In spite of Overwhelming Success, Expedition 33 Creators Intend to Maintain Studio Lean

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just an impressive Game of the Year candidate, it’s also a massive sales triumph. Studio the development team and publisher Kepler Interactive disclosed that the game topped five million copies in sales, this is even with it being a launch-day addition on Xbox Game Pass.

The game's performance came as an unexpected turn for the team. I was convinced that we would have a good game garnering reasonable market performance,” a key executive stated.

A technical director noted the game's critical score, which currently sits at 93, came as perhaps the greatest surprise” to the team versus “our initial expectations and what the reality turned out to be. Because when it dropped the entire team celebrated excitedly. It felt absolutely wild.”

The positive reception resulted in Sandfall developing new free content for the game with a new environment, adversaries, and boss fights, which they said is coming in the next few months.

Nevertheless, as the title expands, fans shouldn't anticipate they'll hire extensively. Our team includes a talented crew with a strong creative director with a clear direction for this game and future concepts. We'd like to keep the human scale that worked for this game and do maybe large projects one by one,” they noted.

Their team size sparked plenty of debate upon the title's release. Certain industry figures, like Hideo Kojima, considered Sandfall’s team as the “ideal” for game development. While Sandfall was and is indeed a small team compared to its AAA counterparts, one glance at the title's staff list indicates many individuals worked on it; Sandfall hired a team in Korea handling movement and effects, to illustrate.

“We plan to recruit a bit more definitely if we have an increase in development down the line,” the executive commented. “But I would see more of a workshop of a few really talented people capable of producing artistic collaborations.” He noted that the studio's philosophy as developers “aims to keep the key advantages that led to this accomplishment from the start.”

Although it's too early for Sandfall to say specifically what’s next — rest assured, efforts were made — the team does know what’s at its core. “The turn-based aspect, I think it's in the DNA of what we built,” they remarked. “It's still premature to announce what will interest us, yet we must to adhere to the DNA of studio with [a] strong narrative universe and engaging mechanics that excites us.”

The developer mentioned that the project started with their director “work[ing] on his dream game. And hopefully that philosophy will be repeated with upcoming games.”