DS Investment & Securities said on the 30th that early sales of the new title "Crimson Desert" at Pearl Abyss are strong, adding the company has succeeded in turning jeers into cheers. It maintained its "Buy" investment opinion and raised its target price to 90,000 won from 65,000 won. Pearl Abyss' previous session closing price was 58,800 won.
DS Investment & Securities raised Pearl Abyss' fiscal year performance estimates to 967.4 billion won in revenue and 453.6 billion won in operating profit. It said this followed a review of user metrics over the weekend, which led the firm to lift its one-year sales forecast for Crimson Desert from 6 million units to 8 million.
Choi Seung-ho, an analyst at DS Investment & Securities, said, "With strong early sales for Crimson Desert, we are adopting the bull scenario that presents 8 million units in one-year sales as the final scenario," adding, "There were questions about follow-up sales due to very low initial Metascore and user scores at launch, but user scores rebounded sharply through revised evaluations and patches."
Potential buyers decide whether to purchase after seeing user reviews, and it was also noted that user reviews are highly likely to continue a rebound trend going forward, which is positive for follow-up sales.
Choi said Choi personally played Crimson Desert for nearly 30 hours, saying, "Despite various issues, Crimson Desert is a remarkable open-world role-playing game (RPG) new release with a firm point of differentiation and an unprecedented amount of content."
Choi went on to say, "The content is vast to the point of being excessive, and the game's fun and addictiveness are excellent," while adding, "However, there are clear problems with the game's intrinsic completeness and the design of the initial learning curve."
An additional analysis was that the weakness of major console releases this year is also positive for Crimson Desert's follow-up sales. It said there are no meaningful competitors until the release of "GTA 6" in the second half of this year.
Choi said, "We judge this to be the greatest success by a domestically listed company since PUBG Battlegrounds," adding, "We analyze it as an issue that will lead to a rerating of game stocks overall."