Crimson Desert feels like Dragon’s Dogma 2 combined with The Witcher 3’s lone hero action swagger

The blood on the snow isn't just crimson – it's a thick, treacly black that becomes a permanent fixture as it's smeared across my armor. Crimson Desert's brash hero Kliff carries himself with tortured tenacity, a signature identity for all of gaming's most memorable lone soldiers, and he has the sword skills to prove it.

My 45-minute hands-on session at Gamescom 2024 saw me introduced to Kliff at a bit of a nasty time in his life, truth be told. But the weighty combo-centric melee combat, deftly crafted environs of a punishing snow-capped medieval kingdom, and no shortage of hulking beasts and even-worse-bad-men to slice down to size? The whole package has left me racing to get developer Pearl Abyss' upcoming open world action epic onto my Steam wishlist faster than you can say "ouch".

A bloody good time

Caught in between two warring factions, my Crimson Desert preview begins with Kliff avenging the deaths of the peaceful Greymanes at the hands of the barbaric Black Bear tribe. Going off context clues alone, his thick Scottish drawl has me picturing them as something akin to the Pict nations of Eastern and northern Scotland. In this instance, there's a lot more steel involved.

Here, I'm introduced to the dynamic melee combat mechanics that bulk out the majority of my preview experience. Fighting in Crimson Desert is all about the bumper buttons: L1 lets me parry, while hammering R1 delivers blow after powerful blow with my main weapon (in this case, a sword). Kliff also has devastating special attack that can be pulled off by holding R1 and R2 at the same time, and it soon becomes second nature to stagger foes with a swift kick to the face before melee-ing them off a cliff. 

But the hack and slash good times came to an abrupt close when I realized that this was just the introductory combat tutorial segment of my preview. I'd barely memorized the fiddly combos neatly printed on a black piece of card right in front of me before I was sent to a hub area to choose one of three brutish boss battles to attempt for the remainder of the session. I'd always considered myself more than halfway decent at third-person action games, not to toot my own horn, but Crimson Desert had more up its sleeve than just Assassin's Creed Valhalla starring a raven-haired Geralt of Rivia instead.

Going up against the Staglord, a heavily-armored man with big stag horns and an even bigger shield, is a humbling experience – not least because I'm given a heads up that he is a "mid-range" boss in terms of difficulty and therefore a good option to go against first. The first thing I do after spawning in the Staglord's den? Pick through his belongings, of course, including equipping a random sword I'd found just sitting there. But as I open the menu to check its stats, I'm interrupted by a cinematic introduction to the so-called Staglord. 

This would go on to spell my doom – not once, but at least 11 consecutive times in 30 minutes. At first, I didn't know what I was doing wrong. I was using the same combo attacks as I'd used to clear tens upon tens of Black Bear marauders just moments ago, but now I found myself in much deeper, darker waters. I dodge about the screen wildly, trying in vain to learn Staglord's attack pattern much in the way I would a Dark Souls or Elden Ring boss. I could also have blamed it on the lack of an enemy lock-on mechanic, or the fact that the camera enjoys panning out to beautifully frustrating wide angles if you turn the right joystick just so. Excellent for photo mode, but not great when you're trying to stay focussed on an enemy's gnarly four-hit attack pattern – and even worse when, like me, you're trying to work out why you've suddenly forgotten how to hold a PS5 controller.

I noticed my error far too late. Remember that random sword I'd equipped earlier on? Turns out it has an attack power of about 13. The sword I was meant to be using? It has an attack power of 47.

A surge of adrenaline shoots through my veins as I barrel back toward the Staglord, and to my amazement, the small licks I get in here or there suddenly do some actual damage. I parry, riposte, deliver a heart stopping kick to the chest, and right as I’m about to finally demolish that second health bar — my screen goes dark. It’s the end of my preview session, and I’d only just gotten the hang of how Crimson Desert works.

Gnarly and unforgiving as this demo was, I thoroughly enjoyed my brief hands-on with one of the most unexpectedly gory action games I’ve had the pleasure of bearing witness to. The camera controls and combos are a lot to take in sometimes, but neither makes any real dent in Crimson Desert, which is shaping up as a huge one to watch for any high fantasy open world fan. Just…don’t equip a random weapon, ok?

Crimson Desert is what action-RPGs could look like post-Elden Ring and Tears of the Kingdom.