source of the picture: The official promotional image of the game on the EPIC platform
The “Crimson Desert” was previously referred to as a new masterpiece before its release, but on the day of its release, it was rated a mediocre 6-point film by IGN. On its first day, the player reviews on the STEAM platform were mixed. However, up to now, the reviews have turned into extremely positive ones, and the sales volume has reached nearly 3 million copies.
Crimson Desert game is quite ambitious. Given that the design makes the game extremely cool, it also drives the players crazy——–Travis from IGN 2026/3/21
Why has the reputation of this game changed so much, and why did its sales still remain good after receiving negative reviews? This article will explore and analyze the game’s pre-release promotion, game design, and player experience to identify the reasons.
First of all, Crimson Desert is an open-world single-player game produced by Pearl Abyss of South Korea. It belongs to the same genre as “Elden Ring“, and its predecessor “Black Desert“, as an online game, was quite mature. The media had high expectations for it from the beginning. There is a lot of positive publicity. After the success of “Black Myth: Monkey“, the media had high expectations for the game market in East Asia. The early trailers and demo videos of ” Crimson Desert” showcased many excellent features, and it was pushed to the status of a masterpiece.
People go in expecting a masterpiece and found something that was just fine—–Electronic-Vast-3351 from Reddit
The game itself has many advantages, but its opening guidance and plot design have significant flaws. Many mass media outlets have described their initial run as “six hours of hell“. The production team clearly lacked experience in making single-player games, so they simply copied the template of RPG games. They interspersed numerous trivial and meaningless tasks throughout the main storyline to waste time. The opening plot is thus very confusing. A man who has just lost everything wakes up and the first thing he does is to go to the tavern to have a wrist wrestling with someone. Similar repetitive tasks prevent many players from persisting until the exciting parts of the game.
Image source: Game screenshot
There are also many problems in the design of the game. In an attempt to achieve authenticity, its lighting system is overly realistic, being too dark and too bright. As a result, many players experience eye discomfort and avoid going near enemies or their own characters at night.The backpack system also fails to accommodate the single-player mode. There are too many critical items that cannot be discarded, and the 240-slot backpack is simply not sufficient.
Image source: Game screenshot
The production team employed realistic physical and interactive systems in an attempt to replicate the physics effects of “Red Dead Redemption“. To be more realistic, their interactions are quite complicated. For example, when sweeping the floor, you have to equip the broom to the weapon slot, which is not the simple operation like in other games where you just click once. These details have a very realistic feel, but there are too many such similar small tasks. Red Dead Redemption is an immersive story-driven game, so this is acceptable. The essence of “Crimson Desert” is similar to a “Assassin’s Creed“-style game. The gameplay requires a degree of repetitiveness.
Just as YouTube creator Neon Knight said, this game is more like a failed MMORPG. It has excellent advantages, but its disadvantages are also hard to ignore.
In conclusion, Crimson Desert is an excellent game, but it does not reach the level of a masterpiece. Its rating has returned to an objective level based on the players’ experiences. But personally, I still think IGN is too harsh on games from East Asia.
Shoujie Wang 
Yinan Zhou 
YUAN Linying