2026 marks the end of a wait that’s been thirteen years long, and if your mind went to GTA almost instantaneously, those years have been long and arduous. But even as I cross off the days on my calendar, I can’t help but feel like Crimson Desert will continue to be a title that stays with me even as I dive into the polished, potentially spectacular open world that GTA 6 is sure to give me.
Yeah, GTA 6 is absolutely going to dominate the discourse around gaming once it drops, and rightly so. It’s a follow-up to a title that continues to be among the best open worlds out there, and one that gave us so much freedom to roleplay to our heart’s content. Everything you got to do in that one ended up with scenes that boasted of bombast and spectacle. I don’t see why GTA 6 should be any different, given that you’re playing ex-cons in an adventure that’s sure to have more than a few set pieces.
I expect a lot of moments that players are going to be talking about with awe that’s well-deserved. But that only makes me certain that Pywel is going to enjoy a quieter sort of appreciation. That’s not to say it’s devoid of spectacle, not in the slightest. I did just tear through an army of enemy troops, dual swords flashing with an otherworldly power that they were ill-equipped to handle. But I also spent time in a cave, trying to figure out a complex piece of machinery in an effort to get a reward. How did I end up there after my epic battle? I couldn’t tell you if I tried.
The point is, there are games that are built to earn the spotlight. That’s going to be GTA 6. Conversely, there are games that simply stay just behind the curtain, quietly beckoning you to return to their worlds with the fond memories they’ve given you, and the personal stories they allow you to craft for yourself. Crimson Desert’s one of those titles. It’s a title that’s going to win your memory even as GTA 6 wins the conversation.
Let’s dive into why.
Events Versus Experiences
The biggest names in modern gaming are often remembered as either launches that have been preceded by a lot of hype or as experiences that have delivered very highly on the moment-to-moment gameplay loop. Rockstar has built up enough hype around GTA 6 for its launch, and the subsequent slew of content around it, to fall firmly in the first category. That isn’t to say that I’m not expecting the game to have me completely enthralled with its offerings, but the way I see it, those conversations are going to be based on shared experiences. They would focus on events.
But in Pywel, things are a tad more chaotic. I’m still learning new things from Crimson Desert’s vocal community of Greymanes, each of whom has discovered fresh ways to achieve specific goals that just sailed past me since my time with the game has taken me in an entirely different direction. I powered down my console last night after a thrilling time chasing down armor pieces for a set that would let Kliff look like a samurai, a search that led me to a place where crows constantly attacked me, intent on impeding my progress through the region.
I misjudged a jump, plummeting downwards, only to find a puzzle that had me scouring the surrounding areas for three symbols that I would then have to use in a solution. Only, I forgot where the puzzle was in the first place. That new search put me in the path of a boss that took multiple tries and a lot of skilful parrying to defeat. Every moment you spend in Pywel could lead to new experiences, which become the sort of thing that makes each session of play a sort of smaller story within its sprawling boundaries. Allow me to elaborate further.
And that starts with how I spent my weekend in Pywel.
Predictably Unpredictable
For starters, I spent hours flitting between various cities and settlements, feeding stray cats to earn their trust before I brought them back to my Greymane camp. I now have a whole bunch of furry friends, and I stop to pet them all every time I visit my fellow brothers-in-arms. It was a lot of work, to be sure, but I did enjoy the quiet rhythm of that particular activity.
I then went on a search for a legendary horse, as my take on Kliff wouldn’t want to show up on a common beast. I made my way to the Steel Mountains, where a group of goblins was annoying enough to distract me from my search. I took them down, the last one falling in front of a gigantic tower that had me forgetting about a new horse. After I figured out that all I needed to do to get inside was to place a few stones around the front door, I soon ended up in Pywel’s alternate world, wracking my brains on a puzzle that had me at my wits’ end, forcing me to look up a solution that was staring me in the face all along.
Of course, the warrior in me was itching to blow off some steam, and I soon came across a bunch of bandits who were waylaying an innocent man. I summarily dispatched them, giving their victim a ride to the nearest village, where I discovered rumors of a whole fort being taken over by those darn villains. Of course, I then went in alone, bringing them down with a ferocity that even GTA 5’s Trevor would admire. All of this was in the space of six hours, with one coffee break to process it all. And there were four more sessions like that over two days. I’ll leave the math of all that could have happened to you.
Crimson Desert’s one of those rare games that gives you all the freedom to explore its world that you could desire, and then immediately has you encountering a form of friction that stems from its mechanics, traversal, or puzzles that comes between you and a discovery that you’re itching to learn more of. It allows things to get messy and trusts you to come up with ways to resolve your predicament on your own terms. You don’t just witness things in Pywel, but live through them and survive them in a way that makes the whole thing feel all the more relatable.
Of course, things weren’t all perfect. I can’t remember how many times I wished the developers would address the annoying double jump issue in their next batch of updates. I spent hours trying to track down an item I needed to progress a quest, endlessly scouring through my inventory and private storage until a friendly Greymane on Reddit suggested I speak to the one who managed my camp’s provisions and trade goods. That friction can get annoying from time to time, but it’s also a part of Crimson Desert’s charm.
Flaws in any game are never good. But in some cases, they stem from nuance and engineered resistance that are meant to make you stop and adapt to what the game throws at you. More often than not, those are the games that tend to be more vividly remembered than their more polished counterparts. The memories you have of them aren’t just about their story or some massive twist, but from the unexpected adventures you have in their worlds.
Snap Back To Reality
I’m under no illusions that GTA 6 is going to be a more polished release that will absolutely dominate both critical and commercial benchmarks, and manage to have the entire gaming community talking about the many things it will bring to the table. It’s a Rockstar blockbuster release, after all. But it’s that very nature that makes it a very different offering from Crimson Desert.
It’s a game that’s meant to gather momentum right off the bat, and sustain that momentum so its players don’t feel like they’re bogged down by its mechanics or systems at any point. It’s designed to encourage a different kind of freedom, one that makes its players feel empowered to do as they please in its open world while encountering the least amount of resistance as the game can manage.
That would mean that it could redefine what production values could mean for modern gaming, but it leaves little to no room for the sort of unpredictability that’s baked into Crimson Desert’s very design. It’s a title that’s meant to have all of its players discussing its best set pieces across the board, its sheer scale overwhelming them into awe. But can it leave fingerprints on their memory the way that Crimson Desert does? I hope so, as I’m hoping to be served a slice of humble pie later this year on that front.
Make no mistake, I think GTA 6 is going to be talked about and remembered for years to come. But it would be because everybody experienced the same highlights, and came away with experiences that might seem varied on the surface, but are largely similar, owing to it being a game that needs to balance player freedom versus accessibility considering how big of a release it really is.
But Crimson Desert’s a game that’s free of such restraints, and it leans into that freedom with unrestrained abandon. It’s a title that has each of its players coming away from it with different stories, and the only common talking point to connect them all is the fact that you’d have to be there to experience it the exact same way. It’s a game that I’d certainly revisit in conversations, not to simply remember a mission but to tell a fellow Greymane about my own adventures on the way there.
The spotlight’s going to move away from Pywel later this year, and I’m definitely grabbing a front-row seat to GTA 6’s unique brand of chaotic open-world fun. Its much-awaited launch could be an era-defining event, one that’s talked about many years from now. But I know that I’m never going to forget how Crimson Desert has made me feel, and the highs and lows that engaging with its vast world brings to the table.
It’s a game that doesn’t aim to be memorable, but manages to leave you with enough fond memories to remain unforgettable. And on that note, I’m off to make more of those memories before I move on to other titles and other worlds.
Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.