Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

 

Clair Obscur Expedition 33 Review

 

Spoilers a plenty!

“It is the best game ever.” + “Rejoice! RPGs have been revived!”

 vs.

“I just enjoyed this great game.” + “It is Game of the Year for me.”

 

After a long month, I finally finished Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (E33). I did not 100% the game, as in "do all side quests and collect everything", I tried most of the side quests, I could not do all of them. Before you, the reader, goes any further, allow me to say this: I will hold nothing back in terms of criticism. It does not help if no one speaks their mind and most of my opinions are subjective but I will try to put them into perspective and be as objective as possible. So, if you can’t stand any bad words about anything related to E33, leave now. I respect your opinions and feelings, if put in a reasonably humane manner, but I do not wish to make anyone feel bad because I don’t agree with them. If you do leave, come back, and say hello to another review!

If any developer is reading this, first, congrats on a great game, and second, I do hope you can cherish my humble criticisms which I deem to be constructive.

E33 has been incredibly divisive among gamers and sparked hate, disgust and downright racism (or accusations thereof). Thankfully, the developers were very amicable about everything. They praised young and old games alike and shared their inspirations openly.

Story

E33 opens with luscious scenery of the fictional town of Lumiere. Everything is floating, there are pieces of furniture flying about, flowers everywhere… Seems idyllic, otherworldly, from the very beginning. The usefulness of the city is quickly replaced with the looming giant of a monolith across the water. The monolith says 34 carved in light. We meet our first character, Gustave, a 32-year-old man with a lovely blue suit and a mechanical arm called Lumina Converter. He plans to give a rose to her ex-girlfriend Sophie, and in his nervous hour of need, gets teased by Maelle, a young adult/late teenager with beautiful red hair and a cutesy voice. Her cuteness is quickly met with her fierce and realistic attitude toward life and how things work in Lumiere and she challenges Gustave to a duel. After a friendly match, we meet Sophie in a white shirt and red skirt (in a most particular French fashion of A-line skirt, mind). We soon find out that Sophie, and other 33-year-olds, will vanish from the face of the earth and turn to, not dust, but rose petals. Here we start seeing the true face of Lumiere and its world: the so-called Paintress wakes up once a year to carve an integer one less than last, and humans of that age disappear. This Paintress is a white-haired figure who is sitting, knees bent and arms folded across her face as if she is constantly crying, at the Monolith. Every year, a group of people, called Expeditions, travel to the continent where the Monolith resides, to learn about the Paintress and eventually kill her and break the cycle of death. After we lose Sophie, in a tragic scene, Expedition 33 sails toward the Paintress and the big journey begins.

Some simple facts: The story is told in Prologue, three main acts and an Epilogue. There are no player choices to dictate the story, except at the very end where one must choose between two paths. The game is full of cutscenes that are very emotionally charged but also not without comic relief. Many story details are hidden in notes that past Expeditions have left for us to find, most contain valuable information about Lumiere’s world and the Paintress.

Get ready for criticism (and big-time spoilers all over) here below:

One thing that became clear soon to a JRPG fan like me was that Lumiere’s world, despite its luscious sunshine, beautifully curved paths and eccentrically colored forests, is macabre. There is little occupation by intelligent agents, i.e. the villages are not plenty. It’s all dungeons or very beautiful static scenery where you obtain collectibles. There is only Lumiere and Gestral Village/Beach, basically. I wish there were more villages and cities to explore and it could have been easily arranged as the world is rich with all sorts of creatures, not just humans. There are Gestrals (wooden speaking martial art loving giants that are a bit soft in the head), Axons (huge enemies that control their own territories that keep the fabric of the world together), Nevrons (the smaller enemies that may seek to kill humans and Gestrals alike), and some special rocks.

There are many explanations for what any of the creatures are, for example, some Nevrons being created by Maelle and Clea from the Dessendre family to help the fight tip in favor of their mother Aline. Or wait, is it… the father, Renoir?

This brings me to my first major no-no in E33’s storytelling. I call this “Souls-like” storytelling. This is harsh because frankly, Sekiro for example does not have a story. It does not. E33 is miles ahead of Sekiro in storytelling but they do share something in common. While the intrigue of the world given by the past Expeditions’ notes is great (and the first scenes where the atmosphere is presented), by taking away the text and essential scenes to tell the story, the character’s motivations and aspirations clearly, you are leaving to the player all the work that they may fail to accomplish. So, people turn to Reddit for discussions.

Let’s go late in the game where we meet Clea, Maelle/Alicia’s sister. This is the conversation between them:

Clea : “Alicia ??”

