SAN FRANCISCO – March 24, 2025 – Pearl Abyss showed its proprietary BlackSpace Engine behind closed doors at the 2025 Game Developers Conference (GDC), offering a closer look at a selection of the engine’s features as demonstrated within Crimson Desert. The features showcased the engine’s high visual fidelity, detailed open-world graphics, and dynamic combat elements, focusing on both large and small details that add to the immersion of the game world.
Highlighted Features of the BlackSpace Engine
Pearl Abyss has long been committed to developing its proprietary engine to create immersive, high-fidelity gaming experiences. The BlackSpace Engine integrates features that define Crimson Desert’s realistic and detailed world:
- Seamless Open-World Exploration: The BlackSpace Engine renders vast, far-reaching open worlds in great detail and allows for a continuous exploration experience with its seamless loading. Players can traverse a wide variety of landscapes including forests, medieval cities, snowy mountains, and vast deserts, with the world around them rendering in real-time.
- Detailed Physics and Environmental Interactions: The engine’s simulations enhance environmental realism, with trees, grass, cloth and hair swaying naturally in response to wind and movement, enhancing the world’s believability. Destructible environments, real-time physics interactions, and details like volumetric fog create a dynamic, living world where objects and surroundings respond intuitively to the player’s actions.
- Dynamic and Realistic Combat: The BlackSpace Engine brings weight and impact to every combat encounter. Detailed hit reactions and physics-driven interactions create part of the foundation for Crimson Desert’s deeply engaging combat system. Object destruction can vary depending on the force applied, and enemies can collide with the environment dynamically, adding depth to battles.
- Real-Time Lighting and Atmospheric Effects: The engine calculates lighting in real-time, replicating detailed light behavior for increased realism, even with ray tracing disabled. Detailed atmospheric scattering effects, dynamic weather such as rain, snow, and fog, and the engine’s real-time lighting calculations all enhance the world’s graphical quality and immersion.
- Realistic Water and Fluid Simulation: Using FFT Ocean Simulation and Shallow Water Simulation, the BlackSpace Engine produces highly realistic water effects. The simulated water creates realistic waves, flow, and ripples, adding to the game’s immersive and graphical quality.
Set in the vast and rugged continent of Pywel, the game follows protagonist Kliff and his Greymane comrades as they navigate a world filled with peril and intrigue. Combining storytelling with intense combat and exploration, Crimson Desert promises a visually stunning and deeply engaging experience. Scheduled for release in late 2025, Crimson Desert will be available on Steam, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Mac.
Download videos demonstrating the engine’s capabilities and other assets here.
For more Crimson Desert information, please visit the official website and follow the game on X, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
About Crimson Desert
Crimson Desert is an open-world action-adventure game developed by Pearl Abyss, aiming for a global release on console and PC platforms. Through vibrant storytelling and intense action, Crimson Desert depicts realistic characters and narratives that revolve around the Greymanes fighting to achieve their noble mission. Players will experience the beautiful yet brutal continent of Pywel and witness the conflicts and epic sagas surrounding Kliff, the leader of the Greymanes, as his mission takes him on an unforgettable journey.
About Pearl Abyss
Established in 2010, Pearl Abyss is a leading developer in the game industry with its renowned MMORPG franchise Black Desert, which is available on PC, mobile, and console. All of Pearl Abyss’ games are built on the company’s proprietary engine and are renowned for cutting-edge graphics. Pearl Abyss is currently developing Crimson Desert, DokeV, and PLAN 8 using its next-generation game engine and is poised to grow its overseas market. More information about Pearl Abyss is available at: www.pearlabyss.com.
Alyx Evans 
Jody Brandow 
Paul Lombardo