Wearing your influences on your sleeves is one thing, and to use those influences and create something that can confidently stand on its own merits is another. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is explicitly built on many of the great modern and classic Japanese RPG ideas, and French developer Sandfall is not shy about it. From bold styling within its epic turn-based combat to comparisons of melodramatic but authentic storytelling, it primarily embraces it. That great execution on those ideas puts their own stamp on one of the more calm but hopeful journeys that I will not soon forget.
In Claire Obsul, the Lumiere people live in a broken reality. Every year, the godlike figures they call painkillers mark the number of towers in the distance and count down the ages when people are perished in nothingness. You are leading the latest survivors of a series of annual expeditions that have set sail in the hopes of destroying the pain despite decades of attempts. It is a tragic premise that puts a heavy layer of melancholy throughout the story. Knowing that your people are signing up for the Death March, facing unknown dangers, and fighting their own extinction by picking up works left behind on the expedition, it is easy to invest in the mystery that determines their fate and their world.
I completed the main story and quite a bit of side content in about 35 hours. Its length speaks to how Claire’s obscurity doesn’t waste the moment. There is no filler along the important path. It makes a strong first impression and then naturally tells you more about the character through their interactions, conversations and expressions. Some of my favorite moments in RPGs come from downtime that offers the opportunity to breathe and take the world away, but here is the urgency embedded in such a way that most of them work their advantage. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good 80+ hour RPG, but this is a great change of pace.
Because its length (relatively speaking) is short, the sharpness of the combat system never becomes dull. At a glance, you can get the unmistakable Persona Vibe from its smooth battle menu and stylish prosperity. More prominently, its active element features real-time button inputs that increase the efficacy of spellcasting and avoid attacks. It’s associated with Mario RPGs or, more recently, Dragon RPGs, and it’s amazing to make turn-based combat thrilling, especially when it comes to the balance that much of your survival can be avoided and parryable.
You really can’t stand the chance unless you pay close attention to audio and visual clues to establish a rhythm against bosses and tougher enemies. As for combos with different cadences between hits, I’m trapped like Sekiro: the shadow dies twice and avoids the gust of attack on a particular beat. First attempts can be frustrating, especially as there is some trial and error in learning these attack patterns. But when I’m trying to pinpoint timing, it instills strength I don’t think I’ve ever felt in base combat in turn. Avoidance provides a wider window for execution, but Parrying requires more precision. And there’s nothing like a highlighted counterattack of rewarding slow-motion camera cuts and accurate timing Parry.
Every party member typically has a unique mechanism that revolves around building their own resources in combat, managing action points (APs) and performing heavier hit skills. For example, Gustave earns a fee for every hit he lands and uses those fees to increase the power of his overcharge skills. In contrast, runes are magicians who cast specific spells, deal higher damage, and gain element stains by stacking the appropriate elements to access larger spells. Maelle, on the other hand, is intended to get into different stances and can do the most damage, but the conditions she enters those stances can depend on the stat effect or the characteristics of the weapon she is equipped with.
Sciel even has Scythe Wielder, who manages the Light Dark Phase and Card Stack to properly use her skills, like the combination of Astro Roro Ro Jan and the Grim Reaper’s work in Final Fantasy XIV. If that’s not enough, the two late-game characters use the Devil May Screentyle Grading System with attacks and shelter, while the other casts a spell in the style of a blue magician from fallen enemies. All this gives each character a clear identity and feature that makes every turn of the fight an exciting effort no matter who you have at your party
Their skill tree is also concise, and Claire’s obscurity remains approachable as they are given only a handful of tools and are asked to have a strong grasp of how they work. It reminds me of the mechanisms found in CRPGs like Baldur’s Gate 3, with an emphasis on meeting certain conditions and giving them a specific knock-on effect when lining up attacks, but has been fine-tuned to classic style Japanese RPGs. The way these skill sets can synergize and play other party members shows an understanding of what sings turn-based systems. You may fall into a routine opener, but as the fight continues, it will earn you a satisfying moment of adapting to the myriad variables thrown at you and pulling away from your most powerful attacks.
Then there’s another layer called Pictos. This is an attachment that offers game-changing stats boosts and perks to dramatically affect how you earn APs, bonuses from avoidance and parasitics, and status effects behaviour, etc. Finally, Pictus allows you to stack perks on something called Lumina, allowing you to build characters in a way that doesn’t allow you to do a skill tree. Navigating these menus is a kind of pain, as sifting 50+ options on tight screens can get messy, and abuse things, but knowing the nomenclature means I’ve learned to deal with and organize. At first I thought I was too overwhelmed (and in some cases I was), but I set up the right loadout and raised the party members in ways that are important to the most challenging fight.
