After a pretty successful night at The Game Awards, which included nearly every category it was nominated for along with the top prize, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 developer Sandfall Games took to the stage to announce that its big Thank You update is now live, adding a brand new level to the game called Verso's Drafts. It's a huge new area inspired by Versa's childhood and houses new bosses, weapons and outfits.
It also contains some cheeky little references to other JRPGs that undoubtedly shaped Expedition 33 into the game it is today. As Sandfall showed last night on stage at The Game Awards, a game wouldn't exist without inspirations like Final Fantasy, and Sandfall decided to use Verso's Drafts to pay homage to a few of its favorites.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's New Update References FF14, Persona and more
First shared by a Twitter user named Bainonis, one particular fight can't seem to help but make a cute little reference to other fairly famous JRPGs, and they come in the form of mid-fight taunts. As you can see in the video Bainonis shared, one of them is “you'll never see it,” which Persona 5 fans should instantly recognize as the game's iconic Last Surprise battle theme.
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There are several other battle taunts like this, another being “test your reflexes”. It's probably not immediately obvious to the average JRPG fan, but Final Fantasy 14 fans should laugh at it, as it's a very familiar quote from the game's fight with the overly dramatic, blonde villain Zenos yae Galvus in Endwalker (or Zenos viator Galvus, if you want to be really picky).
After already giving Sega and Square Enix some love, Clair Obscur is moving on to Nintendo, as the last line Bainonis shares is “I really feel it,” a very obvious reference to Xenoblade protagonist Shulk. Heck, even Super Smash Bros. fans. should be familiar with this particular line that Shulk brought with him to his Super Smash Bros. reveal.
Of course, these are just goofy little lines in one particular fight, but it's nice to see Sandfall acknowledge a few of the games that inspired Expedition 33. It's really evident that the modern Persona helped shape the gameplay and UI, while we've already seen a lot of Xenoblade references in the main game. It's just one JRPG masterpiece paying homage to several other JRPG masterpieces, which I think is pretty neat. At least it's better than the Shrek reference.
- Released
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April 24, 2025
- ESRB
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Older 17+ / Blood and gore, violent language, obscene themes, violence
- Developers
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Sandfall Interactive
- Publishers
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Interactive Kepler
