Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Bankie said:
The cutscenes are ugly AF; they're those low-quality pre-rendered videos and they run at 30fps.
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Not accurate, they are in engine and you can use this mod to run them at normal FPS. 30 FPS is probably for the cinematic feel, I know some players prefer it and reverted to the 30fps cutscenes.
Bankie said:
So balance is not great IMO.
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Similarly to Path of Exile there are countless builds varying from poor to mediocre to god of destruction. It's pretty much impossible for the devs to predict what team build/skills/combos a player will use, I think they did an ok job for the majority of players who will be somewhere around 'average'. There are mods like this one which will allow you to make the dodging and parrying harder if you wish.
Bankie said:
There's quite a bit of jank.
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If this game is what you call jank, then I'd take jank any day rather than the tripleA $400 million dollar polish of games like Concord.
Bankie said:
Overworld fast travel would be welcome.
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A solution to this does come later on (so it might be a good idea to save some of the far off exploration for then rather than now when you're still early game)
 
Bankie said:
I dropped to the standard difficulty from Expert to see how combat feels. It goes from kind of frustrating (you get 1-2 shot a lot on Expert which is pretty annoying when the enemy is doing a 5 hit combo) to stupid easy. So balance is not great IMO.

The cutscenes are ugly AF; they're those low-quality pre-rendered videos and they run at 30fps. All they would have had to do was make them in-engine and they'd look great. It blows my mind that Blizzard had much much higher quality cinematics 20 years ago. It destroys the immersion when you go from 120fps high-quality graphics to a 10MB 360p Quicktime movie from 1998 that's being scaled up on a high-res monitor.

There's quite a bit of jank. Animations can be rough (jumping in particular), lots and lots of holding sprint down to get places, decorations on the ground that are the size of your big toe will sometimes stop all movement, climbing is the standard 'reach for the ledge and hit the action button' but doesn't feel smooth (might be animation related), the combat camera is all over the place and near constantly moves to a position that blocks your view (should have called it Camera Obscura), etc.

Overworld fast travel would be welcome. You'll trek about the map, find a dead end that you'll need to come back to later, and then after you run back across the map to find the item you need, you'll have to slowly sprint all the way back. Maybe they'll pull a Final Fantasy and give a mount or airship later but I haven't seen any suggestions of that in-game at this point.

The environments have 0 interaction with your character unless it's a button to be pushed.

I'm really enjoying the design and lore of the world but the character dialog is usually pretty juvenile and not very interesting.


It is an enjoyable game but I don't see how it could be even close to a 10 out of 10.
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Finished the game last night and this echos a lot of my thoughts, other than cut scenes (looked fine to me) and difficulty (standard difficulty absolutely kicked my ass at times - I guess I have the hand eye coordination of an old drunk). Whatever people are seeing in this game is completely lost on me. I enjoyed the majority of my play time and I'd say it's a solid 8/10, but there was nothing memorable there for me.

I do wonder what the critic response would have been if this were the product of a big budget AAA studio and not a tiny dev team.
 
CaptainClueless said:
Finished the game last night and this echos a lot of my thoughts, other than cut scenes (looked fine to me) and difficulty (standard difficulty absolutely kicked my ass at times - I guess I have the hand eye coordination of an old drunk). Whatever people are seeing in this game is completely lost on me. I enjoyed the majority of my play time and I'd say it's a solid 8/10, but there was nothing memorable there for me.

I do wonder what the critic response would have been if this were the product of a big budget AAA studio and not a tiny dev team.
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I think it's the art and story that really push this above the line. The game is obviously made with passion, dripping with the love of the medium in every corner. Some people are sensitive to that, others find no value in it.

It's one of the reasons why Far Cry 3, Assassin's Creed (original) or Rayman's Great Escape were loved so much: You can tell the developers WANTED to make the game. Then those franchises turned into McGaming slop as soon as Ubisoft learned they made a profit.
 
Drexion said:
Not accurate, they are in engine and you can use this mod to run them at normal FPS. 30 FPS is probably for the cinematic feel, I know some players prefer it and reverted to the 30fps cutscenes.
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If they're in-engine it's even worse as they just look bad, then. Washed out and low-res.