In fact, my biggest concern early on was that Claire’s obscurity was too easy. I steam-controlled almost all of my enemies almost a third of my main path. It definitely rises, but adds layers that can weave with more creative enemy attack patterns and tease new approaches to building party and skill loadouts. By using status effects and enemy shields, or asking them to time jumps with regular Parry and Dodge, or hit special “gradation counters,” the bosses evolved in an interesting way, which ultimately made them more balanced.
It gives Claire enough depth without feeling cumbersome and enough complexity while still staying focused. And if you are smart enough, you are allowed to “break the game” so to speak. Because that system allows you to scale up in a rewarding way rather than exploitative. I’ve been playing this kind of RPG forever, so when I say that Clair Obscur has one of my favorite turn-based combat systems, I’m confident.
Claire’s obscurity is very old school, and its overworld is one of the clearest ways it returns to classic RPGs. There is an oversized model of characters navigating maps filled with optional locations and secrets. These are not accessible until you unlock new ways of travel, just like getting chocobos and airships in the old fantasy games of Final Fantasy Games. It’s actually really appealing and embraces the kind of video game aspect and knows it doesn’t always mean you need to take it that seriously. Floating islands, giant creatures far away from the coast, or far away, create wonders, and in the end you can visit them, visit them to fight the super boss, play stupid mini-games for unique weapons and picts, or make a little more clear about what isn’t. There is no actual quest log, so there is no elegant way to track what you stumble. But rather than feeling blunt instruments, these secrets belong to you and give the impression that you will discover them with true throwbacks.
The main locations you visit act like a dungeon, in a rather direct way of fighting along the track, with additional items beaten and covered from beaten paths in every corner. As linear as these locations, minimaps would have been handy as they often get lost in the winding paths that blend in with the environment. (If there’s nothing else, you just need to track where I’ve already been.) You approach the enemy and begin the battle. They also respawn if they decide to restock flags planted on previous expeditions that function like checkpoints. Although exploration is limited in this respect, it helps to maintain focus and maintain consistent pace for each main story sequence. It is also a comfort in that every place you visit is visually impressive. Whether it was due to the airy, whimsical, natural beauty, or the cruelty of the trench and battlefields, where the bodies of past expeditions were piled up high, I often had an adoration to the world of Claire Oscar.
But it will always be that story that really etches an RPG into the great pantheon. My mind was all in the face of Claire’s ambiguity mortality, and was all in the theme of sacrifices for future generations and the different ways we deal with grief. I’ve written a lot about the latter, especially in relation to the stories that many RPGs tell these days, this is another tragic quest of it – if it consumes you, because of the way it contextualizes time and age, and because of the portrayal of sadness becoming destroyed by the people around you. Final Fantasy X is one of its main influences, and while it shows, Claire’s obscurity separates itself how That’s what I’ll tell you about. The massive credits are due to the perfect acting and audio performance from the A-list cast, as well as the direction of the script and scenes where the dialogue plays like a natural reality conversation.
That brevity works against it sometimes, as the story changes suddenly and slightly undermines the initial premise. I would like you to pay a little more time and attention to embodying the slightly underdeveloped parts, but it is still strong here – particularly focusing on the complex effects that have on families, as it is related to the ugliness that arise from processing losses. There is a consistency in the theme of how to use art and fiction as a coping mechanism, and showing it the risk of getting lost.
Despite the deeply saddened premise, Claire Obsul can also inject lightness, which is largely attractive, rather than being forced. A stupid wooden man called the Guestral takes over most of the continent and works as both a comic relief and a lens to understand the unknown parts of the world. Your parties have stupidity with each other and share a part of their personal lives at camp, and while not all of it is necessarily riveted, those brief moments are essential to wrapping up the human elements that this story channels. Certainly, there are moments when Claire’s obscurity is too much in sadness, and sometimes it gets a little more dramatic. But by evoking a very specific tone, you can always find that footing. It’s more heavily on what you’d expect from theatrical production than the Hollywood blockbuster. And from that point of view, playing like a classic tragedy is an integral part of that identity.
Claire’s obscurity often feels like an expression of French art history, which uses the culture as an attractive artistic foundation (and even enjoys herself with the mime boss and the fun accordion jig). It is not only casually used by characters with distinct Belle Epoque’s aesthetics and French phrases in dialogue, but also a motif that evokes theatre, painting, dance and music woven into the very structure of this fictional world. Like all great RPGs, the exciting soundtrack can lift it up and become a truly memorable experience, and Sandfall understood the challenge here. There are almost excessively Good music didn’t even have enough time to stick to my head on certain tracks, but on every turn, it’s a great song where you hype or set a weird mood for a fight. With a multifaceted approach that includes string quartets, symphonic rock, mobile opera vocals and atmospheric synths, the Claire of Struck soundtrack is stunning, and is one of the reasons why I won’t forget this game.
