While the critical reception for open-world action adventure title Crimson Desert has been quite varied, analysts believe that this hasn’t halted its pre-order momentum. In Alinea Analytics’ latest newsletter, analyst Rhys Elliot has reported that Crimson Desert has hit over 360,000 copies sold on the basis of pre-orders alone, and only on Steam. According to Elliot, this means that Pearl Abyss has made gross revenues of over $20 million before the game’s release.
Further noting the studio’s announcement that Crimson Desert had been wishlisted 3 million times, Elliot estimated that around 2.2 million of these came from Steam. Through this estimate, the analyst was also able to glean some interesting data about the types of games that those who wishlisted Crimson Desert prefer playing. 62 percent of them, for instance, had also played The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. 44 percent had played Elden Ring, and 16 percent had played Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2.
This would indicate that Crimson Desert has already caught an audience that loves its open-world games across a variety of gameplay types. While The Witcher 3 offers more of a narrative-oriented experience, Elden Ring is heavy on the combat. Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 focuses on offering players a large world with overlapping gameplay systems that make up its core rules.
Elliot believes that this came down to how well Pearl Abyss has done in its marketing efforts and community building. “Hype really started to escalate in the past few months, thanks to extensive community building and well-timed announcements,” wrote the analyst. “In general, the marketing – including the gameplay reveal and the recent features deep dives – has been great.”
“But where Pearl Abyss has really hit it out of the park is in quelling vocal online crowds, actively listening to the community, and responding with what gamers really want to hear.”
Interestingly, reviews for Crimson Desert coming out just hours before the game’s release have resulted in the share prices of Pearl Abyss falling by almost 29 percent. The studio was trading at ₩46,600 (approximately $30.66) in the South Korean stock markets. This is a dip of around 28.9 percent from the previous day, where it was trading at ₩65,500 (around $43.66).
The fall of the share price indicates that shareholders were expecting a more positive critical reception for Crimson Desert than what it got. At the time of publishing, the title sits at an average Metacritic rating of 78. This average has taken a variety of reviews into account, with scores ranging from 100 and 90 from some publications, to less than 50 from others.
Crimson Desert is coming to PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S tomorrow. For more information, check out our review. And while you wait, take a look at how well it runs on a base PS5 thanks to Sony’s Japanese show Play! Play! Play! featuring the title in two of its videos. Players who own a PS5 Pro might want more details about its various performance modes, and how well it can keep its frame rate up while still offering beautiful visuals.
