every other action RPG these days has combat reminiscent of Souls games, and truth be told, it has become kind of boring.
Pearl Abyss decided to give us something completely different, and I’m very glad they did. To claim the combat in Crimson Desert is perfect would be a lie. To say it is unique and a breath of fresh air – now that would be an understatement. The combat is mostly melee with all the usual weapons at your disposal: short swords combined with shields, long swords, maces, axes, spears, and all that. For the ranged options, you’ll use bows and guns (not Kliff, the other two characters).
Speaking of the other characters, you’ll unlock them as part of the story, and all three of them will have different combat styles. You’ll be able to switch between them at any given time, except when the game sends them on a story-related mission. I tried the other two, only for the sake of the review, but honestly, Kliff is my guy, and I stick with him all the time.
There are special missions or places accessible only by a specific character, so from time to time, you’ll be forced to play as all three of them; luckily, those missions are a rarity, so you won’t be forced to play with any of them if you don’t feel like it.
The combat in Crimson Desert is very fast and snappy, and it will make you feel like a real superhero. In more ‘grounded’ action games, the combat is usually more precise and calculated, while here, even though all the actions like light and heavy attacks, block, parry, and dodge are still there, the reactions are extremely quick, and the number of enemies you’ll fight at the same time is insane.
Sometimes it seems like you’ll be able to win every encounter only by mashing the attack button, but if you keep doing it, you’ll soon feel the difficulty of this game. Everything is fast and chaotic, but in this chaos, once you master it, lies a pure combat beauty which will make you fall in love with this game very quickly.
The difficulty, while I’m mentioning it, cannot be modified, and the game can be easy or hard, depending on how much time you invest in it. As I mentioned earlier, the game features an enormous open world divided into regions. Once you enter a certain region, you’ll start at level zero. As you do the quests or other activities for the people in that region, the level of trust with that region will rise, and the enemies there will become easier to deal with.
Apart from that, your strength will be directly affected by your gear. Every piece of gear will be upgradable, and you’ll also be able to add special sockets to your equipment and fill them with Abyss gear. Abyss gear will add special buffs to your equipment, while the smithies throughout the game will be there for you to level up your armour and weapons.
You’ll find the equipment pieces scattered all over the game’s world, and you’ll also be able to buy some from different merchants – true RPG stuff, really. I cannot speak about combat without mentioning skills. You’ll be able to unlock skills using Abyss artefacts, and these artefacts will be obtainable in several ways: by accumulating combat experience (killing enemies), through exploration, and as the rewards for certain quests.
While speaking of combat, I must mention boss fights, which are, in my opinion, one of the weaker segments of the game. Don’t get me wrong, the boss design is very good, and also the number of bosses you’ll face is very impressive. The problem is the combat system, which is designed more for group fights than for fights with a single, stronger enemy.
Of all the bosses I fought, not a single one managed to defeat me, not even once, and that’s simply due to the very generous healing system in the game. The food you’re buying or cooking is your healing option, and you’ll heal immediately, without any healing animation that can be interrupted. Also, if you die during combat, you’ll be able to accumulate special items which will either completely revive you or revive you with 30 per cent of your health.
So if you manage your items correctly and play the game safely, without going into zones with stronger enemies, no boss or common enemy will be a match for you. I don’t say it is a bad thing, but it takes a lot of challenge from the game, and in my book, that simply cannot be good, period.
The other equally important segment of the gameplay that, truth be told, is the star that shines brightest in Crimson Desert is exploration. No exaggeration here, really, but I cannot remember which game of late sucked me inside its world like Crimson Desert did these last several days, since I’m spending time in Pywel with Kliff and the company. Every step is a distraction; every new place has something new to offer, something special to discover, and in 64 hours I spent hanging out in Crimson Desert, there wasn’t a single dull moment for me.
The encounters with the enemies are intense and adrenaline-fueled. If you feel like more relaxed gameplay is more your cup of tea, you’ll find so many special places where you’ll be able to solve that many cleverly-designed puzzles; of course, without the game holding your hand even for a moment. Apart from that, you’ll be able to participate in many challenges, minigames, hunting, fishing, cooking, and many more similar activities.
If that’s not enough for you, there is also your own camp you can manage; track down and reunite with your lost comrades; send them on missions in your stead; build relationships with locals; and do so, so many more things. I will definitely fail to mention some of them, even if I try my best, because there is simply so much to do in this game.