Maelle/Alicia : …. (she has lost her voice due to a fire in their manor – the Dessendres are enjoying a rich aristocratic lifestyle full of art and charm until the day of the fire)

(By the way, Clea’s delivery is one of the best emotion evoking performances in the game – you truly want to despise her for her directness with Maelle and you feel her resentment toward everything and her cold-hearted approach to the problems the family has been facing)

Clea: “She’s (Aline) a grown woman and she is the head of the Painters’ Council. She failed her responsibilities.”

“Don’t be so naïve. The world doesn’t stop simply because our family is in mourning.”

“The conflict is spreading and there are things I must do if we Painters are to survive.”

“The Writers used you against us once before, they won’t hesitate to use you again.”

“Lest you forget, the only reason those two are in there is because your naivety cost Verso his life.”

Or this conversation:

Maelle: “You are not Verso, no”

“You look and sound just like him. But you’re you.”

“I’m still Maelle though.”

“If I’d listened to Maman – if I hadn’t trusted the Writers, Verso would still be alive, and you-”

“Maman painted a rather unflattering portrait of him. He’s much warmer than the Renoir you know.”

Why are you still Maelle though? You are now a painted version of Alicia as well, you painted yourself into Verso’s canvas and have Alicia’s memories. I thought Renoir also painted himself into Verso’s canvas – what does that mean in terms of agency in Aline’s version of Verso’s world? Who are the Writers? Why was Alicia naïve, what did Writers do to convince her to do whatever that eventually caused the fire? What is this all about?

You may have conjectures about all of these. You may claim understanding of all of these. The issue is that they are not at all clear in general. The script is convoluted and there is way too many mysteries presented than explained. You may be charmed by how cinematic this all feels but to me, the story and the script feel disjointed and scattered. Nothing is painted in a coherent manner and not much is resolved in the story (except people just die). Is this all part of the next saga? The amount of mystery is too much for a game that professes to be self-contained.

And what happened to Lumiere? The grief of losing loved ones and the prospect of saving them? All condenses to loss of beauty and voice and loss of a son. I say condenses because our grief, our connection with the characters and story become so shallow and diluted. The whole Act 1 disappears as Gustave dies. Why does not Maelle or Alicia use her chroma to return Gustave? Was it because Gustave died in the hands of Renoir? More on this in character development section below.

Alicia’s letter to Verso is also a jumble of words and phrases. “Oh how seeing your expedition through would plunge us all into the abyss” What? Does Verso have his own expedition? Huh? “For in ridding the world of the Paintress…You’d lose the sole force standing against the one who would erase us. The one who invokes the flowers of the Gommage. An act of love. For he does love her. Your father. On her Monolith, she paints a warning for us all. Of the few she can save as her power wanes.. You mother paints life whilst your father paints death. What will you paint?” Why is the Gommage a symbol of love? Renoir to Aline? But then Aline is the one committing it? Or is Renoir the actual one committing the Gommage? As you ask these questions, you do realize what the story is actually saying, however the writing is way too indirect. When things are mixed up in too much mystery, I can’t help but think this is all “smart and serious talk” and something that does not have a clear direction. I felt the same playing Xenosaga a bit. I remember Nephilim asking Chaos “what will you do?” before saving or not saving KOS-MOS. While similar criticisms have been extended to Xenosaga, at least, we were promised a continuation of the story. (side note: I still love that line though, it totally catches you by surprise and the whole events that follow are sublime, anyways back to E33!). The indirect storytelling was way overdone.

