Something to look forward to: Developer Pearl Abyss has spent six years showcasing screenshots and videos from its upcoming open-world fantasy game, Crimson Desert, which many suspect are too good to be true. With the game's launch just over a week away following repeated delays, newly published full technical spec sheets indicate performance metrics just as ambitious as the game.
Pearl Abyss recently released detailed system requirements and performance spec sheets for Crimson Desert on desktop PCs, handheld PCs, Apple devices, and consoles. The company's internal testing suggests that achieving 60 frames per second with ray tracing enabled will not require the latest high-end graphics cards.
On PC, Nvidia's GeForce GTX 1060, which turns 10 this year, can still achieve 30 frames per second at 1080p, upscaled from 900p. Meanwhile, the RTX 2080 or AMD's Radeon RX 6700 XT can reach 60fps at native 1080p or 30fps at native 4K.
Modern upper mid-range cards such as the RX 9070 XT or RTX 5070 Ti can maintain 60fps at ultra graphics settings in 4K. Pearl Abyss explicitly mentions upscaling in the desktop PC chart's minimum bracket and on the other spec sheets, suggesting that the Ultra bracket is intended to estimate requirements for native 4K.
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Furthermore, the developer recently sent Digital Foundry a demonstration of Crimson Desert running in 4K with FSR native anti-aliasing (AMD's equivalent to DLAA) on an RX 7900 XTX, a GPU that often posts benchmark results similar to the 9070 XT and 5070 Ti. The footage was captured at 60fps, with ray-traced global illumination and reflections enabled. The game also supports DLSS 4 and FSR Redstone, which will help lower-end cards achieve high resolutions and frame rates.
FSR 3 upscaling and frame generation are required to achieve frame rates above 30fps on the Asus ROG Xbox Ally and ROG Xbox Ally X. The standard ROG Xbox Ally features the same SoC as the Steam Deck, so users should expect similar performance on Valve's popular handheld gaming PC.
Similarly, Macs rely on MetalFX upscaling and frame interpolation to reach 60fps at 1080p or above, especially with ray tracing enabled. Furthermore, Pearl Abyss revised its earlier minimum macOS requirement from an M1 to at least an M2 Pro, M3, or M4. Achieving 1080p requires at least an M3 Pro, M4 Pro, or M5, while upscaled 4K demands an M3 Ultra or M4 Max.
Meanwhile, the standard PlayStation 5, PlayStation 5 Pro, and Xbox Series X each offer three performance modes, all of which include ray tracing. The PS5 and Series X can maintain 60fps at 1080p with RT set to low, while the PS5 Pro uses the latest version of PSSR to upscale from that resolution to 4K, outputting similar performance with ray tracing set to high.
The balanced and quality modes on consoles maintain 40fps and 30fps, respectively, while upscaling to 4K from various resolutions above 1080p. The PS5 Pro's 30fps mode sets ray tracing to ultra at native 4K. Only the Xbox Series S sacrifices ray tracing and 60fps gameplay.
Prior trailers and preview videos have showcased impressive graphics, massive open-world environments, large numbers of characters, and numerous systemic physics interactions. Rather than using Unreal Engine 5 like most recent AAA games, Pearl Abyss opted to develop its proprietary BlackSpace Engine. Demonstrations of the game's action, puzzle-solving, and flying elements have drawn comparisons to titles such as Crysis, Far Cry 2, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
Crimson Desert launches on Steam, the Epic Games Store, the Mac App Store, the Microsoft Store, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series consoles on March 19.
