Crimson Desert's annoying sprint, which had you mashing buttons over and over like it was in a Rockstar game, has already been fixed by modders.
If there's one thing we can all agree on about Crimson Desert, it's that the controls are the most frustrating and unintuitive in recent Triple-A history. Since the game's release, players have been complaining about how incredibly difficult it is to do almost anything because the controls are incredibly awkward and try to do too many things at once.
The backlash over how clumsy Crimson Desert's gameplay was became so loud that Pearl Abyss responded and even promised changes to come in a future patch. But now, modders are already doing God's work and making Crimson Desert less painful to play, starting with perhaps its most annoying mechanic: sprinting.
Modders have already fixed Crimson Desert's button mashing sprints.
I've never been more jealous of a PC player
Anyone who has ever seen the Crimson Desert will know, many Inspired by Rockstar's games. While some of those influences are good, Pearl Abyss bizarrely decided to do one of the things no one likes about GTA and Red Dead Redemption by forcing players to sprint by pressing the X button.
To be fair, Rockstar actually lets you change that setting, but in Crimson Desert you have no alternative but to use your thumbs.
That's annoying enough for a Rockstar game, but it at least lends itself to more realistic movement and locations, which can't be said for Crimson Desert's vast open spaces and more varied traversal mechanics. I thought I was the only one who disliked the way Crimson Desert ran around, but with a mod already available that fixes Sprint just a few days after release, it's clear that a lot of people are inconvenienced.
Use the aptly named “CDSprintHold – Hold SHIFT to Sprint” mod from Nexus Mods creator Maszradine. This mode does exactly what it says on the tin, pairing a simple Shift key press with running. Maszradine's description of the mode also says what we're all thinking, calling the button-pushing approach “a frustrating throwback that gets tiring quickly.”
Interestingly enough, this isn't the only mod that aims to fix Sprint in Nexus Mods either. RetroXrus has made it clear that the modding scene will be very focused on making Crimson Desert less of a hassle, by putting together a few shortcuts for sprinting, jogging, and other non-intuitive parts of the game's design.
crimson desert
- released
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March 19, 2026
- ESRB
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Age 17 or older / Blood, drug-related, high-intensity violence, verbal abuse
- developer
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Pearl Abyss
- publisher
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Pearl Abyss
It's highly unlikely that you'll ride a dragon in the Crimson Desert
In the Crimson Desert, you'll need to grind a lot before you even get a glimpse of the dragon, and even if you get it, it's of little use.