Characters and character development are also problematic. I have seen many people saying they cried so much in the first act. I… could not cry at all and I am a crier! The reason is simple: I could not feel attached to the characters. The biggest offender of this was Gustave. People say Gustave is such a vital character.... How? He dies in Act 1; he is completely erased from the hearts of the other characters all too soon. He is not revived by Alicia’s chroma because he could not matter less to anyone. Such a letdown. One could have little presence and still matter in a story but Gustave simply did not. A filler character if I know any character in fiction. Redeemed in the eyes of the gamers with the one liner “For those who come after”… Same goes for other characters but at least we have got to spend time with them at the camp and hear more from them. Sciel is the character I was able to attach to the most. She is presented as this very down-to-earth, believable, relatable and charismatic character. Lune also has a complex character: she is fierce, unforgiving, calculating and unsympathetic especially toward Maelle. Sometimes I swear I almost thought Lune would say to Maelle: “Why am I not the main character and everything is about YOU?” but alas she did not. Which brings me to my other complaint. Characters are simply not dynamic. They never really changed. Even Maelle, has not changed but replaced or merged with Alicia. I really liked the ethical dilemma that Aline and Renoir’s war represented (later in the game it became Verso and Maelle’s): do we kill off our imagined family and live in reality, or do we keep them to feel close to one’s we lost? By the end, however, the dilemma revolved too much around Verso, that it became artificial and Lumiere and its peoples did not matter. Characters did not change in their stance within this dilemma. From the very beginning, Verso, with all the subtleties and lies he told the Expedition, never meant to keep Verso’s canvas, likewise Maelle/Alicia being forced by Clea to help Renoir to erase the canvas, was also never meant to destroy Verso’s canvas. All the characters’ motivations, no matter how poorly clearly stated they were, remained static. There wasn’t any moment where I went: “oh wow, that was a surprise” or “oh wow, I think I may have seen it coming and I see where it comes from, but it totally got me!”. This is a complaint about complexity of characters and how we bond with them. Esquie is probably the most developed character out there. I am half joking, but he was truly an interesting character with Whees and Whoos. Half of this, again, has to do with our bonds with the characters.

Another thing that may improve our bonding with the characters is their flaws. In the beginning, when Renoir attacks the expedition, Gustave starts distinctly panting and coughing, which made me think that he may have some sort of panic attack or a respiratory problem. But no, it’s just a cough. In the world of Lumiere and Gommage, one could imagine a severe psychological profile of people but this is not portrayed well. Even Maelle’s being an orphan is just that, Maelle is an orphan. There are cutscenes where we see Maelle being attached to Gustave, but then he dies. Maelle, despite all her screen time, becomes underdeveloped. People may remember Maelle after all the PR of the game, a decade later, but what kind of character was she exactly? I was left severely disappointed at how prominent Maelle was in the game and yet there was so little complexity. On the other hand, because Maelle is the center of the show, Lune, Sciel, Monoco, even Esquie with all his charm, become even more filler characters… Noco…started out great and then…

People compare E33 to Final Fantasy X for example. Story, characters, character development were miles and miles ahead of E33. Despite being two decades old, I still remember how Yuna changed from the loving caring obedient character to the questioning, even more self-sacrificing person, how Wakka starts out a bigot and then turns accepting. In contrast, how Lulu is unwavering, never flinching, despite all odds. They leave an impression. The story is less complex in FFX than E33 for sure but within FFX’s execution, the time we spend with the characters in so many different contexts, cities, cutscenes, dialogues, we became attached to them.

The script in-game can also be jarring and makes me think the script writer is cocky and taking themselves too seriously. In the White Tree, for example, you read the Expedition 36 file (a nice poem btw) and afterwards Lune goes “This world is full of wonders.” and Maelle goes “Yet everywhere we go, we walk with death.” And immediately after, you pick up a music record and Maelle goes “Nice.” Sigh.

There is some sort of relationship building at camps. I did enjoy some of the conversations a lot, especially between Sciel and Verso, and particularly when Sciel talks about her husband. You may also unlock special attacks after you interact with people enough times. This is where it gets weird again. You can level up by just pressing X and initiate the many cutscenes in one go... Feels too plastic, I wish that was embedded a bit better. You can have an intimate time with Sciel, then go with Lune and talk about her guitar, then get into a fight with Monoco, all in one night. Eh.

Gestral Village is the best location in the game, it is so fun to talk to every single Gestral. They all had unique things to say and do. I wish this kind of thinking was expanded and used to create more locations like Gestral Village.

I am being extra harsh but it’s needed, because I think while the storytelling is confused and scripts are haphazard and too holier-than-thou, there is undoubtedly some love and thought put to the story and it deserves all the criticism it gets so that the next game is even better. Otherwise, I would have said, the story is ok and moved on.

Gameplay

Even the gameplay was a huge contention among fans and haters alike. It is a turn-based RPG. I am not sure if I want to get into the JRPG definition conundrum. I wouldn’t call it a JRPG because E33 doesn’t heavily remind me of the past JRPGs I’ve played, it does have elements from past JRPGs.

The battles are carried out in a separate screen as in most turn-based RPGs. There are at most three characters you can play at any one time and you cannot swap characters in battle (which is a dreadful shame).

