With such a long development cycle and pivoting from an MMO to a single-player open-world title, Crimson Desert has paid off very well for Pearl Abyss. Its recent Q1 2026 financial results revealed that it earned $180 million in revenue as of March 31st, resulting in the company’s highest quarterly revenue ever.
And while the company expects its revenue to soften over the rest of the year, it’s also looking at ways to take it to the “next level,” including DLC.
“Crimson Desert will continue to focus on enhancing user satisfaction and driving new sales through continuous updates, while expanding its market presence through platform expansion. In addition, we are currently exploring various ways to broaden the game to the next level, including DLC. We will share the details once the concrete plans are set.”
The continued focus on post-launch updates probably won’t come as any surprise, especially given the positive reception. You can read more about the latest patch, which adds special mounts and Material Extraction, here. It’s the DLC that’s most intriguing because of the different directions that Pearl Abyss could go in.
Maybe it will expand even further on Pywel’s history and craft a narrative to eschew for the base game’s lackluster story. The mysterious village that players discovered could also play some role in it. Either way, both the leadership and the development team are clearly settling in for the long haul.
Crimson Desert is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. It’s sold over five million copies in less than a month, with revenue split evenly between consoles and PC. If you’re curious about our thoughts after all the updates, check out our re-review.
