It's mind-blowing to think that one of the year's hottest RPGs didn’t come from an industry giant but from a team of random strangers who banded together on Reddit during the pandemic.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, developed by Sandfall Interactive, didn’t start with a fancy office or a million-dollar pitch—it started with a bored Ubisoft developer named Guillaume Broche and a dream that somehow worked.
Back in 2020, at the peak of the global lockdown, Guillaume found himself itching to do something different. Looking to break free from the usual routine and reconnect with the magic of Final Fantasy VIII from his younger days, he began experimenting with Unreal Engine.
He bypassed the conventional hiring route and turned to Reddit forums, posting to find people who could help make his idea a reality. He wasn’t offering much, just the chance to contribute to something that might go nowhere—or might become something special.
One of the first responses came from Jennifer Svedberg-Yen, a writer and actor who was living in Australia then. She’d never done voice acting before but figured it would be fun to give it a shot. That audition completely transformed her career, taking her from demo line assistant to the lead writer of the game.
From SoundCloud to game development, composer Lorien Testard made his debut in the industry. After hearing his music, Guillaume got in touch, and together, they created some of the game’s most emotionally impactful tracks.
Guillaume and Jennifer described the development process in a BBC feature as a bizarre, lucky sequence of events. The team that eventually formed was filled with people who had little to no prior experience in game development but shared a common creative vision and the energy to try something new.
Guillaume eventually parted ways with Ubisoft and founded Sandfall Interactive in Montpellier, France. Thanks to backing from Kepler Interactive, the project transitioned from a casual side gig to a full-fledged development pipeline, though the team remained tight-knit, with only about 30 members.
Despite its modest size, the team operated with intense dedication, each member wearing multiple hats and learning on the fly. The game they built was anything but conventional. In the crumbling city of Lumière, a twisted take on Paris, Expedition 33 unfolds in a world cursed by the Paintress.
She’s a mysterious figure who lowers the number on a monolith each year, erasing everyone of that age from existence. A band of survivors leads the story, their goal to break the cycle with world-building that’s as deep as the melancholic themes they face.
Merging turn-based strategy with reflex-based actions such as dodging and timed attacks, combat brings together retro design with a more tactile, modern twist. It outperformed what anyone thought was possible. The game quickly surpassed a million copies sold in its first three days.
Its soundtrack caught fire online, landing on viral music charts, and French President Emmanuel Macron even applauded the title as a symbol of French innovation and artistry.
No one could’ve predicted this odd little team would create one of the year’s most emotionally powerful and critically acclaimed RPGs. But they did, and the story behind it is just as memorable as the game itself.