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Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn't just a top Game of the Year candidate, it’s also a huge commercial success. Developer the development team and publisher Kepler Interactive disclosed that the game topped five million copies in sales, this is in spite of it being a launch-day addition through the Game Pass service.

The game's performance came as an unexpected turn to Sandfall. “I was strongly believing that we'd create a good game achieving reasonable market performance,” the COO and producer explained.

The CTO and lead programmer remarked the game's Metacritic rating, rated 93 by critics, was “maybe the biggest shock to the studio versus what we anticipated and the actual outcome of the field was. When the score released all staff members were cheering loudly. The energy was electric.”

The positive reception prompted the studio creating a free update for players featuring fresh areas, foes, and boss fights, reportedly would be out in the next few months.

That said, despite the game's evolution, fans shouldn't anticipate they'll hire extensively. We've built a great team guided by a visionary director who has a great vision for the project plus upcoming innovations. We intend to preserve the human scale that led to our success and perhaps create large projects one by one,” the executive said.

Their team size drummed up significant conversation following launch. A few well-known creators, like Hideo Kojima, viewed the development group as a perfect example for creative teams. Despite being indeed a small team versus large developers, checking Expedition 33’s credits shows that many individuals participated; Sandfall hired a team in Korea for animation work, to illustrate.

“We will hire a little more definitely when facing a future production surge down the line,” they commented. “But I would see more of a workshop of a few really talented people that can make collective masterpieces.” He noted that Sandfall’s vision as a company “focuses on preserving the strengths that made this achievement possible from the start.”

Although it's premature for the studio to disclose concrete plans about future projects — believe me, I tried to get them to — they are certain their essential identity. “The turn-based aspect, is integral to our identity of this project,” the lead programmer remarked. “It's still premature to announce future passions, but it's important also to adhere to our studio's essence with [a] strong narrative universe plus innovative play that inspires the team.”

They noted how this game started with the creative director “work[ing] on his dream game. It is hoped that philosophy we will be able to do in coming projects.”