Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Review (Xbox Series X|S)

I'm coming in a little bit late on this review because Bethesda decided to drop good old Oblivion in a fancy new outfit right before embargo, so forgive me!

However, and continuing with the Bethesda link as a lazy-ish way to kickstart this review, it's lucky for the masters at Sandfall Interactive that their brand-new action-RPG is so absolutely incredible, as otherwise they'd really have been totally done in by Bethesda's announcement timings. Were Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 not such an awe-inspiring feat, it'd surely be totally lost to the late-April release mix almost immediately.

Having played through it now, though, I reckon we'll all be singing this one's praises long after the excitement of a fancy-pants return to Cyrodill has died down. Because what Sandfall has produced here, is undoubtedly one of the most stylish, all-encompassing and richly evocative games I've played in ages.

Telling the tale of a bedraggled band of misfits led by a Robert Pattinson lookalike, who set out to destroy a malevolent entity known as The Paintress, Clair Oscur: Expedition 33 revels in a dirty, gritty style that leans into a sort of quiet realism during cutscenes and conversations. It grounds you in its world by surrounding you with characters who are wonderfully normal, scared and full of emotion, and then it does horrible video game things to them, for maximum effect.

It feels both sumptuous in its wonderful Japanese take on flamboyant Belle-Epoque stylings and, at the very same time, stripped back like a lean, mean, Final Fantasy machine. If that makes any sense. It does all the good stuff from those games, and the likes of Persona. It gives you the cool locations, the memorable party members, the excellent (and very flashy) turn-based combat and exploration within spaces that control the flow of the action - all mixed with the odd chance to "wile out" (still down with the kids) in more open areas.

In terms of the story, I'm not going to ruin anything about this one but, I reckon, the fact that it's been brought to life by a small indie team, even though it looks and sounds like some great big AAA effort, has worked out well for the narrative aspects of this tale. This is a game that has focused, due to this small team, we're sure, on what they could realistically do well, on making sure its world is brought to life in the ways that count the most. And so the small stuff, that often gets overlooked, is on-point.

Writing is uniformly excellent, the characters are a delight, and it's a world you'll 100% want to explore as you go, picking up lore and getting to know more about its history and situation in interesting ways. So even without the excellent combat, which I'll get to, and without any spoilers whatsoever, this is a narrative journey that digs its hooks into you from the very first ultra-stylish cutscene. It continues to beguile throughout, and it gives you a world full of majesty and weirdness, beauty and terror to breathe in. We promise you'll gasp at a certain "underwater" bit.

Oh, and speaking of cutscenes, the style here really does remind me of that Tom Cruise movie "Edge of Tomorrow", in how it's so fantastical but gritty and realistic at the same time, if you catch my meaning. There are outfits and other aspects here that also remind me of that movie, but maybe that's for another day. I don't want you falling asleep.

Onto the combat, then, and it's absolutely gripping from the get-go, both in terms of its mechanics and in how it puts up a challenge right from the start. Yes, the freakish roster of bosses will test you from the off, not in a soulslike way, no, but in a "have you learned all the controls properly yet?" way, which is fine. It's nice to feel tested, and it keeps you involved in learning what is a very slick battle system.

Indeed, the real star here, apart from the all the other good stuff I've mentioned thus far, is the fighting. Clair Obscur: Expedition pushes way out in front of so many other games of this style, because it seeks to excite at every opportunity. You take turns in a queue, and charge up "stains" and AP points in order to unleash varying degrees of elemental and weapons-based damage on foes which, yes, is all fairly standard. But it's in the extras, the little flourishes that you can make in attacks, and the twitchy, real-time defending you'll need to do against a host of excellent enemy designs that really bring this whole thing to life.

Getting to know the rhythms of enemy attacks, or when to jump over a sweeping tentacle (and then tap RT very quickly for a mid-air riposte), these things just make engagements far more fun. You need to consider a ton of other stuff too, with each character rocking various elemental boons and ways to help the team - again, standard for the genre - but here it's all so slick, it all makes sense, the combos stack in ways I understand and want to engage with. I love it. It's the sort of combat you can just idly do forever without being annoyed. Know that way? But it's also show-stoppingly exciting a lot of the time if you are sat up and being engaged, too.

In its weapons and "pictos" the game is cleverly designed, as well. Pictos can be found throughout the world as you explore, and given as a reward at times, and these can be equipped in bunches to your party members to give them all-new attacks and spells to work with. Pictos have a lot of flexibility in how they can be set up and swapped about, so there's a ton going on, lots of moving parts and things to fix and get exactly the way you like it. Weapons are kept engaging by having boons and stats tied to them, so you'll want to think ahead and choose your loadout and pictos carefully to max your effectiveness. For those of you, like me, who simply must have the best party setup going, there's a lot of time to be sunk into this lovely stuff right here.

I've also got to mention the gorgeous world map. The world of Clair Obscur is set up in separate instances, big locations that you travel to by using this world map, which is a zoomed-out little toy-model-esque affair, it reminds me of Ni No Kuni, in how you wander around this lush map on your way to the next main location, and you can fight and explore, find pictos and all-sorts. It's also just a nice way to mix things up after a big scrap, and it looks great. So there.

And so, onto the bad bits. There aren't many! I hate the Mimes, that's the first thing I want to say. There are creepy Mime guys, who wear sunglasses, and they pop up out of scenery and fight you. Get rid of them, you're creeping me out. Beyond this horror, and more seriously, the characters in your party, although I have grown to love them, and I fancy Ben Starr as well, but they aren't as grandiose, I guess, as those found in Persona, or Final Fantasy. They aren't quite up to the same memorable standards. It's also a bit cloying at times, a little melodramatic, especially early on as you get to know the protagonist.

Oh, and before I forget, performance - in performance mode - has been fine for me. It's not perfect 100% of the time, to be clear, and there are the odd drops here and there, but it's nothing to worry about, it's not going to interfere with your fun.

Overall then, and considering this is a debut from an indie studio...it's hard not to go with a 10/10 score, really, and so with a perfect score I must thusly go.