Despite Massive Achievement, Clair Obscur Developers Aim to Maintain Studio Compact
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just a top Game of the Year contender, but also a huge financial hit. Developer Sandfall Interactive along with publisher Kepler Interactive disclosed that the game surpassed five million copies sold, this is even with it being a launch-day addition through the Game Pass service.
The game's performance came as quite a shock for the team. “I was strongly believing that we'd create a good game achieving some average commercial success,” the COO and producer commented.
A technical director noted this title's Metacritic rating, rated 93 by critics, came as the most surprising moment for everyone relative to our early predictions and what the reality of the field was. Because when it dropped everybody in the studio was screaming and jumping. It felt absolutely wild.”
This triumph prompted the studio creating new free content for the title with a new environment, enemies, and boss fights, which they said would be out sometime soon.
That said, as the title expands, fans shouldn't anticipate the team will expand. Our team includes a great team guided by a visionary director possessing strong ideas for the project and future concepts. Our goal is to maintain the small-team dynamic that made this possible and perhaps create major titles sequentially,” they said.
The studio's scale drummed up significant conversation upon the title's release. A few well-known creators, like Hideo Kojima, viewed Sandfall’s team as the model for a studio. Despite being indeed a small team versus large developers, one glance at Expedition 33’s credits reveals dozens of people were involved; the French studio contracted a Korean team to work on gameplay animations, as an instance.
“We plan to recruit a bit more for sure when facing a future production surge in the coming years,” the executive stated. “However, I envision more of a workshop comprising a handful exceptionally gifted creators capable of producing collective masterpieces.” It was stated that the studio's philosophy as a studio “aims to keep the key advantages that enabled this success originally.”
Despite being premature for the studio to reveal exact details what’s next — believe me, I tried to get them to — they are certain their essential identity. “Strategic combat, forms the foundation of what we built,” the lead programmer explained. “The timing isn't right to specify future passions, yet we must to adhere to our studio's essence through compelling worlds plus innovative play that excites us.”
The developer mentioned that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 began with their director pursuing his ideal project. We aspire that's something we can continue as well for future productions.”