Drexion said:
Similarly to Path of Exile there are countless builds varying from poor to mediocre to god of destruction. It's pretty much impossible for the devs to predict what team build/skills/combos a player will use, I think they did an ok job for the majority of players who will be somewhere around 'average'. There are mods like this one which will allow you to make the dodging and parrying harder if you wish.
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I'm not sure it's the builds. On Expert I could not beat the mimes or the petratank (sp?) and died quite a bit to the bosses I had fought. On Normal I'm obliterating everything with no trouble at all. Now, I'm still pretty early (just got past the brush people village). I'll check out the mod and see if I can add some damage to at least make the enemies a threat.

Drexion said:
If this game is what you call jank, then I'd take jank any day rather than the tripleA $400 million dollar polish of games like Concord.
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Bringing up patently awful games doesn't help since most AAA games aren't dying because of jank. I didn't say the "game is jank" just that it "has quite a bit of jank". Jank isn't necessarily bad unless it really gets in the way and can in some cases add a bit of charm. I can't remember a game that gave so much trouble with just running around and getting hung up on geometry. Or the non-player controllable combat camera moving right behind the left-most character and completely obscuring the view of what's coming.

Drexion said:
A solution to this does come later on (so it might be a good idea to save some of the far off exploration for then rather than now when you're still early game)
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Good to know. I've been avoiding guides and spoilers so I'm not sure what's coming.
 
I installed the mod that fixes the cutscenes and am in Act 2. The parkour is awful due to the camera. The story has gotten better but the controls still suck ass.
 
Bankie said:
I installed the mod that fixes the cutscenes and am in Act 2. The parkour is awful due to the camera. The story has gotten better but the controls still suck ass.
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What's the mod? Thanks!
 
I'll check when I get home but I think it was just 'Clair Obscura Fix'. I'm also using Optiscaler so that I can have FSR instead of XESS; looks a little better to my eyes.

I'm in the Monolith now and I have to admit, I'm enjoying the heck out of it now. After Act 1 was over it clicked with me. The invisible walls, battle camera, and frequency of getting stuck on ankle-high objects are still awful but I'm having a good time progressing through the story.

Started out running with Luna, Gustave, and Maielle but eventually moved to Luna, Verso, and Monoko. Monoko is fun to use and has some interesting theory crafting to his kit. I have Luna all in on Fire/Burn, Verso on direct damage duty, and Monoko as DPS/Support. My battles are basically; Luna casts Wildfire every turn to stack burn, Gustave does the shooting on his first turn and works his way up to the big Light skills, and Monoko gives everyone AP when needed and applies more burn or targets elemental weaknesses. Everything but bosses die by the end of Turn 2.
 
There has never been a game with a worse battle camera. I'm on what I'm assuming are the last few battles and you can't see shit. If you enable the 'Alternative camera' option it stops the camera movement and helps a ton but then you can't see off-screen attacks. Absolute garbage camera. Might have reached a 10/10 if it had the old-style JRPG side-view but for me the constant frustrations from the camera and stopping on a piece of gravel while running drops it to 7/10.

Just 'beat' it and:
I'm not sure how I feel about there being an Act 3. I was pretty happy that it was 'over' and wasn't planning on doing NG+ (if there is one)
 
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Bankie said:
There has never been a game with a worse battle camera. I'm on what I'm assuming are the last few battles and you can't see shit. If you enable the 'Alternative camera' option it stops the camera movement and helps a ton but then you can't off-screen attacks. Absolute garbage camera. Might have reached a 10/10 if it had the old-style JRPG side-view but for me the constant frustrations from the camera and stopping on a piece of gravel while running drops it to 7/10.

Just 'beat' it and:
I'm not sure how I feel about there being an Act 3. I was pretty happy that it was 'over' and wasn't planning on doing NG+ (if there is one)
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This doesn't sound to good to me and would probably get me going if I were playing this. When I play a game I want complete and absolute control over what I'm doing and if I don't have it my patience gets lost very quickly. This is most likely gonna be a heavily discounted game for me, but I do eventually want to give it a shot.
 
Bankie said:
There has never been a game with a worse battle camera. I'm on what I'm assuming are the last few battles and you can't see shit. If you enable the 'Alternative camera' option it stops the camera movement and helps a ton but then you can't off-screen attacks. Absolute garbage camera. Might have reached a 10/10 if it had the old-style JRPG side-view but for me the constant frustrations from the camera and stopping on a piece of gravel while running drops it to 7/10.

Just 'beat' it and:
I'm not sure how I feel about there being an Act 3. I was pretty happy that it was 'over' and wasn't planning on doing NG+ (if there is one)
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There is still a TON of story in "Act 3"... it almost does a fake ending.

