Despite Runaway Success, Clair Obscur Developers Aim to Maintain Team Small

The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is not only a strong Game of the Year candidate, it’s also a huge financial hit. Developer Sandfall Interactive along with publisher their publishing partner announced that this title topped five million copies in sales, and that’s despite it being a day-one release on Xbox Game Pass.

Its success came as quite an unexpected turn for the team. I was convinced that we would have a good game achieving reasonable market performance,” a senior team member commented.

The CTO and lead programmer remarked this title's critical score, which currently sits at 93, came as the greatest surprise” to the studio compared to what we anticipated and what the reality of the field was. When the score released everybody in the studio celebrated excitedly. It was really frantic.”

This triumph prompted Sandfall developing a complimentary expansion for the game featuring fresh areas, enemies, plus epic encounters, as announced will release in the next few months.

However, as the title expands, fans shouldn't anticipate they'll hire extensively. Our team includes a talented crew with a strong creative director possessing strong ideas for this game plus upcoming innovations. We intend to preserve the close-knit size that worked for this game and perhaps create one big game after another,” the executive noted.

The studio's scale drummed up significant conversation following launch. Some developers, such as the famed director, viewed Sandfall’s team as the “ideal” for creative teams. While Sandfall was and is relatively lean versus large developers, checking the game's credits reveals dozens of people worked on it; the French studio partnered with overseas animators handling movement and effects, for example.

“We plan to recruit slightly more definitely if we have a future production surge down the line,” the executive stated. “However, I envision essentially a craft studio with a small number of really talented people capable of producing artistic collaborations.” They emphasized that the studio's philosophy as developers “aims to keep the successful elements that led to this accomplishment in the first place.”

Although it's not the right time to reveal exact details regarding upcoming titles — and trust me, efforts were made — they are certain their fundamental principles. “Turn-based gameplay, forms the foundation of this project,” they said. “It's a bit too early to be able to tell our next interests, but it's important also to stay true to our creative core with [a] strong narrative universe plus innovative play that excites us.”

They mentioned how this game started with the visionary pursuing his ideal project. We aspire that philosophy will be repeated as well for future productions.”