Pearl Abyss has reserved a special reveal for Crimson Desert at this year’s G-Star event.
In the latest trailer for Crimson Desert, Abyss introduced a new female boss with this description:
“Familiar adversaries arise – Staglord, Reed Devil, and the Queen Stoneback Crab – but this time, an unknown figure emerges from the darkness…”
In the trailer, Hexe Marie rushes Kliff into a house, before they chase after each other out in the open. The way Pearl Abyss talked about her, you would think that they were introducing some mysterious new character, but old Pearl Abyss fans know better than that.
Hexe Marie is a boss that dates back to the original PC version of Black Desert, all the way back in 2014. The fan wiki Black Desert Online Codex shares this description on her wiki page:
“The deadliest Witch in history. It is unlikely there exists anyone in the world who can look Hexe Marie in the eye and not feel the most paralyzing fear they have ever imagined.
Rumor has it that Hexe Marie was almost burnt to death as a child by the townspeople of her village. It is said that, because of this incident, she still fears fire and flames. Still, these rumors have never been confirmed and there few brave enough to try.”
More recently, Pearl Abyss themselves shared this description of her in a 202 update about a Dark Rift Event with her:
“Hexe Marie has appeared from the Dark Rift!
They say she holds the Remnants of the Rift, an item filled with ominous energy… Let’s defeat Hexe Marie and find out! “
Marie is quite the popular boss in the Black Desert games, but it seems Pearl Abyss hasn’t seen it fit to give her a full backstory quite yet. We know that Crimson Desert is also set in the Black Desert universe, but we don’t quite know where it is placed in the timeline. So we don’t know if the Hexe Marie who Kliff faces is the fearsome spirit spoken of in legend, or a younger version of her, possibly one who could still be human. Or if she/they may not have ever really been human all along. So maybe Pearl Abyss has a story to tell here.
Hexe Marie’s appearance certainly suggests that we will be immersed in Black Desert’s world deeply in Crimson Desert. While Queen Stoneback Crab is also in both games, one can surmise that she could have been brought it as simply a cameo, or with no significance to the storyline.
Black Desert may not have crossed over with Western gamers the way Lies of P or Stellar Blade did, but you can rest assured there’s a cult following around it outside of Korea, and they’re more than excited to find out where Crimson Desert goes. We can’t wait either, as Pearl Abyss felt confident enough about it that they rejected an exclusivity deal from PlayStation to publish it themselves.
In the meantime, you can watch the Crimson Desert Hexe Marie trailer below.
