Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Was Born Out of Boredom at Ubisoft, Says Game Director

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has become one of 2025’s breakout hits, and the excitement hasn’t let up even a week and a half after launch — just yesterday, the game hit a new record on Steam with 145,000 concurrent players.

Amid the buzz, Guillaume Broche — former Ubisoft developer and head of Sandfall Interactive — sat down with the BBC to discuss the game’s development. Broche revealed that the idea for Expedition 33 was sparked by sheer boredom at his previous job. Feeling creatively unfulfilled, he began dreaming of building something of his own.

The project’s launch, he admits, was also a stroke of luck. The first team members were recruited through unconventional channels like Reddit and online forums. That’s how Broche discovered Jennifer Svedberg-Yen, who started as a voice actor and eventually became the game’s lead writer.

The composer, Lorien Testard, joined in a similar way — her work was discovered on SoundCloud. With funding from Kepler Interactive, the studio later brought on major talent, including Charlie Cox and Andy Serkis.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is available on PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PS5, and is also included with Game Pass.