Expedition 33 Wins Indie Awards at TGA, Though the Team Wanted to Give Them to Other Studios
The remarkable Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 won nine awards at The Game Awards 2025, including "Best Indie Game" and "Best Debut Indie Game," but the project's creative director, Guillaume Broche, admitted that the team initially wanted smaller studios to win.
In an interview with Edge before the ceremony, Broche discussed the game's strange position in the indie category: "In terms of budget, we belong more to the triple-I bracket," he noted. "It's weird because we have 3D graphics, which doesn't quite fit the typical indie game image."
Sandfall Interactive lead programmer Tom Guillermin added that the project indeed started as indie:
It all began with a small team, with the same concept and ideas that we eventually implemented. Now the project has grown, and it's hard to draw a clear line between 'indie' and what we are now.
Broche also candidly admitted: "We'll see what happens, but we’d prefer this category's win to go to a smaller studio. I feel like we don't really need it, although the recognition is certainly nice."
Despite this, Clair Obscur surpassed competitors such as Blue Prince, Absolum, BALL x PIT, and even well-known contenders for "Game of the Year" like Hades II, Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, and Hollow Knight: Silksong.