Though I was content with the 'ending' of Act 2 and was ready to have the credits roll, unanswered questions and all.

But in Act 3 you have a metric fuckton of story-relevant optional bosses, and the true ending.

And NG+ so you can make verso shag the girl you didn't get to the first time round (Damn whore Sciel swooped in before I could get Lune warmed up!)

Also: There's an option to lock the camera in battles.
 
Bankie said:
I'm not sure how I feel about there being an Act 3. I was pretty happy that it was 'over' and wasn't planning on doing NG+ (if there is one)
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There isn't really, that Act is all optional post game content. You're actually 95% done, common advice is to just do the individual character quests then head to the end level. Because if you run around doing the optional content before the end level, you'll be seriously over-leveled and 1 shot everything, causing you to lose some mid fight dialogue.
 
I am starting to get into this game. It is not bad but very repetitive. I think I will drop difficulty just to finish it.
Somebody was eating some serious shrooms when they made this. I have no clue wtf is going on.
 
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How long is this game if you do all side quests, and optional bosses and whatnot? Not into collecting random stuff or achievement hunting. A casual search comes with some people saying it is only 36-40 hours with side quests/bosses, others say around 60+. For those that completed it, how long would you say it is?

Going to try and see if I can squeeze this one in this week, but don't really want to rush it either. If its more like 60+ hours I'd rather play something else.
 
Flogger23m said:
How long is this game if you do all side quests, and optional bosses and whatnot? Not into collecting random stuff or achievement hunting.
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Which is it?

You can easily do a serious chunk of what the game has to offer in 30-40. Maybe if you go for 100% it'll be longer. I skipped some of the super bosses, but I went around and cleared a good bit before ending it.

Also take note that in typical jrpg fashion you will be beyond beefcaked if you do all the optional shit before the end. Like stupid strong.

Honestly I kind of recommend just tackling the main story first because utterly stomping the ending kind of dilutes the experience
 
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socK said:
Which is it?

You can easily do a serious chunk of what the game has to offer in 30-40. Maybe if you go for 100% it'll be longer. I skipped some of the super bosses, but I went around and cleared a good bit before ending it.

Also take note that in typical jrpg fashion you will be beyond beefcaked if you do all the optional shit before the end. Like stupid strong.

Honestly I kind of recommend just tackling the main story first because utterly stomping the ending kind of dilutes the experience
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Is there a level scaling option? I'm assuming there isn't. Does more stuff unlock after the main story, or does all side content pop up before the ending? I usually try and do as much as possible before the ending, after I complete the main story my interest drops considerably. But don't want to be too over leveled or too weak either.
 
Flogger23m said:
Is there a level scaling option? I'm assuming there isn't. Does more stuff unlock after the main story, or does all side content pop up before the ending? I usually try and do as much as possible before the ending, after I complete the main story my interest drops considerably. But don't want to be too over leveled or too weak either.
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The game essentially fully opens up and about 30% of the content (including the ending zone) is unlocked in Act 3. You should probably try to be level 60-70 for the final boss, at 90+ i literally had to skip my turns in order to see the cool attacks that did barely 10% of my lifebar.
 
Flogger23m said:
How long is this game if you do all
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No one answer as there is a lot of post game content that is completely optional and probably should have been hidden from the player until he beats the game, as this is what causes the overleveling at end game, as you can access it before you complete the single player campaign. About 45 hours is enough to complete the main campaign, all character quests and most optional and quest side areas, (providing you ignore the optional post game content that becomes accessible in Act 3 - the recommendation is that once you hit Act 3 just do the character quests then head into the final level - then after beating the game you can optionally look at post game content)
 
