Expedition 33’s Player Count Has Beaten Every Final Fantasy, Persona, And Dragon Quest Game

Summary

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 had 121,422 players, a rare achievement on Steam.
This is a minor miracle, as only 0.0016% of games on Steam have reached the 100,000-player mark.
No JRPG has surpassed 100,000 players on Steam, meaning Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has surpassed its predecessors.

There are a lot of games on Steam—over 107,000 in fact—so it’s becoming increasingly challenging for them to find the spotlight on the Valve-owned platform. Many of those that do reach the masses aren’t those that are developed by a team of 33 people, much like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was. Sure, there are some breakout hits, like this year’s Schedule 1, but you’ll often find smaller developers bemoaning how hard it is.

Gustave reaching out to catch a pettle in front of maelle in clair obscur.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Player Gets Rare Item For Interrupting Couples’ Intimate Last Moments

“You’ve been listening for too long now! It made things more exciting at first.”

Despite the hype it has received, it would have been easy for Clair Obscur to become another casualty of Steam’s brutal algorithms, especially given the fact that it launched during the same week as the surprise-not-actually-a-surprise The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remaster. But, in fact, it’s done quite the opposite, breaking through the 100,000 concurrent player mark on the platform, something which many other RPG behemoths have never managed to achieve.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Has Had A Truly Staggering Launch

Gustave looking at a very large white bourgeon in Clair Obscur Expedition 33.

On Sunday, April 27, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was being played by 121,422 players at the same time, according to SteamDB. This is the 137th-highest peak ever achieved on Steam.

Over Steam’s almost 20-year existence, only 177 other games have managed to achieve this feat. This means Clair Obscur is part of a very exclusive club featuring only 0.0016 percent of the games on the platform. Given that it’s a brand-new IP that simultaneously launched on Xbox Game Pass, and was developed by such a small team, it’s a minor miracle.

The scale of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s accomplishment can probably best be illustrated by the fact that not a single JRPG has broken the 100,000 mark on Steam.

Final Fantasy, with its storied history, has only ever come close when XIV Online hit 95,150 three years ago, and its best single-player offering, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, managed 40,564.

The highest Persona has ever reached is 45,002 with Persona 3 Reload, and Dragon Quest is similar, with Dragon Quest 3: HD-2D Remake hitting 45,357 last year. Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengance managed just shy of 22,000 players, and Tales of Arise perhaps gave the best showing, with an all-time peak of 60,274.

You have to give it to the Sandfall Interactive for mixing up the formula; Clair Obscur has already earned its position as an all-time great.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Released: April 24, 2025
ESRB: Mature 17+ // Blood and Gore, Strong Language, Suggestive Themes, Violence
Developer(s): Sandfall Interactive
Publisher(s): Kepler Interactive
Engine: Unreal Engine 5