🔗 Share this article

The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just a top GOTY contender, it’s also a massive sales triumph. Studio Sandfall Interactive along with publisher their publishing partner disclosed that this title exceeded 5 million units in sales, this is despite it being a launch-day addition through the Game Pass service.

The game's performance came as a surprise to the developers. I firmly believed that we would have a solid title that would meet reasonable sales results,” a key executive explained.

The CTO and lead programmer remarked that Clair Obscur’s review aggregate, rated 93 by critics, was the greatest surprise” to the studio relative to “our initial expectations and the actual outcome of the field was. Because when it dropped all staff members were cheering loudly. The energy was electric.”

The positive reception prompted work on new free content for players including novel settings, enemies, plus epic encounters, reportedly would be out within the “upcoming month[s]”.

That said, while the game is growing, don’t expect the studio to grow. Our team includes a great team guided by a visionary director possessing strong ideas for this game and also for new ideas. We intend to preserve the close-knit size that led to our success and perhaps create one big game after another,” they said.

The size of Sandfall generated a storm of discussion upon the title's release. Some developers, like Hideo Kojima, looked at Sandfall’s team as the “ideal” for creative teams. Although the team is and was relatively lean compared to its AAA counterparts, checking the title's staff list reveals many individuals were involved; the French studio hired a team in Korea to work on gameplay animations, for example.

“Some hiring will occur slightly more for sure when facing next an upcoming production peak in the coming years,” they stated. “But I would see rather a creative atelier comprising a handful highly skilled individuals that create artistic collaborations.” It was stated that Sandfall’s vision as developers “is more to maintain the strengths that enabled this success from the start.”

While it may be premature for the studio to disclose concrete plans about future projects — rest assured, I attempted to learn more — they are certain their essential identity. “Turn-based gameplay, forms the foundation of our creations,” they explained. “It's still premature to be able to tell what will interest us, however, it's crucial to adhere to our creative core through compelling worlds and engaging mechanics that drives our passion.”

The developer noted that the project started with the visionary developing his passion title. We aspire that philosophy will be repeated in coming projects.”