Despite the limited presence of first-party blockbusters so far, 2025 has already produced several hits. Smaller titles like Split Fiction and Blue Prince have joined larger games like Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 and Monster Hunter Wilds in the running for various people’s Game of the Year, and they aren’t even the likeliest overall winners anymore. French developer Sandfall Interactive blindsided many with its April release of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and with 3 million sales in 33 days, it’s clearly had an impact. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is a serious GOTY contender, and that’s not just based on ambient chatter. However, it’s not uncontested.
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Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is Already Flipping the Script for RPGs
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s success might have made it one of a few indie hits to set a new bar for the industry, with AAA studios already impacted.
Record-breaking accolades and excellent performance for an indie game line Clair Obscur‘s short history, as evidenced by a 9.7 user score on Metacritic and the site’s highest 2025 critic score of 93 before Tears of the Kingdom’s Switch 2 port rose three points higher. That 9.7 was also based on over 17,200 reviews, granting Clair Obscur one of the highest user review scores on the website. Other sources reflected this praise, making it easy to call Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Game of the Year 2025 already, but a recent release has proven that the narrative isn’t set in stone yet.
Death Stranding 2 Just Stole One Of Clair Obscur’s Achievements
Clair Obscur Finally Has Real Competition For 2025’s Most Popular Game
Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding 2: On The Beach launched at the end of June 2025, and both critics and fans alike have been enamored with it. Its critical score on Metacritic averaged out at a 90, three points lower than Expedition 33’s, but DS2’s true victory lies in an unexpected place. Death Stranding 2 has a 4.93 rating on the PlayStation Store, derived from 97% of user ratings giving the sequel five out of five stars, immediately becoming the highest-rated title ever hosted on the platform. And sure enough, the game DS2 replaced with the former high score of a 4.91 rating is none other than Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.
Obviously, there is a wide range of circumstances dividing these games and justifying their respective scores, with the most notable possibly being that Death Stranding 2 is a sequel to a highly polarizing game, and most people buying it will know that and appreciate its improvements over Death Stranding 1 deeply. Death Stranding 2 is also a PlayStation 5 exclusive, being published and funded by Sony while benefiting from a significant marketing budget and frequent trailers, while Clair Obscur was a multiplatform title with less, but still significant, marketing from Xbox. Still, DS2 surpassing Clair Obscur on even a line console has wider-reaching implications than rankings or sales.
Game of the Year Deliberations Around Clair Obscur And Death Stranding 2 Are Getting Complicated
Death Stranding 2 proves that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is not the slam-dunk Game of the Year winner that many people thought it would be. Its chances of performing well in 2025’s end-of-year award show season are still high, and being a passion-driven game made by a smaller team would follow the trend of prior Game Awards GOTY winners Baldur’s Gate 3 and Astro Bot. However, Death Stranding 2 has suddenly joined it as a fellow award contender, and it likely won’t be the last game to do so.
Clair Obscur Has More GOTY 2025 Contenders To Deal With
Acclaimed titles like Monster Hunter Wilds, Split Fiction, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, and Blue Prince already dot 2025, and even if they haven’t sparked the same fervor as Clair Obscur and Death Stranding 2, they’re still contenders. Donkey Kong Bananza, The Outer Wilds 2, and Ghost of Yotei are all upcoming major GOTY contenders, and indies like Hollow Knight: Silksong and Hades 2’s full launch could rival them if they make their 2025 windows. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 isn’t a guaranteed award-winner anymore, but that’s far from a problem for fans in this industry.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Released
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April 24, 2025
- ESRB
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Mature 17+ // Blood and Gore, Strong Language, Suggestive Themes, Violence
- Developer(s)
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Sandfall Interactive
- Publisher(s)
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Kepler Interactive
- Engine
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Unreal Engine 5