Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has emerged as one of the big hits of 2025, thanks to its combination of turn-based gameplay and souls-like elements, as well as strong storytelling and rich art direction. The game has a distinctly French vibe to it–thanks to it being visually influenced by France’s Belle Époque art movement–but early in its development, Expedition 33 was originally set in a steampunk world that was populated with supernatural enemies.

“This game was very different. The gameplay would have been similar, but the story was completely different. It was set in a steampunk Victorian England with zombies, aliens, and various things,” narrative lead Jennifer Svedberg-Yen explained to The Gamer.

After Expedition 33’s investors encouraged developer Sandfall Interactive to think bigger, this led to the game being rebooted entirely. The studio had been working on Expedition 33 for six months at this point, and the new direction was inspired by a painting that game director Guillaume Broche liked and a short story with artistic themes that Svedberg-Yen had written.

The final spark for Expedition 33’s new direction was Guillaume’s mother, who helped provide the “catalyst” for the story. From there, all the pieces fell into place as Expedition 33’s crew polished the story and recruited an all-star cast of actors to voice the game’s characters. While the game does leave some room open for a potential sequel, Svedberg-Yen added that Sandfall Interactive is now focused on fine-tuning Expedition 33 and addressing any bugs. That doesn’t mean that the studio isn’t thinking about producing new content, but “it’s probably not going to be for a while” Svedberg-Yen said.

Sandfall Interactive recently dropped a patch that addresses several issues in the game. The patch has also drastically reduced the power of the popular Stendhal build, but savvy players can still use it to inflict absurd amounts of damage on tough enemies. Expedition 33 has so far sold over 2 million copies since launch, and its official soundtrack is also doing quite well on the streaming charts.