One distinguishing stylistic choice in the gameplay is the parry and dodge system. The moment an enemy lands its attack on you, if you press the right button, you can parry and gain action points that are used in your turn. It was fun at first, but this entire system drags after a while. So much so that yet another type of parry is introduced later in the game: Gradient Dodge, which can be performed before a Gradient Attack. Gradient Dodge, while very cool looking and satisfying (and far easier than a parry), does not offer in any way a strategic element to the gameplay. I would rather have only gradient dodge or only parry because it feels overdone. It is by no means difficult to master, especially when you die multiple times and you’ve memorized the rhythm of the enemy attacks but it does get tedious. Sometimes you can’t parry or dodge because you can’t see the attack (e.g. Creation, Lampmaster bosses). Some areas were really dark and all you could do is learn the attack pattern by sounds rather than visuals. Which brings me to another point about music and parry. A reason some players, even experienced ones, fail to parry attacks they’ve learned may be because of the tempo of the music. Our perception of time may be altered by the tempo of music (side note: and tempo of exercise has a similar effect). If the battle has ups and downs in its music, then it may contribute to the lack of attention or parry timing.

Regardless, you absolutely need to master Parry or Dodge to finish the game. For example, there is a time when you play as Maelle only and in one fight you face three enemies: they had six consecutive turns. Get but one hit and you die. Parry and Dodge / Gradient Dodge are essential.

So how do you upgrade the characters? You collect these Pictos, which are passive skills that have various effects: adding an extra Action Point when you successfully parry or start with a Powerful effect (adds attack power) etc. You equip these Pictos and when you battle enough times, everyone can have access to them using Lumina points, which are acquired with Colors of Lumina that you find in the world at large. It was great after a while, but the Pictos do pile up quickly and I found it tedious to go through each Pictos to see what their effects were. (Minor point: the menu overall could be better, in the main menu, sometimes I wouldn’t know if I am on a character or not). Some pictos may also be overpowered, such as Painted Power. It is perhaps the only one I really cared about as it breaks the 9999 damage cap.

You earn skill points to unlock new abilities. This is where I am baffled the most. I did not change a single skill once I unlocked six skills. Ever. It did not matter. It does add variety to the game but to win, they are not needed. That is parry/dodge system is a double-edged sword, while it adds spice (not novelty!), it takes away strategy. I never once stopped to think: “ok let me switch to this skill now to kill this boss”. Not once. The only skill in memory that I thought was absolutely essential was Monoco’s Agile skill Chevalière Piercing, which damages enemies in spite of their shields and moreover, the damage scales with the number of shields the enemy has. The rest were superfluous.

There are status effects, like Silence, Cursed etc. They are not very prevalent and do not add much to the game (again parry takes the cake here). However, some battles are scripted with status effects where you need to do the right thing to win. I loved those. In fact, boss battles were really a highlight for me. They added variety, the designs are absolutely gorgeous and each had a separate meaning that fits Lumiere’s world.

A minimap had to be included. I know the developers intentionally excluded it so that we explore more but it makes one more frustrated than curious. You are sometimes not rewarded for exploring and when you explore a lot and you get nothing, you feel bad. Not to mention, lost, so expect drawing circles a couple times. This was particularly felt in Tainted Meadows inside the Monolith. At one point, I just decided to proceed and not bother with all the twists and turns.

In the world map, there is no fast travel, although the distance feels shorter than it looks on the map! You can set up camps at any time. They do remind me of Chrono Trigger, but I thought the camp areas could change depending on where you are on the World map but ok.

There are gazillion side quests. Go out and explore the world, for you will find plenty of places to gaze at and new bosses or even main characters lurking in the background.

Overall, despite its flaws, I enjoyed gameplay. The fun is what matters, and I did enjoy parrying a great deal, I just wish it was polished a bit more.

Graphics

Lumiere’s world is gorgeous. Everything is so pleasant to look at. The game is also optimized really well, I never once had a hiccup. The monster designs, especially bosses were excellent and replete with variety. Some facial expressions were a bit awkward but ok. I especially liked Gustave’s eyerolls at Lune! Those outfits! Cosplays will be so lively for this one. The fashion alone is something to behold in this game.

I can’t really find a big fault with graphics at all. There were some dark areas (that cave!) both in and out of battle. In battle, it made parrying an issue but overall, I did not mind it that much.

I also loved the transition to 4:3 aspect in the noire filtered cutscenes. E33 oozes with style!

Sound

Sound design was excellent for the most part. Every sound effect made sense. It’s nothing groundbreaking (looking at Silent Hill games) but I did not find any sound being out of place. There was one particular glitch, at the end of Paintress’s end cutscene, an “enemy alert” sfx was inserted but this is just a glitch.

