Crimson Desert is a grim place to exist, but at least it lets you adopt every stray dog you come across, and unlike most cosmetic systems in this game, these dogs actually pull their weight.

Four pieces of the Plate Armor of the Shadows sit out in the open world waiting to be picked up, and the fifth costs a fight most people won't enjoy.

Gambling your digital life savings away is an exhausting endeavor, but hitting the prestige button to reset your miserable scratchcard empire actually pays off here.

An early attack stat this high shouldn't exist yet, and that's exactly why the Soul Spear sits in a dungeon most people are still too underleveled to clear.

Finished suplexing bandits in Pywel and need a new obsession? Here are five gritty action RPGs that will completely ruin your sleep schedule.

Crimson Desert looks stunning right out of the box, but a handful of default settings on both PC and PS5 are actively working against you.

Scratching cardboard by hand works fine for about an hour, and then your wrist starts filing a formal complaint.

Standard attacks buckle fast against a group, and the fix isn't in any menu the game points you toward.

Kearush the Slayer doesn't care how good a combo looks if it's thrown from the wrong range at the wrong time.

Buying Mundo for the first time feels like getting scammed by your own shop.

Getting the rarest ending in Scritchy Scratchy requires fighting every single reflex the game spends hours building into your brain.

Blackwood Pier has turned into a slaughterhouse, and your standard SWAT tactics are going to get hostages killed. Here is how I push fast, hit hard, and clear Ready or Not's brutal No Good Deed mission without the civilian body count hitting double digits.

I spent an embarrassing amount of time combing every inch of Sodor for lost conductor hats and tiny whistles. If you want the 100 percent completion without the headache, my complete location guide has you covered.

Pywel does not care about your grand destiny, but it will absolutely pay you to solve its local disputes.

Crimson Desert's gambling minigames run on numbered sticks instead of cards, and the AI running them has a flaw ruthless enough to turn a night at the table into your fastest source of silver in the game.

Pywel doesn't hand you materials for free, and figuring out how to actually harvest Iron Ore, Copper Ore, and Timber takes more trial and error than the game lets on.

Pywel lets you rob, pickpocket, and murder your way across the map, but the guards here don't mess around, and getting caught usually means waking up in a cell with an empty wallet.

A handful of Abyss Artifacts spent wrong early on will follow you for the rest of the campaign.

Getting stomped by a boss with an empty wallet and empty potion pouch is one of the worst feelings in Crimson Desert, and there are faster ways out of that hole than most people find on their own.

Kliff gets dropped into Pywel with zero explanation and a combat system that punishes anyone still thinking of this as a standard action game.