And then there is a traversal system which will crawl under your skin, especially once you unlock all the upgrades through the skills. You’ll be able to climb on pretty much everything in the game, as long as you have stamina (similar to the system introduced in The Legend of Zelda games). Apart from that, you’ll use special powers to literally fly, use some sort of force like a Jedi from Star Wars, and grapple yourself around with a special hook.
Add mounts, including horses, bears, lions, and even dragons, and you’ll ride through this vast open world, and the enjoyment will be through the roof.
There are also many animals to catch, hunt, or simply study, filling up the knowledge section in your journal, and also every event or person you come across will be added as an entry in your journal, too, to review later if you fancy. I say again, no dull moment awaits you in Crimson Desert, and in my humble opinion, this is a real wet dream of every fan of a good and meaningful RPG.
Breathtaking Vistas, Blemished by Some Rough Edges
I don’t know if it is fortunate or not (it probably is), but I got the Crimson Desert review key on launch day. Let me be clear here: we're often disappointed by that, but we fully understand that the developers are simply not able to provide everyone with a code in time, and that’s completely normal; however, getting this key on the launch day is more of a blessing than a curse, if you catch my meaning.
Let me elaborate. The state of the game, from the technical point of view, the moment I launched it for the first time and the moment I write this review, is miles apart. The latest updates improved the experience considerably. While playing the game for the first couple of hours, I knew where the game would get the lowest score, and that was the performance and visuals in general, but now, it is a different story.
Crimson Desert is simply a stunning game, end of story. Those views and vistas are just unmatched, and no matter how long I played it, it never ceased to amaze me with its beauty. Every biome, from the lush and dense forests in the south, pine forests and rocky areas around the game’s beginning, snowy peaks in the north, crimson deserts in the east, or the marshes in the far east, everything is beautiful, stunning, and jaw-dropping.
While the visuals truly excel outdoors and after the patch, even in indoor environments, face models, sadly, leave a lot to be desired. Seriously, not only are all the NPCs almost identical, but their faces look like they jumped straight from a PlayStation 3 game.
Before the patch, the game had problems with lighting and shadows, especially inside indoor areas, with a very strange manifestation of red colour, but luckily, with the latest patch, all have been taken care of. I played the game on the PlayStation 5, and here the situation was far from good, to put it mildly.
On the PS5, the game features three visual modes: performance, balanced, and quality mode, and the performance mode, before the patch, was simply unplayable. It targeted 60 FPS, but the picture was too blurry. Now, when everything is fixed, all works as intended. All three modes give the promised balance between looks and performance. The performance mode provides 60 FPS, balanced mode 40 FPS, and quality mode 30 FPS, with much better fidelity.
A good sound design, especially in such epic games like Crimson Desert aims to be, plays a huge role in delivering the complete experience, and when it comes to sounds, I really don’t have anything bad to say. The soundtrack isn’t memorable, but all the compositions are adequate and serve a purpose.
Epic battles are accompanied by epic music; calm moments of carefree exploration are accompanied by soothing melodies, so no complaints here. The only complaint for me, but it might be only me, is the forced mild Scottish accent. It seems like every character in the game came directly from Scotland. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against Scottish people; on the contrary, I love them, but forcing those things only makes it annoying, and in video games, the last thing we want is to be annoyed.
I say again, it is just my sentiment, and it won’t affect the rating of the game. Only a bit of variety would serve the game well; just saying.
Conclusion
Crimson Desert is like a heavy train that takes a really long time to get into full gear, but once it does, and the game opens up after quite a slow and long start, it simply cannot be stopped, or you cannot let go of it. It will grab you and suck the life out of you. Trust me, your free time will suffer greatly for it.
With so many things and activities to partake in, quite an interesting story once it finally clicks, and the visuals that will sweep you off your feet, you’re in for a real RPG treat, provided, of course, you can forgive some bad-looking face models and a very slow start that might bore you, but if you manage to survive that, what follows is a ride worth every single penny.
The Good
Unique and refreshing combat- Exploration that never gets old
- Stunning and varied open world
- Overwhelming amount of content
- Thrilling traversal system
- A story worth the wait
- Fitting and atmospheric sound design
The Bad
Agonisingly slow and confusing start- Jarring NPC face models
- Boss fights lack any real challenge
