5/5 ★ – DWAG's review of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

(Spoiler free). 10/10 story. 10/10 characters. 10/10 combat. 10/10 soundtrack. This game has a completely different feel to the classic fantasy setting where in this case there are heavy themes of loss, struggle and grief. The story is a lot darker and more mature than what is expected of this type of game and this grit and real world struggles that the characters face help connect the player to that character in a way that I have not felt since final fantasy VII and red dead redemption 2. The combat is super flashy and extremely easy to understand however it can be quite difficult especially if you are not levelled appropriately. The damage scales really fast with lots of Pictos and Luminas that you can equip that act as perks and I even managed to one shot the final boss with little preparation. I absolutely hate turn based combat but this exceedingly interactive system provides the necessary skill in parrying, dodging and jumping attacks which in the middle to end game ramps up significantly with enemies being tougher. The ways of mitigating damage and the quick time events make the combat super engaging and I went from hating turn based combat to wanting to fight everything in clair Obscur: expedition 33. The characters are super well written and all have these tragic backstory’s which can be discovered at the camp when leveling relationships. The main positive is that these characters are flawed and have each of their own problems which is necessary in good character writing and that is what makes characters like the main character of expedition 33, Gustave exceedingly amazing. On top of that the cast for this game is absolutely exceptional and Ben Starr once again showed his Hollywood level acting skills. The story follows gustave and the expedition who intend to kill the paintress because every year she writes a number on a massive monolith and everybody of that age disappears/ Gommage. This story, in true JRPG fashion is extremely well written and the direction that the ending takes is very well done. Furthermore, I think this may honestly be one of the best soundtracks ever. So many of these tracks are extremely memorable and the range between classical opera to show mystery, to deep, heavy piano and cello that symbolises loss and even to the happy upbeat techno, metal and jazz elements. To summarise: Get this game, there is a reason why the reviews are so good.