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The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is not only a strong GOTY contender, it’s also an enormous financial hit. Developer Sandfall Interactive along with publisher their publishing partner announced that this title surpassed five million copies sold, this is in spite of its status as a launch-day addition through the Game Pass service.

The game's performance came as quite a shock to Sandfall. I was convinced that we'd create a solid title that would meet reasonable sales results,” the COO and producer commented.

Another leading developer remarked that Clair Obscur’s critical score, rated 93 by critics, was “maybe the biggest shock to the team compared to our early predictions and the actual outcome of the field was. Once it was published everybody in the studio was screaming and jumping. It felt absolutely wild.”

That success prompted Sandfall developing a free update for the game with a new environment, enemies, plus epic encounters, which they said is coming within the “upcoming month[s]”.

Nevertheless, while the game is growing, don’t expect the team will expand. We've built a talented crew under clear creative leadership with a clear direction for the project plus upcoming innovations. Our goal is to maintain the human scale that made this possible and do maybe large projects one by one,” they added.

Their team size sparked plenty of debate upon the title's release. A few well-known creators, including renowned designers, looked at Sandfall’s team as a perfect example for a studio. Although the team is and was relatively lean compared to its AAA counterparts, one glance at the title's staff list shows that many individuals worked on it; the French studio contracted a Korean team to work on gameplay animations, for example.

“We plan to recruit a little more definitely if we have a future production surge in the coming years,” they said. “Yet I picture essentially a craft studio comprising a handful highly skilled individuals that create a work of art together.” They emphasized that the studio's philosophy as a company “is more to maintain the key advantages that enabled this success in the first place.”

Although it's not the right time to say specifically what’s next — rest assured, I attempted to learn more — the developers understand their fundamental principles. “Strategic combat, I think it's in the DNA of what we built,” the lead programmer said. “The timing isn't right to announce our next interests, yet we must to adhere to the DNA of studio featuring rich storytelling plus innovative play that drives our passion.”

They mentioned that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 started with the visionary pursuing his ideal project. We aspire this approach will be repeated with upcoming games.”