Crimson Desert Addresses Difficulty and Soulslike Comparisons

Crimson Desert won’t be easy, and it won’t have any difficulty options at launch, according to developer Pearl Abyss. There has been a lot of chatter around the upcoming fantasy RPG, drawing equal parts excitement and curiosity about what exactly to expect from it when it releases. One thing that Pearl Abyss has made abundantly clear, though, is that Crimson Desert won’t be a cakewalk, even if it’s not a Soulslike.

After a reveal all the way back in 2020 and at least one delay, Crimson Desert is set to come out in March 2026, leaving just over a month before fans can try it out for themselves. Pearl Abyss has made some bold claims about the title, and early gameplay trailers have left some audiences saying it “looks too good to be true.” Whether it meets its lofty expectations won’t be clear until after release, but the team behind the game has clarified what it will look like in terms of its difficulty.

Crimson Desert Officially Confirms PS5 Pro Support

Crimson Desert will take full advantage of the PS5 Pro with special enhancements, giving players more control over their visual experience.

Crimson Desert Won’t Be Easy or Have Distinct Difficulty Modes

In the same interview where Pearl Abyss explained that Crimson Desert won’t have any microtransactions, Director of Marketing and Public Relations Will Powers was clear that the game will be difficult. Powers said that the RPG is not a Soulslike, but “does that mean the game’s easy? Hell no.” In a separate interview with Gamereactor, an unnamed Pearl Abyss developer said the studio doesn’t plan on bringing adjustable difficulty options to Crimson Desert “at the moment,” either. That dev went on to explain that the game offers plenty of ways to prepare for tough battles and play the game as players want, which may remove the need for a sliding difficulty scale.

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This echoes Powers’ explanation of why Crimson Desert is not a Soulslike, despite its apparent high degree of difficulty. While some players could struggle with some bosses, there are often alternate paths to take to explore more of the game and upgrade their skills or equipment before attempting a fight again. Pearl Abyss has claimed that Crimson Desert‘s world is twice the size of Skyrim‘s map and even bigger than Red Dead Redemption 2, so it sounds like there’s enough content to dive into if players get stuck at one point. Forgoing conventional linear progression and emphasizing player freedom could help balance difficulty and accessibility, possibly similar to how Breath of the Wild changed the classic Zelda formula.

A game’s difficulty can be contentious among players, with some saying games like Hollow Knight: Silksong or Elden Ring set the bar too high for beginners to enjoy them, while others say the satisfaction of working through these challenges is just right. In the same way, developers disagree on how to approach these settings. While Ghost of Yotei offers five distinct difficulty modes, others, like Dead Cells, give all players the same experience and ramp things up over time to balance progression. It sounds like Crimson Desert is taking a middle-of-the-road approach by not offering a sliding scale but leaving the game open enough for players to take it at their own pace and address difficult moments in whatever way works best for them.

It remains to be seen how this approach will pay off for Peal Abyss. However, early looks at the game have already done enough to convince a sizable audience that it’s worth a shot. Over 2 million people have wishlisted Crimson Desert on Steam, enough to rank it among the top 20 most-wishlisted games on the platform right now. With the RPG eyeing a March 19 release, the wait for fans to see how its difficulty feels firsthand won’t be long.