Crimson Desert

A monumental masterpiece: Despite the bugs, clunky menus, and awkward controls, its magnetic pull is simply impossible to resist.

After spending roughly 30 hours with the game, I would have scored the game in the 9.0 out of 10 range. Now that I have completed the story, I feel that score is completely warranted, and would have been even higher if the narrative had a bit more cohesion. Crimson Desert is very fun and gripping, and a game that is very easy to get lost into with an incredible world density, its sandbox mechanics allowing for tons of player expression in traversal, combat, and quest completion, so much so that I feel I will continue to play the game for a long time even after having completed the story. Now completely comfortable with the game's unique quirks, I firmly believe Crimson Desert has the chance of being this year's Baldur's Gate 3 and becoming a benchmark moving forward for all open-world games.

Crimson Desert features a fantastic, content-rich open world where player freedom is the number one priority. There's so much to do and so many places to go to that it's easy to get lost among its ancient ruins, mystical forests, and snowy mountains. A lack of polish breeds frustration, but nothing can shake up the firm foundations of this incredible title.

Crimson Desert will likely appeal most to players who enjoy getting lost in an incredibly detailed and realistic open world and figuring things out for themselves, even when the game isn't always clear about how everything works. Those who value exploration and long-form progression will find plenty to dig into, especially if they don't mind learning it all through a fair amount of trial and error. On the other hand, players who prefer a more streamlined experience, a stronger narrative focus, or systems that clearly communicate their rules may find the journey more frustrating than rewarding. Even though Crimson Desert initially seemed like a game for everyone, it's not, but it is one that everyone should at least try.

Crimson Desert is an experience that won’t appeal to everyone, but it can be unforgettable for those who embrace what others might see as flaws. Blending combat, survival, and exploration, the game offers over 100 hours of content that may feel superficial to some yet captivating to others. Despite issues like confusing menus and a clunky inventory system, it remains fun and worthy of attention in 2026. Ultimately, the key question is whether you have the time and willingness to dive into its expansive design, which could shine even brighter if it focused less on quantity and more on personality.

Crimson Desert’s best moments come when you think about the game it could have been, were it not for its overabundance of clunky mechanics and its painfully sluggish controls. Riddled with glitches and systems that don’t work, Pearl Abyss’s first single-player game can rely on its sublime open world, or its core management system borrowed from BDO, to occasionally lift us out of our frustration.

Crimson Desert draws attention for its ambitious open-world adventure proposal, but the experience ultimately falls short of expectations. The game features a confusing narrative, with uninteresting characters and missions that feel like generic MMO tasks. The combat has many mechanics but little depth, with artificial difficulty spikes and unresponsive controls. Even with impressive graphics and a high degree of exploration freedom, issues with art direction, bugs, and design decisions make the game feel vast in content but shallow in quality.

For me this is the best open world game I've ever played right apart with Red Dead Redemption 2.

Jogo incrível, mundo aberto fantástico, combate do crimson é espetacular, a história não é a mais marcante, mas é um história OK, o mundo desse jogo é vivo, A empresa traz atualização toda semana, sempre ouvindo a comunidade e atendendo os pedidos. Eu garanto que se vc comprar não irá se arrepender!

Crimson desert est un bon jeu, mais avec énormément de défauts. Les 20-30 premières heures de jeu sont top, on découvre l’open world, on améliore notre personnage avec des armures et armes plus puissantes, malheureusement passez ces 30h de jeu, l’exploration devient inutile, aucun intérêt d’explorer davantage et se prendre la tête à faire des énigmes pour seulement un point de compétence, ou une armure inférieure a celle équipée. De plus l’histoire et les personnages sont inintéressants, seulement la mise en scène est réussie mais il n’y a aucun travail d’écriture. Le gameplay quant à lui est sympa, mais les combats sont assez brouillons et répétitifs. Enfin, il y’a des zones que j’ai trouvé horribles, spécifiquement celle avec les robots, c’était horrible. C’est un jeu sympa si vous avez 100h à lui accorder.

I played 16 hours and I was bored the entire time. Very generic fantasy rpg

My main issue with the game is an issue with many PC games. The game was designed for consoles and the porting to pc is half assed at best. As for the positives, the game is gorgeous to look at and the interaction with the environment is decent. Also, the ability to climb is great. I love the freedom it provides. and unlike many pc games, you do not have to spend hours walking around mountains or other terrain features. This feature is well designed, and thought and planning are necessary to climb high cliffs. Now for the bad. This is a console game, like many of these games, that is not ported over to PC well. Also, the game interaction is often cumbersome and tedious. ?You want to cook some meals, start pressing buttons and either wait for the same cut scene or press more buttons to proceed. You want to interact with an NPC, you cant press one button. No, you have to press multiple buttons, ridiculous. And combat, like many console game ports, is simply mashing buttons while battling oodles of enemies. Half the time, I don't even know what combination I am pressing, yet I easily defeat scores of npc enemies. The inventory interaction is confusing and frustrating. YOu want to arm a sword, press a function button then choose. No easy way to switch through different items. It gets frustrating. Especially when you are trying to do a specific task like mine, and the game simply switches your active item. As for the game, designers really need to stop giving our champions of the land ridiculous task like go gather flowers because the npc refuses to do it. But I, the hero has to go pick flowers. WHY? And the puzzles, how about you design puzzles with subtle clues vs simply having to randomly guess for days in the hopes I can solve a random assignment. I would prefer writing a 10 page English report than try to guess random puzzles. There are many more negatives, but I am doing this off the top of my head. This game is more designed to frustrate than entertain. As an example of the frustration, every boss fight follows the same sequence, battle boss even though they can stun you for many seconds and beat you to a pulp, but luckily, just eat some food mid battle to instantly heal, pound on the boss, only to have him fully heal and increase power so you have to do it again, beat some more, then boss fully heals again and powers up more. Finally defeat the boss (not actually as a cut scene finishes the boss, not you) only to have them escape and run off. So you spend 10 minutes battling, and no kill. Finally, and this applies to many games, why must I follow an npc at the slowest walk possible. Can you not design a system of me following the npc, but let me set the pace? Follow an npc and have them get stuck behind another npc so you could crawl faster. And its not for a quick 5 second walk. It lasts many minutes of following these NPCs incapable of moving faster than a limping shuffle, even while on horse back. Again, if you want a fun and challenging game, spend your money else where.