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Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just an impressive GOTY candidate, it’s also a massive commercial success. Developer the development team and publisher their publishing partner disclosed that the game surpassed five million copies in sales, and that’s even with its status as a launch-day addition through the Game Pass service.

This achievement was a shock to the developers. I was convinced that we would have a good game that would meet moderate market performance,” the COO and producer commented.

A technical director remarked that Clair Obscur’s critical score, now standing at 93, came as perhaps “maybe the biggest shock for everyone relative to our early predictions and the actual outcome of the field was. When the score released all staff members celebrated excitedly. The energy was electric.”

That success has led to work on a free update for the title with a new environment, enemies, plus epic encounters, as announced would be out in the next few months.

However, while the game is growing, it's unlikely the studio to grow. We've built a great team under clear creative leadership with a clear direction for this game and future concepts. We intend to preserve the human scale that made this possible then develop one big game after another,” the producer said.

Their team size sparked significant conversation upon the title's release. A few well-known creators, including renowned designers, looked at Sandfall’s team as the “ideal” for game development. Despite being relatively lean versus large developers, a quick look at Expedition 33’s credits reveals numerous contributors worked on it; the French studio partnered with overseas animators for animation work, to illustrate.

“Some hiring will occur a little more definitely if we have next an upcoming production peak in the coming years,” the producer said. “Yet I picture rather a creative atelier comprising a handful exceptionally gifted creators capable of producing artistic collaborations.” He noted that their core belief as a company “focuses on preserving the key advantages that led to this accomplishment from the start.”

Despite being not the right time to say specifically what’s next — believe me, I tried to get them to — they are certain their essential identity. “Turn-based gameplay, is integral to our identity of our creations,” they remarked. “It's still premature to announce future passions, but it's important also to stay true to our studio's essence through compelling worlds plus innovative play that excites us.”

The developer added that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 originated from the visionary “work[ing] on his dream game. It is hoped this approach will be repeated in coming projects.”