Expeditioners,

Patch v1.4.0 is now LIVE!
We’re SUPER excited to bring you the Battle Retry option in this update, which has been one of our most requested QoL additions! We’re also thrilled to have added Frame Generation and Low Latency on compatible NVIDIA and Intel GPUs. We are still exploring support for FSR, but we need more time to work on it. Stay tuned for more updates on that in a future patch!
Take a look at the biggest changes in this update:
Performance & Visuals
  • DLSS & XeSS Enhancements: Added Frame Generation and Low Latency Mode support for both DLSS and XeSS (compatible GPUs only). Enjoy smoother gameplay and lower input lag!
Quality of Life Improvements
  • Battle Retry Prompt: A new pop-up window appears after defeat, giving you the option to quickly retry the battle.
  • Lumina Cost Display: The Pictos menu now clearly displays the Lumina cost of each ability for better planning.
  • Autoplay Dialogue: Added an optional autoplay feature for dialogues outside cutscenes. You can toggle it in the settings and during dialogues.
  • Separate Volume Sliders: Audio settings now lets you independently adjust the volume for exploration and combat phases.
Accessibility
  • Added icons to Lune’s Stains to improve readability and accessibility for colorblind players.
Combat
  • Lune's "Thermal Transfer" skill will no longer grant an extra turn without meeting the Stain consumption requirements
  • Characters will no longer gain immortality when using the Second Chance pictos combined with Healing Boon and Protecting Death
Misc:
  • Fixed the Rocher holding a crystal occasionally despawning after reentering the Stone Wave Cliffs
  • Fixed some players being teleported behind the Monolith upon loading a save
  • Fixed Gameplay modifiers being applied to a New Game save when enabled on other saves
  • Fixed landing as Esquie without the party spawning, leading to input loss
  • Fixed the Fog on Flying Manor covering the screen and blocking the view on Steam Deck
Achievements:
  • Fixed journals vanishing after loading a Save File that was created at the exact moment of picking up that journal
The following two trophies should now pop for you when you load your save if you were effected by these bugs:
  • Fixed "Expeditioner" and "Trailbreaker" achievements not unlocking if the characters reach a level higher than 33 or 66 after a battle
  • Fixed 'Connoisseur' and 'Follow The Trail' achievements not unlocking after collecting all required items on some savefiles
Environmental Polish
  • Various environmental bugfixes, tweaks and visual polish across multiple levels for a more immersive experience.
Thank you all for your continued support for Clair Obscur: Expedition 33! Of course, there is more to come in the future…
Until then,
Tomorrow comes!

~ The Expedition 33 Team
 
Finally picked the game up might be too deep for me but the Overwhelming Positive Reviews got me curious.
 
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It's ok I just find the game is loaded with Bloom and Audio senses to overload you giving off good vibes gameplay it's ok nothing I haven't seen before.
Dodge I can Manage but Parry seems pretty hard might have to level up but the enemy is suppose to hit you. I was playing at Story mode but found it too easy so I cranked it up a notch.
I skipped maybe a good 20 minutes of cut scene since I watched a stream a few months back. I saw they edited the part where the guy gets his head cut off found that part just bad.
 
Played a little more got to the 1st Major Boss which took me 3-4 tries finally dodged everything and parried a few times too. I like the game but it's just on Rail feels like it on Rail
Nothing graphically I haven't seen before in other games. Parry and Dodge is required so far which is kinda fun if you dodge or Parry.



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Kelp and Minesweeper



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Overview Map nice looking for just weird
 
This game is quite boring. It tries to come off as a turn based game but it is really just a QTE game. Your QTE dodges/parrying has more impact than any type of tactics which makes the whole thing so dull. The parrying/dodge windows are bad if not broken. Sometimes your character is not even on screen when you need to dodge/parry which makes no sense. How are you supposed to tell if they take the camera off your character? Even when on screen there is a bunch of particles flying around and the sound is a mess so you can't even tell what is an impact or not. Seems like a bunch of amateurs focused more on flashy graphics before having a concept for gameplay.

Story is... bad so far. Starts okay then it just drops for hours on end. With zero explanation for anything. Lots of copy paste environments and quests with bad dialogue and jittery conversations. Not seeing how people give this more than a 5/10.
 
Flogger23m said:
This game is quite boring. It tries to come off as a turn based game but it is really just a QTE game. Your QTE dodges/parrying has more impact than any type of tactics which makes the whole thing so dull. The parrying/dodge windows are bad if not broken. Sometimes your character is not even on screen when you need to dodge/parry which makes no sense. How are you supposed to tell if they take the camera off your character? Even when on screen there is a bunch of particles flying around and the sound is a mess so you can't even tell what is an impact or not. Seems like a bunch of amateurs focused more on flashy graphics before having a concept for gameplay.

Story is... bad so far. Starts okay then it just drops for hours on end. With zero explanation for anything. Lots of copy paste environments and quests with bad dialogue and jittery conversations. Not seeing how people give this more than a 5/10.
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i was enjoying it except for that damn qte part. ended up putting it down and havent gotten back to it yet...
 
