Crimson Desert has a high-profile fan: the director of The Witcher 3.
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Both games are single-player fantasy adventures, and while The Witcher 3 leans more heavily on story, character, and traditional RPG elements, Pearl Abyss and CD Projekt’s vast open worlds are often compared.
Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, the director of The Witcher 3 and former Cd Projekt executive, told The Game Business that Crimson Desert, alongside Sandfall Interactive’s Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, are “different.”
“The problem in this industry sometimes is that people opening companies are thinking [too much] about how to make money,” Tomaszkiewicz said. “This is a really cold approach for the games. You cannot create art like this.”
Tomaszkiewicz, who left CD Projekt to start his own studio, The Blood of Dawnwalker developer Rebel Wolves, said both Crimson Desert and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 rekindled memories of the nineties, when “every game was some unknown.” The approach, he said, of “adding some risky stuff” to triple-A RPGs so they’re not simply the same as what has come before, was the whole point of setting up Rebel Wolves.
“I think that this [idea] is growing these days, because when you look at Clair Obscur, or Crimson Desert right now, those games are different,” he said.
“They are not a copy of other AAA games, but delivering something quite fresh. And I’m really glad of it because I’m starting to feel like I did in the 1990s when I played games on my 286 PC, or even on the Atari where every game was different game. Every game was some unknown. We want to deliver a similar experience for people.”
Both Crimson Desert and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 are big hits, with the former selling 4 million copies so far, and the latter selling over 5 million and winning most 2025 Game of the Year awards. Tomaszkiewicz will be hoping for similar returns from The Blood of Dawnwalker, which is another single-player open world fantasy adventure.
We’ve got plenty more on Crimson Desert, including a story on how the NPCs are the stars of the show, a hidden food consequence system that a modder has restored, and an impressive character creator mod. We recommend you take a look at our guide to Things to Do First in Crimson Desert, plus Things Crimson Desert Doesn’t Tell You (we’ve got 28 and counting!). We’ve also got a guide to the Best Early Weapons we recommend picking up, the Best Skills to Get First (including a handy explainer of the skills system), and 34 Essential Tips and Tricks to help you succeed in Pywel.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].