The game is pleasing not only with its gameplay capabilities but also with the quality of its graphics.
Recently, Digital Foundry examined the graphics of Crimson Desert. Specialist Alex Battaglia evaluated the game by Pearl Abyss. The developers used their own BlackSpace Engine.
The game features ray-traced reflections, which are especially noticeable in standing water. Battaglia also praised the interiors with marble floors:
[...] both diffuse RTGI and RT reflections create an impressively realistic effect. Many games with a similar setting choose RTGI but do not use RT reflections — one might say, due to the mismatch between the environment and the presence of shiny surfaces — however, Crimson Desert handles this perfectly. I would say that the effect is quite comparable, and in some places even surpasses the Lumen GI technology in Unreal Engine 5, while a PC with a 7900 XTX provides native 4K resolution with a target frequency of 60 frames per second.
External weather conditions and lighting will affect internal spaces. And the rendering (drawing) of long distances "looks good" — trees and vegetation on the horizon feel three-dimensional and well-shaded, with uniform lighting.
Alex Battaglia also noted the rendering of water and the physics system:
The rendering of water also looks impressive. It does not rely on standard 2D textures, particles, and displacements only in height — the effect looks more voluminous, with a physically accurate display of waves and coastline. And this is not only the case with the sea: the water looks great in rivers as well, resulting in realistically flowing and falling water. Usually, such effects are faked or created manually, but here, it seems, they are the result of a single simulation system. There is also environmental destruction, which resembles more physically oriented games of the mid-2000s, like Crysis and Far Cry 2.
The release of Crimson Desert is scheduled for March 20. Digital Foundry clarified that it will study not only the PC version but also the console versions.
