There would be a whole lot that maybe is worthwhile, but I’ll try to be terse here.

I wrote about Crimson Desert back in 2019. Most people misremember when they say the game started as an MMO. More precisely it was always intended (within the vagueness of what was disclosed back then) as a sort of single-player story that then opened in some shared “MMO” zones for its end/post game. At the time I simply stated that, in the context of game design, the principles that make a single-player game directly conflict with those of an MMO. We now know how it ended: they dropped the multiplayer part, and the game is fully offline, without any form of co-op. Firmly closed against any sort of open activity.

More recently, in discussions outside this blog, I was very skeptical before release, and critical/cynical now. Like many others I doubted that the engine worked as well as they advertised, and despite many glitches and flaws they surely delivered and won on that whole angle. I’ve read some perspectives claiming that Pearl Abyss wanted a game to advertise its engine. I don’t see this likely, but they definitely hit that target. If their goal was to use the game as a way to showcase an engine, to then sell to other studios, then it’s all a flawless win. But again, I don’t see any concrete sign that they want to sell this technology to someone else.

Right before the game’s release the controversy was all about no one being able to pin down what the game actually was going to be. It looked like 10 different games smashed together, but where all of them were turned to eleven. It was all exaggerated, but in a way that didn’t simply look off, but downright implausible. No one had a real idea of how playing this game would actually “feel.” Whether you loved or were dismayed by those previews, it all seemed “unlikely”. What I think I correctly anticipated, before release, is that this overall “confusion” would CONTINUE even after release. EVEN for those who have already played the game for 10-20+ hours. What the game truly is, and whether great or awful, continues to be hard to decide. And creating radical disagreement.

In typical internet controversy this obviously becomes a fight between two factions, and as it often happen in these cases, these varied opinions that appear to directly contradict each other are instead, for the most part, all valid and true at once. They are all apparent contradictions, but they are simply shining different lights across the surface of the game. It just depends what face you’re presently observing.

That’s a terse way for me to say that there’s plenty that this game does brilliantly, but usually it’s also more interesting to learn from what this game does wrong.

It is also possible to find some synthesis, like an overall take that is valid: Crimson Desert feels precisely like a game realized by a talented team of programmers thinking that they could execute game design equally well, on their own. It certainly doesn’t come together as a “good game”, it simply is not.

But, I think, what defines it best, is the frustration, from looking at it from the outside. The same frustration I have with Black Desert, precisely. Crimson Desert is a really bad “game” built around technology that (despite a myriad of flaws) is quite outstanding. WELL MORE THAN ENOUGH to seize a game of the year type of prize, EVEN in the year of potential GTA6. We are truly talking about a game that defines a DECADE, a worldwide milestone. It is in light of this absurd, sky-high potential that Crimson Desert is infuriating. Not because it’s not as great as “we” project, but because it’s actually MEDIOCRE. Despite its technology and foundation, it never reaches the quality of an “average” game. All its flaws are, as it usually happens instead, within the technical limits, or budget, or needing more months/years of development. As it happens with Black Desert, we are talking about fundamental problems that are EASY AND QUICK (cheap) to solve.

How is it possible for a game that was in development for several years, that the same (hardcoded) button to loot items is the same you use to jump? It goes beyond the typical “devs don’t play their own game.” This is something that would irritate me within 5 minutes testing a dev build. How it’s even plausible that this made into a released game!??

This makes Crimson Desert (and Black Desert) an absurd anomaly.

We’ve never seen something like this. It never happened. Games usually stumble and fall DESPITE the developers best efforts. Often it’s merely about technical skills that limit the scope and vision, but in general you try your best and have to live with what comes out. Crimson Desert is a unique case because ANY team could have done so much better, given what’s available. Its flaws, for the most part, are ridiculously obvious to see and solve for anyone with an average design sensibility.

And again, the best way to frame and understand Crimson Desert, is in light of what I wrote, at length, about a single inventory item in Black Desert. Despite the topic is completely different, the contextual frame is exactly the same. Pearl Abyss is a team that slips and falls constantly on BANALITIES.

