The review build of "Crimson Desert" also comes with Denuvo this time, but oddly enough, I want to give it a thumbs-up

As a veteran JRPG player who considers 80 hours just the starting point, my first reaction to this kind of news usually isn’t panic, but to see whether the developer dares to be fully transparent. On March 23, 2026, Pearl Abyss gave a rare and direct response regarding encryption in the review version of Crimson Desert.

The core issue is simple. A common industry practice is to provide the media with a “review-only version” that has no encryption and runs more smoothly, then add DRM only for the official release. As a result, the performance reviewers see may be completely different from the version players actually buy on launch day—like in a JRPG where the flashy early scripted battles have nothing to do with the real combat numbers later on. The whole feel is suddenly off.

This time, Crimson Desert developer Pearl Abyss confirmed in a letter to Forbes reporter Paul Tassi that the review code and benchmark footage provided to media outlets and content creators worldwide used the exact same Denuvo solution as the launch version. The article also explicitly stated that the recipients of this code included global media and creators such as Digital Foundry.

To me, the key point here is not whether it has “Denuvo encryption” or not, but whether the real situation is disclosed to players in advance. Pearl Abyss’s reasoning was also very straightforward: "It is crucial that the experience of reviewers and testers ultimately represents the real experience of consumers." In the context of the industry in 2026, that feels a bit like an old-school JRPG laying all its hidden stats out in the open—not necessarily pleasing, but honest enough.

The reaction from the player community was also interesting. The original article noted that less than 24 hours after this public clarification, the anger surrounding Denuvo’s performance impact cooled rapidly. Some players even said outright that this kind of honesty was more convincing than overwhelming waves of marketing copy. Put simply, what players fear most is not that problems exist, but being kept in the dark and only discovering on launch day that they got a completely different experience.

We’ll still need to wait for full reviews and more real-world testing after release to judge the combat system, but as far as handling public perception goes, Pearl Abyss made the right move this time. Unfortunately, if the actual performance doesn’t hold up later, then this transparency will only become a harsher point of contrast.

As for trend analysis, I actually hope more developers adopt this approach. Review versions matching launch versions should be the industry baseline, not some rare achievement. For players planning to pick up Crimson Desert at launch, my advice is simple: prioritize performance tests based on the review code, especially side-by-side results from media outlets and technical creators, because this time they should theoretically be closer to the final consumer experience.

If more developers are willing going forward to proactively disclose whether their review versions include encryption, I’d see that as a signal more worth watching than any trailer. After all, what really affects your launch-day mood has never been how hype the marketing slogans are, but whether the game you get when you press Start is actually the same game being advertised.