Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 could set a trend for affordable games — developers urge support for $40 projects

Amid the expected price increase of AAA games to $100, the developers of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and publisher Kepler Interactive are urging players to pay attention to more affordable, but high-quality projects. This is reported by Videogamer.

Kepler Interactive CEO Matthew Handrahan noted that the rising prices of big games create opportunities for smaller teams. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was released at a price of $50 — below the standard price for premium projects — and at the same time offered high quality and a meaningful story without unnecessary content.

"I think as that AAA price goes up, I think it creates more of an opportunity to be launching games – more sensibly scoped games – [and] pricing them at that $40–50 range. And I don’t think anyone that played Expedition 33 would think they didn’t get their money’s worth out of that," Handrahan commented.

However, studio co-founder François Maurice admitted that the team faced mistrust: some players perceived the low price as a sign of a short or low-quality game. Despite this, the studio has not changed its approach and now hopes that the success of Expedition 33 will help change the perception of such projects.

Meanwhile, publishers expect that Grand Theft Auto 6 could set a new price point of $100. In this context, examples like Expedition 33 and Baldur's Gate 3 look like an alternative that big companies are not yet ready to follow.

As a reminder, French studio Sandfall Interactive recently shared that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has sold 3.3 million copies. It took the game just 33 days to do this. Just three days after its release, sales exceeded one million copies, despite the fact that the game was available on Game Pass from day one. The studio was even congratulated by French President Emmanuel Macron on the occasion of its success.