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The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just an impressive GOTY contender, but also a huge sales triumph. Studio the development team and publisher their publishing partner announced that this title topped 5 million units in sales, and that’s despite it being a launch-day addition on Xbox Game Pass.

Its success came as a shock to Sandfall. I firmly believed that we'd create a solid title achieving reasonable market performance,” a key executive commented.

The CTO and lead programmer noted this title's Metacritic rating, rated 93 by critics, was the greatest surprise” to the team compared to our early predictions and what the reality turned out to be. Once it was published all staff members was screaming and jumping. It felt absolutely wild.”

This triumph prompted work on a free update for the game including novel settings, enemies, along with challenging bosses, reportedly is coming sometime soon.

Nevertheless, as the title expands, fans shouldn't anticipate the team will expand. “We have a great team under clear creative leadership possessing strong ideas for the project and future concepts. We intend to preserve the small-team dynamic that led to our success and perhaps create major titles sequentially,” the producer added.

The size of Sandfall drummed up significant conversation following launch. Certain industry figures, such as the famed director, considered this studio as the “ideal” for creative teams. While Sandfall was and is indeed a small team next to major studios, one glance at Expedition 33’s credits reveals dozens of people were involved; the French studio partnered with overseas animators for animation work, to illustrate.

“We will hire a little more for sure when facing an increase in development down the line,” they commented. “But I would see rather a creative atelier comprising a handful highly skilled individuals capable of producing artistic collaborations.” He noted that the studio's philosophy as developers “aims to keep the successful elements that enabled this success in the first place.”

Despite being too early for Sandfall to reveal exact details regarding upcoming titles — believe me, I attempted to learn more — they are certain what’s at its core. “Strategic combat, I think it's in the DNA of this project,” the lead programmer explained. “It's still premature to announce our next interests, however, it's crucial to adhere to the DNA of studio through compelling worlds plus innovative play that inspires the team.”

The lead programmer mentioned how this game started with the creative director “work[ing] on his dream game. And hopefully that's something we can continue as well for future productions.”