Clair Obscur: Expedition 33takes alotof inspiration fromFinal Fantasy,so much so that it’s a spiritual successor to the 10th installment in some ways. It even decided to throw in terrible minigames as delightful distractions from the main narrative that offer distinct rewards off the beaten path.
Square Enix’s flagship series has a long history of incorporating minigames in each entry, like Final Fantasy 7’s myriad Gold Saucer activities, Triple Triad and Tetra Master in 7 and 9 or the god-awful travesty that isBlitzballin 10. None of them look good, control well, or are fun when you play them in isolation, but there is something admirable about turn-based RPGS taking a stab at something so different. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is no exception.
General movement and exploration in Clair Obscur is exactly what you’d expect. You control characters in the field from a tight third-person perspective with the ability to jump around or over obstacles that come your way. There is also the option to sprint, which comes in handy when you need to avoid random combat encounters. It’s easy to simply leg it when a scuffle starts looking hairy. It does the job while feeling deliberately reminiscent of the RPG classics it takes considerable inspiration from. Most dungeons or locations are a linear path with just a few distractions peppered throughout, and whether you seek them out is up to you.
My hot tip for the game’s platforming sections is to useMaelle. She’s the smallest member of the party and as a consequence doesn’t take up as much space or require as much precision when it comes to platforming.
But I’m not here to intricately break down the ins-and-outs of movement, I want to talk about the platforming challenges found on Gestral Beaches across the overworld that transform this emotional classic into an Only Up clone. It is utterly bizarre and absolutely brilliant, and even if these sections control like ass and make you scream out in frustration, there is something I can’t help but love about them.
Things start off simple as you’re asked to navigate a number of floating objects strewn along a body of water, including a bunch of incredibly thin spinning logs designed to disorient your sense of speed. How you need to move and position yourself even at the easiest level is so specific, and failing to take your momentum into account even once will send you right back to the beginning. Muscle memory soon kicks in though, and it won’t be long until you are so close to the finish line you can smell it. Your reward for making it: a cute, old-timey swimsuit.
Clair Obscur’s Swimsuit Costumes Are Well Worth The Platforming Hardship
Later on in the campaign you’ll come across a platforming gauntlet that took me 15 minutes to conquer, and that was after failing countless times to reach the summit as I plummeted to the bottom again and again and again. It waspainful,so much so that I even passed the pad to a few friends to see if anyone else could crack it. We could have come back at a later date and tackled it when the continent wasn’t in mortal peril, but I’m a stubborn gal and needed to earn the Monoco swimsuit that awaited at the top. The key was patience, so I accepted each failure with gritted teeth and tried again and again and again.
Another minigame on the Gestral beach has you standing on a wooden platform as you try to deflect explosive objects thrown at you. Controls for this once are even worse.
Like speedrun levels in Astro Bot though, there is a light at the end of the tunnel you can’t help but chase. I found myself tilting the camera upwards to see exactly how long I had left and if the precarious obstacles that awaited would prove too much.
Sometimes they almost did, since the sheer accuracy required on certain jumps, sprints, and clambers is ridiculous. Move forward at the wrong angle and it’s not uncommon for your avatar to tumble to oblivion of their own volition. Like I said before, it sucks, but man, I couldn’t get enough of it.
