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The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just a strong GOTY contender, but also an enormous financial hit. Developer Sandfall Interactive along with publisher their publishing partner revealed that the game topped 5 million units sold, this is even with its status as a day-one release through the Game Pass service.

Its success was an unexpected turn for the team. I was convinced that we would have an enjoyable experience garnering some average sales results,” a key executive commented.

The CTO and lead programmer remarked the game's Metacritic rating, now standing at 93, was the most surprising moment for everyone compared to our early predictions and what the reality proved to be. Once it was published everybody in the studio was screaming and jumping. The energy was electric.”

The positive reception prompted the studio creating a complimentary expansion for the title including novel settings, enemies, plus epic encounters, reportedly is coming in the next few months.

Nevertheless, as the title expands, don’t expect the team will expand. “We have a great team with a strong creative director with a clear direction for our work and also for new ideas. We intend to preserve the human scale that led to our success then develop one big game after another,” the producer added.

The size of Sandfall drummed up significant conversation when the game came out. A few well-known creators, like Hideo Kojima, considered this studio as a perfect example for game development. Although the team is and was relatively lean versus large developers, one glance at the game's credits indicates dozens of people worked on it; Sandfall hired a team in Korea to work on gameplay animations, for example.

“We plan to recruit slightly more certainly if we have an increase in development in upcoming years,” the producer commented. “But I would see more of a workshop of a few exceptionally gifted creators that create collective masterpieces.” They emphasized that the studio's philosophy as a company “aims to keep the key advantages that made this achievement possible from the start.”

Despite being premature for the studio to disclose concrete plans regarding upcoming titles — and trust me, efforts were made — the developers understand what’s at its core. “The turn-based aspect, forms the foundation of our creations,” a developer remarked. “It's still premature to be able to tell what will interest us, yet we must to adhere to the DNA of studio with [a] strong narrative universe and the interesting gameplay that drives our passion.”

They mentioned how this game started with the visionary “work[ing] on his dream game. It is hoped that's something we can continue in coming projects.”