Name: Crimson Desert - Before You Buy
Uploaded: 2026-03-19T21:37:02.000Z
Duration: 18 min 4 s
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And we're back with another episode of before youe Buy that show where we give you some straight up gameplay and our first impressions of the latest games releasing.

It's me, Jake Baldino and today we're talking about Crimson Desert.

There's been a lot of hype about this big splashy open world game, man.

It's been in development by Korean studio Pearl Abyss for many years now with some incredible looking visuals.

Now how is the game actually, Is it actually fun to play?

While inspired clearly by so many other big games from like the Witcher to Skyrim to Tears of the Kingdom to Even a little Monster Hunter manages to feel like a unique experience.

Sometimes it's a weird experience and I think some types of gamers are just gonna completely be turned off by some of it or just nope out.

But ultimately this feels like a big, ambitious, sometimes goofy but passionate video game theme park to play around in.

Basically if you can put up with some BS here and there and are okay with great gameplay, not a very compelling story, at least so far, then you'll have a blast in this world, man.

It gives you a generous amount of game and content and great music and visuals.

Now keep in mind this is a massive game, like just staggeringly big.

One of the biggest we've seen in a long time.

And this is just gonna be our first impressions here.

We've been playing a review copy and this footage is captured, running on PC and is spoiler free.

The footage you see here only scratches the surface as we keep it to early stuff to avoid spoilers.

Now another thing, another disclaimer about footage here.

This is the PC footage we did not get our hands on console version of the game.

And I've seen a lot of questions out there about the quality of console graphics and what players on Xbox series S X PlayStation 5 base like what they can expect.

And so we're not messing around this time.

Keep your eyes peeled for that when the game launches.

As soon as it launches we're gonna get to work capturing footage on those other consoles to show you guys.

Essentially we're going to do a Second before youe Buy Video.

That's gonna be a summary of some of what I say here, but

with a lot of extra thoughts and lots of gameplay for those console versions so you could see for yourself and make sure that everything is copacetic.

Crimson desert drops you into this medieval fantasy world filled with knights, kings, maidens, goblins, monsters, dragons, and

then weirder stuff, like some crude robotics and high fantasy technologist stuff.

He is a warrior of the Graymanes, one of many factions in this world.

And after being killed by a rival faction, you're revived by an otherworldly force and thrust back into the world, but

In the early hours of the game, it's up to you to just get your bearings, reunite with your Graymanes, build a camp and a home, and

Now, I'm gonna rip the band aid off here with a negative, but

for me personally, the first like eight hours or so of this game are not good at all.

Now, I know hearing that, I know some JRPG fans know what I'm talking about.

But for some people, this might come as a shock.

The game just has so many gameplay systems and mechanics that it takes hours to slowly introduce all of it.

Like, it trickles out, and even then it still actually manages to gloss over some things.

There's gonna be stuff that they don't explain to you.

Look, if a game has a lot and it takes a lot of time to explain it all, that could be fine, I guess.

It's just that the quests they give you here, the things you need to do, are all just pretty boring.

The game has a lot of weird, nonsensical moments that feel like disjointed.

Or maybe it's just put in place to, like, annoy you or slow you down.

Your motivation is basically very little, and the game gives you minimal story reasons to really care.

At the outset, I was nervous, kind of thinking to myself, like, you know, what's the big deal with this game?

This seems kind of lame, but I stuck with it.

And once this game opens up, it really opens up.

Fun, expressive combat that makes you feel powerful while keeping the game challenging.

Loads of variety to it, the ability to play as other characters with their own unique spins, and

There's base building, crafting, fishing, mining, bounty hunting mounts, robots, jetpacks, riding dragons, weirder and weirder enemies.

This is a game where the developers threw the kitchen sink at you.

You could do tons of stuff And I've talked about games like this before, but

the difference with a lot of other games we've mentioned in the past that take this approach here in Crimson Desert, most of it doesn't feel cynical or half assed or including so much just to check boxes.

Most of the systems here are done right and they feel good and are nicely implemented down to like chopping a tree down or placing a table in your house to the feel of a parry or horseback controls.

Just because the moveset slowly builds over time.

You have a block parry, light attack, heavy attack, you very quickly get a kind of force push ability that expands into more and you know, you think that's it.

But the moveset expands greatly through your magical abilities, but

also through a pretty damn solid skill tree with lots of different things to unlock.

As much as it's a very hack and slashy style game, there's a surprising amount of like ability combos you can stack on one another and just pull off some really cool shit that makes you feel powerful.

The strike of a sword, a parry, all of that feels really good.

The way Cliff will rend his sword into someone and pop the sword out with like a little flash of gore and the enemy flying away.

And again, as the moveset expands, this just gets more and more fun.

The game is happy to throw tons of enemies at you and let you go hog wild.

If you want to use a bow and arrow to snipe out some guys and stealth around, that's fine.

at the very least when you crouch and move around, the map adapts to show you enemies vision cones, which is cool, but

you know, typically I would thin the herd a little bit and then go all out with combat.

If you're like me, you're going to be playing and you're probably going to end up like unlocking things and then using them a lot.

Like, you know, getting the ability to throw dudes, eventually getting the ability to like choke slam clothesline dudes, but

then more massive magical abilities like a ground pound and just like all kinds of effects you can stack on one another.

So again, combat with a pretty simple, straightforward foundation that gets surprisingly complex.

And that's a big part of what I'm saying here is like, you know, when the game really opens up, it gets a lot more fun because you get to just do all this wild stuff and how all these Systems, again, starting with small foundations and building upon that, all kind of lead to fun player experimentation.

The game's not holding your hand, it's letting you just figure out what you can do, how capable you are just by messing around.

Kind of like figuring out your favorite tricks in like, you know, Tears of the Kingdom or something like that.

The game has a lot of moments that hit the same way.

Not to mention the fact that like, while Cliff is very much a sword and shield type of guy, you do have some weapon variety there as well.

And then switch switching to other characters to get another different flavor of combat.

They all have their own movesets that are fairly well thought out.

As much as Cliff is the one you're gonna stick to, these characters don't feel like an afterthought, gameplay wise, at least from what I have encountered so far.