What will be left of all of this? In a year or two? The tech is certainly noteworthy, but this is not a game that will have any stay in players’ hearts. Including those who rightfully love what the game is, right now. I doubt there’s any replayability, in a way like Skyrim is always fun to replay (there’s no “RPG” depth and progression, the story is not there, the varied activities and free player agency are illusions for a game that is exceedingly linear). I don’t see this game remain in the conversation for more than a couple of weeks.

Let’s say they give the game an expansive DLC (it’s quite probable), I expect it to have zero improvements in the game’s current systems, but I guaranteed it will add ten brand new ones, all executed poorly. If it follows Black Desert path: nothing will be fixed or improved, some things will be broken further, a whole clumsy lot will be added on top of this already overcrowded pile.

Gameplay itself, the combat, is trivially easy and repetitive. Hordes of the same 5 guys that occasionally switch how they dress, but that you all fight in the same way without a threat. Ironically this is exactly like Black Desert, a game with an insanely deep combat system… but performed against enemies that are glorified training dummies. They barely pretend to move around you. In Black Desert it’s all a mindless grind where the only skill level is how fast you can farm them. The game is a speedrun. That’s the only skill ceiling. You either kill slow or fast.

You could make a case about bosses in Crimson Desert. From what I’ve seen, some players struggle, even for a long time. But boss design is mostly built around some gimmick that once you find out you can exploit. I’ve seen this praised, because it actually pushes you to perform specific attacks rather than lamely spam the basic one, but it’s all technically bad. For example I saw a player struggle for a whole hour against a boss whose special attack was digging and disappearing underground. There are tons and tons of problems with this boss, but the main one is that the player was trying hard to anticipate the special attack, to stun the boss, and failing most times (for him, done too early, a single attack of this boss would one-shot him, so he was forced to kill it without a single mistake). Turns out that you stun the boss by acting LATE rather than early. If you try to anticipate the attack, you fail, but if you instead stun it while it’s already disappeared underground (still as soon he goes under), then the stun works. And it makes absolutely no logical sense, because you’d intuitively assume that once the boss is underground it’s then impossible to hit.

In general, from what I’ve seen, boss design in this game is really mediocre, and I would put it one notch below even what “Where Winds Meet” delivers.

As I’ve written elsewhere, “bizzarre” game design is not an ingredient of Crimson Desert, it’s been the MAIN ingredient since Black Desert. One one hand the game is excessively overdesigned (not going to comment for the “focus interaction”, which would be a main topic otherwise), while at the same time being so clumsy, easily fixable with the bare minimum of care.

And it all meaningfully converges right here:

(screenshot from resetera, in this case, but I assume it’s legit since I’ve seen personally even worse)

A piece (or two?) of AI art (let’s not even go there). Look at the frame clipping into the ceiling, then how the two paintings are positioned.

That’s the attention to detail, that’s how much care there is in building and shaping this world. That’s the immersion it demands.

Not as a meaningful example on its own, but as a metaphor you can apply to the rest of the game, especially its game design.

It’s the most accurate, pertinent metaphor.

Including of course those who will see that image, enjoy the warm tones, and say they are fine with it, that it’s really not a big deal impacting their experience. And they are totally right. This is not a damning example, but again the standard that is applied across the whole game, across all its system (including the horse movement and “handling”).

Both absurd and ridiculous, and actually so easy to “fix.” But as Black Desert has shown across its 10 years of its existence: no, it won’t be fixed, it won’t get better.

Or at least, that’s the rational outcome, given the experience with Black Desert. And so the rational conclusion giving the information that is available. They just don’t know what they are doing. They’ve picked what looked cool (including Cliff, as a placeholder for Jon Snow, since that was what was cool at the time of development of Crimson Desert, right when Game of Thrones was at its top) and mashed together a bunch of games. Whether it was Witcher 3, RDR2, Zelda. They had the better technology, just borrowing system across all the successful games that come out: how can you possibly not qualify for GOTY, given that formula & clever strategy?

Yeah. Crimson Desert is literally all it appears to be: a mess. (or a great technology in the wrong hands)

Exactly the same of Black Desert.