Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 – A Detailed Breakdown of its Painterly RPG Combat

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was revealed for the first time at Xbox Games Showcase, and wowed an unsuspecting audience with its mix of stunning visuals and RPG combat, set within a truly unique fantasy world inspired by the French Belle Époque. It’s all the more impressive for being the debut game from Sandfall Interactive, telling the story of a world in which the ominous Paintress regularly condemns everyone of a set age to death – and the group of adventurers who set out to put an end to the cycle.

That reveal was a tease for what’s to come – and in a walkthrough at gamescom 2024, I got a far more in-depth look at the game. Watching a party helmed by Gustave, a character we met in the reveal trailer, I saw two areas from the game: a fantastical underwater realm called Flying Waters (with gorgeous, shifting lighting and enormous coral reefs) and a glimpse of Ancient Sanctuary, covered in blood red vegetation and dotted with imposing structures on the horizon.

But perhaps the most detailed part of the walkthrough focused on combat, a mixture of classic turn-based systems accented with real-time inputs. Clearly inspired by the Persona series, and with flashes of recent Final Fantasy titles, it’s immediately striking in how it turns what could be familiar, simplistic systems into something deeply stylish and gratifyingly reactive.

Here’s a rundown of how it all works:

Exploration and Pre-Battle

Areas in Expedition 33 are freely explorable – you control a single character (it’s your choice who from your party that will be) as they navigate locations, finding treasures, secrets, and points of interest. Enemies roam these areas, and interacting with them kicks off an instance of battle – but you have the opportunity to strike them before they strike you, offering a turn advantage as the battle begins.

Your Turn

When in a battle, you and your enemies’ turn order is displayed prominently at all times, allowing you to prepare for battle accordingly. When one of your characters’ turns arrives, you’ll be presented with a slick menu, offering the ability to attack, use items, use skills, or enter a free-aim mode (more on that below).

Your skills are the key point of difference between characters, offering special physical attacks, elemental abilities, stat buffs and debuffs, and more. Key to all your skills is timing – each attack comes with an onscreen prompt, asking you to hit a button at the correct time to make the skill more powerful or add additional beneficial effects.

Each character also has a wholly unique ability that changes how they play. Gustave has a mechanical arm that is charged by other abilities, and does huge damage when unleashed. Lune can create “elemental stains” that are created by casting spells and can be consumed to unleash extra effects, while Maelle can seemingly take up different swordfighting stances to allow for a range of different abilities and stat changes.

Free-Aim Abilities

As mentioned above, you can start your turn with a free-aim ability that acts slightly differently to other options. Your character will use a pistol or magic, and you physically aim them at your enemies, adding extra damage. This can come with some added benefits – in the example I saw, an enemy called a Demineur was attached to a floating sea mine, which could be shot and detonated with Gustave’s gun. This dealt damage to all the enemies, rather than just one, and made the evasive Demineur vulnerable to follow-up physical strikes.

Enemy Turns

You can’t take your eye off the ball during enemy turns, either. Expedition 33 has a neat risk-reward system for enemy attacks – many attacks can be dodged or parried with well-timed button presses, but which you choose can determine how well you succeed. A successful dodge has a longer input window, and will negate all damage you receive. Parries, however, are harder to pull off – but manage them successfully and you can perform massive counterattacks as well as avoiding the damage. Neither is designed to be easy to pull off, but there’s a clear indication about how you should prioritize which to use during tougher bouts.

Boss Battles

I only saw sections of a single boss battle – against a gigantic monster called Goblu – but it’s clear that Expedition 33 will add more to think about in its signature fights. Goblu can attack all your party members at once, making dodges and parries more important than ever – and of course comes with an enormous health bar that means your choices are more important than ever.

Post-Battle

While I only saw a glimpse of its skill trees, Expedition 33’s battles end with the loot and XP rewards you’d expect – as well as more in-depth stats like the highest damage you did, the number of successful parries and dodges, and more. You can even get a bonus for taking no damage at all within a fight, teasing the possibility of doing a challenging no-hit run of the game for die-hard players. How all of this ties into your party’s progression is still a mystery, and I look forward to seeing more.

Even in a short look at the game’s combat, it’s clear that Expedition 33’s combat is as flashy and in-depth as you’d hope for from that first look – and a tease of the areas and enemies we’re still yet to see promises that there’s so much more to find out.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 comes to Xbox Series X|S in 2025, and you’ll be able to play on day one with Game Pass.