Voice acting… is where I differed from most people on Twitter I think. It was a big hit or miss for me. I could not connect with any of the deliveries. Yes, even Ben Starr’s Verso, Jennifer English’s Maelle and Andy Serkis’s Renoir. They are not bad of course but I found them overly melodramatic, pretentious at times, and too whispery as if we are in a Hollywood movie. I also do not care for the occasional “Putain” or “Merde” which weren’t pronounced properly at times anyway. I found the French dubs to be much more genuine and natural. I wish I played the French version first.

I never…cried at anyone’s performance here. This is another reason for not being able to connect to the characters well. Only Sciel’s brief talk about her husband made my throat itch, I could hear the actor’s voice crack as if she was really about to cry. It is very hard to pull that off! Even Aline with only a few lines managed to bring chills down my spine: “I’m. Not. Crazy. I know exactly what I am doing.” Or “You are not my Verso”.

I don’t like comparisons, but readers may feel the urge to ask: what recent performance in a videogame have you cried for then? I played Detroit: Become Human. I cried bucket after bucket. Sometimes a single thought of Kara and Alice made me teary eyed. Markus’s struggles as a revolutionary…all the VA were so impactful (and well… the story is incredibly well-crafted but then that’s the game).

Soundtrack on the other hand is superb and wonderful. More on that below.

Conclusion

Given how I unabashedly criticized the game, perhaps one may think I did not enjoy the game or worse I hate it. Hate is a very strong word that is better banned in most art discussions. I enjoyed the game very much. I would give it an oscillatory 8, sometimes 7.5 sometimes 8.5. Given the efforts of the developers and first-big project for the composer, the game deserves all the acclaim it gets. If you like turn-based battles, avant-garde film/story making, and enjoy a big fictional world, then you will enjoy E33. While its impact isn’t as big on me as it was on others (see quotes above), I will remember the game fondly and I do expect an even better game next time!

Soundtrack Review

Composer: Lorien Testard, Alice Duport-Percier

https://vgmdb.net/album/149020

This is Lorien Testard’s big debut album. Alice Duport-Percier, the singer who sings all throughout the soundtrack, also co-composed her songs with Testard. It’s almost full day’s worth of music. Gasp.

What an accomplishment. I would say the soundtrack is the best thing about E33. There is infinite variety in Testard’s musical brush: orchestral work, wonderful heartwarming arias, jazz (Monoco), catchy synths (Gestral Beach - I'd Rather Play Pétanque!), acoustic guitar, staccato strings, piercing solo violin and piano, even Brahms samples going full baroque (Lampmaster) and of course all too European (French) accordion combos (World Map - In Lumière's Name). I enjoyed my time so much with this soundtrack, I am sure I will keep returning to it.

The soundtrack opens with a wonderful operatic aria, Alicia. It is one of the core melodies of the game, and will come back as leitmotif in other songs which I adored. The music is very emotionally charged but they never overstay their welcome. Lumiere, is a lovely folk track that is also a core melody and gushes out the love for violin that the composers have for sure. The choir that accompanies Percier’s singing is gorgeous too.

Battle themes are highlights as well. For me, these in particular: Paintress, Orphelin, Divided Swords, Of Virtuosity and Heart, Tisser la Beauté, Rouge d’Iris, Portrait Imparfait, and Gestral Merchant. Percier’s singing in battle themes is so powerful. I would respectfully suggest power/symphonic metal songs for Percier and Testard’s composing talents, it would be such a good combo. Also a special shout out to Tisser la Beauté, which uses Cümbüş, a traditional Turkish instrument and it sounds lovely. The name, Cümbüş was given by the founder of the modern Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. Needless to say, this is the first time I’ve heard this instrument in such a battle theme context!

There are very long tracks with many ups and downs as if they’re telling a story. I loved them all. Most notably: Une vie à rêver (feat. Axelle Verner), Une vie à peindre (feat. Victor Borba), Une vie à t'aimer (feat. Victor Borba). Some parts are filler sure, but it works.

I loved Percier’s singing and Testard’s arrangements, but sometimes it got way too chaotic, looking at you, Renoir’s Drafts - Gone Away (Battle Theme). Percier’s operatic flair is turned into a bit pop-like here which made me cringe a little but thankfully these weird parts are very few and far between.

(To those who compare this OST to Nier’s. It can only be a compliment either way. They are different and beautiful in their own ways. I always try to make a comparative analysis and not a competitive one.)

I did listen to other songs compiled elsewhere. Among some of the great missing tracks are: Our Painted Death and Our Drafts Unite (Training), the latter using Alicia leitmotif to great effect despite being very short.

A full soundtrack (8 CDs!) and vinyl versions are promised to release in February 2026: https://vgmdb.net/album/151422. Can’t wait!