Flogger23m said:
This game is quite boring. It tries to come off as a turn based game but it is really just a QTE game. Your QTE dodges/parrying has more impact than any type of tactics which makes the whole thing so dull. The parrying/dodge windows are bad if not broken. Sometimes your character is not even on screen when you need to dodge/parry which makes no sense. How are you supposed to tell if they take the camera off your character? Even when on screen there is a bunch of particles flying around and the sound is a mess so you can't even tell what is an impact or not. Seems like a bunch of amateurs focused more on flashy graphics before having a concept for gameplay.

Story is... bad so far. Starts okay then it just drops for hours on end. With zero explanation for anything. Lots of copy paste environments and quests with bad dialogue and jittery conversations. Not seeing how people give this more than a 5/10.
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The dodge/parry QTE thing is just awful. Another victim of the "everything has to be Dark Souls" era we find ourselves in. Like most games with "parrying" forced into them, it would have been much better without it.

I do disagree with your flashy graphics comment though. I thought the graphics were mediocre at best, and the game ran like dog shit on top of it. Although for a small AA studio using UE5, I guess that's not surprising.

I called it an 8/10 after finishing it, but I think I was bought into the hype. If I played this a couple years from now, a 5/10 would probably be very generous.
 
CaptainClueless said:
I do disagree with your flashy graphics comment though. I thought the graphics were mediocre at best, and the game ran like dog shit on top of it.
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I mean there is too much crap flying across the screen. Lots of splashing stuff which makes it hard to tell what is going on. Sometimes the QTE damage prompts get lost in them. Like this dodge/parry prompt screen (no characters in sight):

Clair Obscur Expedition 33 Screenshot 2025.09.13 - 13.39.29.73.png


And this ugly UI overlapping which makes it harder to read what is being replaced:

Clair Obscur Expedition 33 Screenshot 2025.09.13 - 23.37.31.79.png
Clair Obscur Expedition 33 Screenshot 2025.09.13 - 23.30.28.59.png


And the cutscenes, even with the FPS fix, looks blurry and awful.
 
Flogger23m said:
I mean there is too much crap flying across the screen. Lots of splashing stuff which makes it hard to tell what is going on. Sometimes the QTE damage prompts get lost in them. Like this dodge/parry prompt screen (no characters in sight):



And this ugly UI overlapping which makes it harder to read what is being replaced:



And the cutscenes, even with the FPS fix, looks blurry and awful.
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100% agree. I interpreted "flashy" to mean "good". The Picto selection UI is especially bad.
 
The more I play it the worse it becomes. I'm not sure if intentional but often they will call out a character to dodge, but the actual character you need to dodge with is someone else. Example, someone will say something like "watch out Gustave" and instead the character being attacked is Lune. Which makes it even more complicated because you're now trying to time it for someone else. I'd like to think it is a bug, but it happens so frequently. I guess the audio cues aren't supposed audio cues. You'd think they would have come across that in alpha/beta testing.

So far, this game feels like a 4/10. Not sure if I will bother continuing with it. Amazing how gamers often applaud slop like this.
 
Flogger23m said:
The more I play it the worse it becomes. I'm not sure if intentional but often they will call out a character to dodge, but the actual character you need to dodge with is someone else. Example, someone will say something like "watch out Gustave" and instead the character being attacked is Lune. Which makes it even more complicated because you're now trying to time it for someone else. I'd like to think it is a bug, but it happens so frequently. I guess the audio cues aren't supposed audio cues. You'd think they would have come across that in alpha/beta testing.

So far, this game feels like a 4/10. Not sure if I will bother continuing with it. Amazing how gamers often applaud slop like this.
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I couldn’t get into it either. Half the language I don’t even understand. Pictos and some other shit. Paintress wtf. I don’t know. I want to play it but have too many games and it will leave game pass before I get to it.
 
Flogger23m said:
So far, this game feels like a 4/10. Not sure if I will bother continuing with it. Amazing how gamers often applaud slop like this.
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everyone doesn't like the same games...some games are highly regarded but that doesn't mean that everyone will like them...Claire Obscur gets almost universal praise from the majority of people playing it...doesn't mean that you have to like it but to group all 'gamers' that like it together and imply that they are wrong is silly

I don't like turn-based games but that doesn't mean I'm going to say Clair Obscur sucks...it's just not for me but I can still appreciate the accolades it has received
 
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I avoid turn based games until people start saying that the story is excellent, then I succumb. Good story and atmosphere are enough to make me enjoy a game despite undesirable mechanics. I guess after a while I just get numb to the turn based gameplay then the rest of the game carries me forward.

I just started playing this.
 
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